20 November, 1594 - Doctor Faustus

Here's what the Admiral's Men performed at the Rose playhouse on this day, 424 years ago...

Henslowe writes: y^e 20 of novmbȝ  1594 ... R at docter fostes ... xviij^s 

In modern English: 20^th November, 1594 ... Received at Dr Faustus ... 18 shillings

Faustus summoning Mephistopheles: from the
1616 text of the play 

Today, the Admiral's Men staged Christopher Marlowe's famous tragedy Dr Faustus, in which a scholar summons a demon and sells his soul to the devil. You can read more about this play in the entry for 2 October.

The company is settling into a groove of performing Dr Faustus once a fortnight. But it's not doing well; this is a very small house.

Then again, we must always remember that it's mid-November during the Little Ice Age; it's always impressive to get anyone at all to show up at an open-air theatre...

Henslowe links

• Transcript of this page of the Diary (from W.W. Greg's 1904 edition)
• Facsimile of this page of the Diary (from the Henslowe-Alleyn Digitisation Project)

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