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Textual and Narrative Space in Professional Dramas in Early Modern England

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Textual and Narrative Space in Professional Dramas in Early Modern England by Te-Han Yeh A thesis submitted to The University of Birmingham For the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY The Shakespeare Institute Department of English The University of Birmingham September 2011 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. Abstract This thesis aims to examine the varied notions of space in early modern play-texts as well as to challenge the assumed text-space relationship that has been the foundation of various scholarly approaches towards early modern theatrical practice, including a Shakespeare-centred historiography and theatre reconstruction carried out by scholars such as Andrew Gurr and Richard Hosley and contemporary editorial practices that appear to reconstruct early modern performances scenographically through annotations and editorial interventions. In order to depart from such Shakespeare-centred and London-biased architectural determinism, the thesis will adopt a repertory approach to the Queen’s Men, a methodology that emphasises the materiality of the play books and an author-function approach to the plays associated with Robert Greene in order to explore the alternatives to a conventional architectural and scenographic theatre reconstruction based primarily on the literary analysis of play-texts. In addition to challenging the assumption of an interchangeable relationship between play-texts, performance and space, this thesis aims to demonstrate how the concept of space within a play-text will be ultimately an issue of dramaturgy, determined and defined by the diverse dramatic forces in this period and the idiosyncratic styles of their narrative. Acknowledgement This thesis has benefited tremendously from the guidance of my supervisor Kate McLuskie whose generosity in sharing ideas and academic input help the project take shape. Most of all, I am incredibly grateful for my family and my husband who have shown the greatest support. Without their help, this project would not have been possible. Contents Introduction 1 The Notion of Space 3 The Stage-Centred Approach and Text-based Historiography 7 in the Study of Early Modern Theatre Space in Typography: the Role of Printers 20 Space of Reading: Reconsidering Weimann’s Locus and Platea 22 Chapter One A History of History: Contemporary Historiographical Approaches to Early Modern Theatrical Space 27 The Historiography of Early Modern Theatre History 27 Stage Directions and Theatrical Space in Early Modern Printed Texts: An Architectural Reconstruction 37 Chapter Two Locus, Personnel and Texts 48 Part 1 Theatre Reconstruction through Play-texts Texts, Performance and Editorial Intervention: a Scenographic Reconstruction 49 Text, Stage and 2 Henry VI 55 – On Entrances and Exits 58 – Bed, Curtains and Theatricality 64 Textual Authority and Monarchical Authority 68 Part 2 Theatre Reconstruction without Plays: Reading REED 77 Chapter Three The Queen’s Men and their Spatial Practice: a Repertory Approach 96 The Queen’s Men’s Repertory and the Issue of Provenance 97 Stage Directions and Architectural Reconstruction: Texts and Venues 104 Promptbook, Play-text, and Early Modern Performance 112 Props, Space and Spectacles 115 Spectacles and Spatial Allegory 120 – Fire and Flame 121 – Lightning as Fire 123 – Historical Account on the Effect of Fire 124 – Spectacles and Speaking Heads 126 Allegorical Spatial Practice 130 Chapter Four Space in Typography: Theatrical Title Pages, Woodcuts and the Case of Thomas Creede 137 Theatrical Space and Theatrical Title Pages: Printers’ and Publishers’ Role 140 Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay and the 1630 Woodcut 148 Thomas Creede and his Theatrical Output 157 Thomas Creede’s Theatrical Title Pages 159 A Note on the Textural Variants in Creede’s Play Books 164 A Looking Glass for London and England: 166 a Typographical and Narrative Space Chapter Five Space of Narrative and the Transgression of Spatial Practices 186 The Interplay between the Mimetic and Diegetic Space in Early Modern Plays 187 Locus and Platea Reconsidered 200 Robert Greene and the Transgression of Narrative Space 208 Conclusion 231 Appendix A: Property Bills 233 Appendix B: A List of Plays Printed by Thomas Creede 240 Bibliography Early Editions of Plays 245 Modern and Critical Editions of Plays 250 Other Early Modern Printed Materials 252 Supporting Materials 253 Abbreviations DEEP Database of Early English Playbooks DNB Oxford Dictionary of National Biography ESTC English Short Title Catalogue OED Oxford English Dictionary REED Records of Early English Drama SQM Shakespeare and the Queen’s Men Project Introduction The purpose of this thesis is to explore the relationship between early modern drama and space by examining the varieties of space and spatial practices that have been reconstructed or are yet to be identified with the help of early modern play-texts and play books. I will look into the reasons why a large number of scholarly approaches to theatre reconstruction tend to be closely associated with the literary analysis of play-texts, and examine the degree to which these methodologies are problematised by their shared assumption of a generic model of the early modern space – retrievable from an abstracted model of an Elizabethan playhouse by decoding the physical elements in early printed play-texts and revolving primarily around Shakespeare and his playing company. I will also examine alternative approaches to such kinds of spatial reconstructions which remove the emphasis on the literary analysis of a dramatic text and see the extent to which the results and underlying assumptions of these diverse disciplines vary from or remain akin to one another. The methodologies that will be examined to look at early modern spatial practice include: (a) A London-centred and author-based methodology such as the historiography of the early modern theatre carried out by Andrew Gurr, Richard Hosley and Glynn Wickham; (b) The editorial practice on early modern play-texts by scholars such as W. W. Greg, R. B. McKerrow and Stanley Wells. By examining the above methodologies, I hope to demonstrate how their approaches are problematised by their underlying assumption of an interchangeable relationship between play-text and space as well as a shared theatre model based mainly on the repertoire of Shakespeare and his company. In addition, I will also employ the 1 following approaches in order to look at the alternatives to a London-centred and Shakespeare-oriented model. These include: (a) Practices such as the REED (Record of Early English Drama) project, which investigates playing spaces in early modern England outside London and marks a departure from a Shakespeare-centred and play-text based methodology on the history of early modern theatre. (b) A repertory approach conducted by scholars such as McMillin and MacLean in The Queen’s Men and their Plays as well as Lucy Munro whose Children of the Queen’s Revels also has a new emphasis on playing companies instead of playwrights, (c) An approach that focus on para-textual materials and mise-en-page of the early modern play books and examine the extent to which theatre and performance is imagined and shaped by the printers and publishers of the books – a scholarly approach that can be observed in the works of Zachary Lesser, Tiffany Stern and Maureen Bell etc., (d) Finally, an author-function and author-centred approach to look at the extent to which the diverse and varied dramatic forces in early modern England could create different styles of spatial practices through their idiosyncratic choices of dramaturgy. My intention is to cover the full range of traditional and recent critical practices and resources in order to examine the underlying problems and feasibility of the conventional theatre model based on the works of Hosley and Gurr and to see the degree to which the materiality of a play book as well as the model of a playing business based on the accounts of REED could help us to understand the concept of space and spatial practice of this period. Eventually, I will go back to an author-centred approach on Robert Greene and demonstrate how his idiosyncratic choice of dramaturgy exhibits a unique style of spatial division that is distinctive from Shakespeare’s model. Before I go on to examine and attempt to demystify the 2 relationship between play-texts and theatrical space with the above methodologies, it is important to clarify the notions of space, what constitutes a theatrical space in these separate disciplines, how these diverse concepts of space will be subsequently employed in this thesis, the significance and history of these academic approaches in shaping our understanding of the early modern theatre and the underlying issues of these approaches. The Notion of Space Space, according to Oxford English Dictionary, denotes meanings that can be briefly divided into two major categories: it indicates “time or duration” and also carries geometrical meaning which signifies “area
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