Today, the company revived a play that Henslowe calls Bouillon. This was probably TheSecond Part of Godfrey of Bouillon, a lost sequel premiered about a month ago; you can read more about it in the entry for 19th July. Alternatively, it might have been the equally lost original play, sometimes identified by scholars with the mysterious Jerusalem, which you can read about in the entry for 22 March, 1592. Either way, today's play would have dramatized some aspect of the eponymous medieval warrior's capture of the city of Jerusalem from the Turks.
Godfrey of Bouillon has finally entered what looks like its death spiral, as the box office plunges down from disappointing to awful.
Henslowe writes: ye 29 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the knacke to know & oneste man ... xxxxvijs
In modern English: [30th] October, 1594 ... Received at The Knack to Know an Honest Man ... 47 shillings.
Two Young Venetian Men (anon., 1515)
Today, the Admiral's Men revived A Knack to Know an Honest Man,their comical moral romance set in Venice. You can read more about this play in the entry for 23rd October.
This is the second performance of A Knack to Know an Honest Man. The premiere had received a disappointingly small audience, but things are looking up: today's follow-up performance attracted more people than the first! That almost never happens, and suggests that word of mouth may have been spreading.
Henslowe writes: ye 28 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the frenshe docter ... xvs
In modern English: 29th October, 1594 ... Received at The French Doctor ... 15 shillings
A French Physician, by
Matthew Darly, 1771
Today, the players revived again their lost play about a doctor from France. We know very little about this play, which was probably a comedy; you can read more in the entry for 19 October.
The company's experiment with returning this old play to the stage does not seem to have paid off. The lacklustre revival ten days ago has been followed by a worse showing today. Someone has blundered.
Henslowe writes: ye 27 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at pallaman & harset ... xxxxvijs
In modern English: [28th] October, 1594 ... Received at Palamon and Arcite ... 47 shillings
Emily watched by the prisoners from their cell
window; from a 15th-century manuscript of
Boccaccio's Teseida
Today, the company revived Palamon and Arcite, an adaptation of Geoffrey Chaucer's "Knight's Tale", in which two noble kinsmen become rivals for the hand of a fair maiden. You can read more about this play in the entry for 18th September.
What?! Palamon and Arcite is weird. A disappointing premiere was followed by a month-long absence and a lacklustre second performance. Now, ten days later, its third performance has attracted a large crowd to the Rose. I don't pretend to understand what's going on.
Henslowe writes: ye 25 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at galleaso ... xjs
In modern English: [26th] October, 1594 ... Received at Galiaso ... 11 shillings
A Spanish galleass, one possible subject of this
play. From Ships Through the Ages by Frederick
Leonard King (1934)
Today, the Admiral's Men revived for the last time their their lost play Galiaso. We do not know what this play was about, as its title could refer to many historical and fictional figures, or even to a kind of ship. You can read more about it in the entry for 28 June.
Today, we say farewell to another play. Galiaso was introduced at the end of June and has lasted four months, but received only nine performances in that time. The players seem not to have had much faith in it, and today's wretched box office is probably what led them to kill it off. We will never know what this play was about.
Just for fun, here's a graph comparing Galiaso with Philippo and Hippolito, which opened and closed at at a similar time. It's interesting to see how Galiaso starts and ends more popular than Philippo, but the latter gets more performances.
What's next?
There will be no blog entry tomorrow, because 27 October was a Sunday in 1594 and the players did not perform. Henslowe's Diary ... as a Blog! will thus return on 28 October. See you then!
Henslowe writes: ye 24 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the love of & Jngleshe ladey ... xxiijs
In modern English: [25th] October, 1594 ... Received at The Love of an English Lady ... 23 shillings
An English lady in winter,
etching by Wenceslas
Hollar (1644)
How strange. The second performance of The Love of an English Lady is also the last. This lost play may have involved a Venetian in some kind of romance with an Englishwoman; you can read more about it in the entry for 26 September.
The Love of an English Lady had a very disappointing premiere, and, after waiting a month before restaging it, the Admiral's Men have now confronted a theatre less than half full. They will never perform the play again, presumably seeing no future for it. Farewell English lady, we hardly knew ye!
Henslowe writes: ye 23 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at tasso ... xxiijs
In modern English: [24th] October, 1594 ... Received at Tasso ... 23 shillings
Tasso in the Madhouse
by Eugene Delacroix (1839)
Today, the Admiral's Men returned to Tasso's Melancholy, a lost play that dramatized the lovesick insanity of the Italian poet Torquato Tasso; you can read more about it in the entry for 13th August.
The players have been performing Tasso's Melancholy at irregular intervals, and this time have waited two weeks between performances. The play continues to decline further and further below the average for the Rose.
Henslowe writes: ye 22 of octobȝ 1594 ... ne ... R at the knacke to know a noneste ... xxxxs
In modern English: [23rd] October, 1594 ... New ... Received at The Knack to Know an Honest ... 40 shillings.
Today, the Admiral's Men performed a brand new play with a familiar name. Those of you with long memories will recall that back in 1593, Lord Strange's Men performed a play called A Knack to Know a Knave. Today's title may suggest a sequel, but that is not so: A Knack to Know a Knave is a morality play set in northern England, whereas A Knack to Know an Honest Man is a comic romance set in Venice. There is only one obvious connection between them: both feature an allegorical figure who represents the concept of honesty and moralises on the other characters' sins. It seems likely, then, that the author of today's play simply borrowed the title of a popular old play for marketing purposes.
The title page of the
printed text, 1596
If so, the ploy did not work, because the box office is remarkably unimpressive. Premieres normally drew huge audiences to the Rose, but today the theatre was barely more than half full. And although the play survives in a printed text published in 1596, it's not an easy read: the grammar is messy and the publication may have been assembled by actors remembering - or misremembering - their lines.
But don't feel sad for this play. Keep your eye on it because there will be some surprises in the future...
The play
A Knack to Know an Honest Man is a tale of wrongful arrest in Venice. Lelio fights a duel with Sempronio, who had attempted to seduce his wife, and wounds him. But a group of peasants mistakenly think Lelio is a murderer and chase him away, leaving Sempronio to die. At the instigation of the evil Servio, who wants his property, Lelio is pronounced a murderer, but his father-in-law, Brishio, helps him escape on a ship (leaving his wife and daughter behind in charge of his property).
Two Young Venetian Men (anon., 1515)
But Sempronio is not really dead! He has been nursed back to health by an old hermit named Philip, and is now a reformed man. The hermit magically disguises Sempronio as an old man named Penitent Experience and he returns to the city, where he utters moralistic commentaries on the evils of Venetian society, unable to reveal his true identity. He becomes a servant to Fortunio, Prince of Venice.
Fortunio and his friend Marchetto desire Lelio's daughter Lucinda and his wife Anetta respectively, but the women rebuff their aggressive approaches (Penitent Experience, observing, tells the audience, "Here's first a knack to know an honest lady"). The young men plot to return and rape the women (yes, this is still supposed to be a comedy), but they are prevented by Brishio's sons and after various shenanigans the end result is that Fortunio is a repentant man.
When Brishio proudly confesses to having helped Lelio escape, Penitent Experience observes "Why, here's a knack to know an honest man!" and Fortunio helps him escape the city. Ultimately, Lelio ends up in Florence and Brishio in Milan, but the cities are at war and the two men somehow end up being chosen as their warrior champions. When they recognize one another, they are unable to fight, and the Dukes of the two cities are so moved that they resolve to end their dispute.
Marino Grimani, Doge of Venice, 1596-1605
Lelio returns to Venice and offers himself up to justice in the hope that Brishio will be forgiven and allowed to go home. More shenanigans ensue, the main result of which is that Lelio is sentenced to the death for the murder of Sempronio. The members of his extended family all offer their lives in his place, and when Brishio proposes the state should execute all or none of them, Penitent Experience observes - yup - "Here is a knack to know an honest man". However, Lelio nobly rejects their offers.
The play ends when Philip the hermit appears at exactly the right moment to release Sempronio from his disguise. Sempronio marries Lucinda and nasty old Servio gets nothing, so everything works out in the end. In the conclusion, Sempronio utters advice on how to tell the difference between a knave and an honest man, none of which is particularly earth-shattering ("An honest man on love and faith relies; / A knave makes lust his love, respects no friend"). The Duke of Venice gets the last words:
Thanks, good Sempronio, for this worthy skill.
To register the memory of this,
Henceforth, where'er this history is heard
The world shall praise thee, in whose life began,
The perfect knack to know an honest man.
If you would like to read A Knack to Know an Honest Man, your only option is the Malone Society's old-spelling text from 1910.
What we learn from this
Once again, Venice is the setting for a play at the Rose. We have already seen a Venetian Comedy on the stage, and there may have been a Venetian character in The Love of an English Ladytoo. The Admiral's Men are putting a lot of effort into Italian-style comedy, but there's still no evidence that it is scoring with audiences.
In the only detailed study of this play, Tom Rutter points out some more subtle connections with plays in the Rose repertoire. He draws connections between the avaricious Servio and Barabas in The Jew of Malta, and to the idealised male friendships in other plays of the era (including, perhaps, the recently performed Palamon and Arcite). He also connects the play's style, which partly descends from old-fashioned morality plays, with The Jew of Malta, in that both contain figures who appear based on allegorical figures (of virtue or of and vice), but are individualized. And looking forward, Rutter suggests that the Venetian setting, the theme of friendship in opposition to an evil usurer, and the courtroom scenes could all have inspired Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. This play may be more important than its obscurity today might suggest.
FURTHER READING
A Knack to Know an Honest Man information
G.K. Hunter, English Drama, 1586-1642: The Age of Shakespeare (Clarendon Press, 1997), 368-9.
Martin Wiggins, British Drama, 1533-1642: A Catalogue, vol. 3 (Oxford University Press, 2013), entry 969.
Tom Rutter, Shakespeare and the Admiral's Men: Reading Across Repertories on the London Stage, 1594-1600 (Cambridge University Press, 2017), 24-53.
Henslowe writes: ye 21 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at docter ffostus 1594 ... xxxiijs
In modern English: [22nd] October, 1594 ... Received at Dr Faustus, 1594 ... 33 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 has waited a fortnight before bringing back Dr Faustus. They may be disappointed that on its third outing, it has already become an average play, rather than the blockbuster one might have expected.
Henslowe writes: ye 20 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the Jewe of malta 1594 ... xiijs
In modern English: [21st] October, 1594 ... Received at The Jew of Malta ... 13 shillings
Caravaggio's portrait of the Grand
Master of the Knights of Malta,
1607-8.
Today, the players once again performed The Jew of Malta, Christopher Marlowe's satirical comic tragedy; you can read more about this play in the blog entry for 26th February 1592. You could be forgiven for having forgotten about The Jew of Malta. The players have left it unperformed for nearly two months. And the audience did not miss it. This giant of a play, which had once been the most popular at the Rose, can no longer draw a crowd; today's box office is dismal. A sad day.
Henslowe writes: ye 18 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the frenshe docter ... xxijs
In modern English: 19th October, 1594 ... Received at The French Doctor ... 22 shillings.
Today, the Admiral's Men appear to have brought back another old play from the archives. But as with The Love of a Grecian Ladya few days ago, this was not one of the great modern classics by Christopher Marlowe; instead it appears to have been a forgotten comedy that barely attracted anyone to the theatre.
A French Physician, by
Matthew Darly, 1771
We do not know what The French Doctor was about, but in his catalogue of British drama, Martin Wiggins suggests that French doctors in the plays of this period tend to supply drugs. Perhaps the doctor was a poisoner, or perhaps he sold love potions?
Sadly, we will never know what the doctor did. And it looks as though the theatregoers of London didn't much care anyway.
What's next?
There will be no blog entry tomorrow, because 20th October was a Sunday in 1594, and the players did not perform. Henslowe's Diary ... as a Blog! will thus return on the 21st, for a week that will include one new play.
FURTHER READING
The French Doctor information
Martin Wiggins, British Drama, 1533-1642: A Catalogue, vol. 2 (Oxford University Press, 2012), entry 833.
Henslowe writes: ye 17 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at tamberlen ... xxxxs
In modern English: [18th] October, 1594 ... Received at Tamburlaine ... 40 shillings.
Illustration of the historical Tamburlaine from Richard Knolles' General History of the Turks (1603).
Today, the players performed Tamburlaine, Christopher Marlowe's spectacular epic about the bloodthirsty conqueror of Asia. You can read more about this play in the entry for 30th August.
Well, this is weird: the players have performed a play only two days after their last performance of it. That almost never happens! Even weirder, today's performance of Tamburlaine drew a much bigger audience than the one two days ago. Clearly, the players were expecting this surge and planned accordingly. But how did they know? It's a reminder of how little we know about what's actually going on in these theatres all those years ago...
Henslowe writes: ye 16 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at palaman & arset ... xxvijs
In modern English: [17th] October, 1594 ... Received at Palamon and Arcite ... 27 shillings
Emily watched by the prisoners from their cell
window; from a 15th-century manuscript of
Boccaccio's Teseida
Today, the company revived Palamon and Arcite, an adaptation of Geoffrey Chaucer's "Knight's Tale", in which two noble kinsmen become rivals for the hand of a fair maiden. You can read more about this play in the entry for 18th September.
Something is wrong about Palamon and Arcite. Its premiere back in mid-September received surprisingly low box office. Now, the players have waited a month before returning it to the stage, and this second performance has drawn only an average-sized audience. It seems that for whatever reason, this play has been misfiring from the outset.
Henslowe writes: ye 15 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at tamberlen ... xxviijs
In modern English: [16th] October, 1594 ... Received at Tamburlaine ... 28 shillings.
Illustration of the historical Tamburlaine from Richard Knolles' General History of the Turks (1603).
Today, the players performed Tamburlaine, Christopher Marlowe's spectacular epic about the bloodthirsty conqueror of Asia. You can read more about this play in the entry for 30th August.
Once again, the Admiral's Men have waited a fortnight before returning Tamburlaine to the stage. Once again, the box office is not as good as one might expect, being merely average for the Rose. Is the conqueror of Asia failing to conquer the London theatre scene?
Henslowe writes: ye 14 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at mahemett ... xxvjs
In modern English: [15th] October, 1594 ... Received at Mahamet ... 26 shillings
1629 Portuguese illustration of the Battle of Alcazar
Today, the company returned to Mahamet, which may survive today as The Battle of Alcazar. If so, it was a popular old play that told the story of Abd el-Malik's struggle for the throne of Morocco against the vicious usurper Muly Mahamet; you can read more about it in the entry for 21st February, 1592.
Like Belin Dun yesterday, this is a play that the company has ignored for three weeks. And like Belin Dun, this has not arrested the sliding of its box office into mediocrity.
Henslowe writes: ye 13 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at bellendon ... xxijs
In modern English: [14th] October, 1594 ... Received at Belin Dun ... 22 shillings
A highwayman portrayed in Richard
Head's The English Rogue (1666)
Today, the Admiral's Men once again performed Belin Dun, their lost play about the notorious robber who terrorized the highways around Dunstable during the reign of King Henry I; you can read more about this play in the entry for 10 June.
The company has now left the once-reliable Belin Dun unperformed for three weeks before returning to it. The box office continues to slide gradually toward unacceptable levels.
Henslowe writes: ye 11 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the venesyon comodey ... xvjs
In modern English: [12th] October, 1594 ... Received at The Venetian Comedy ...16shillings
The Quack Doctor by Pietro Longhi (late
18th century)
Today, the Admiral's Men revived The Venetian Comedy, a play about which we know nothing beyond its title. You can read more about it in the entry for 27 August.
The players have whisked The Venetian Comedy back to the stage after only a week, despite its poor showing on its last outing. Today the box office is worse. Whatever they're trying to do is not working.
What's next?
There will be no blog entry tomorrow, as 13th October was a Sunday in 1594, and the players did not perform. Henslowe's Diary ... as a Blog! will thus return on the 14th for a week that will include a new play. See you then!
Henslowe writes: ye 9 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at docter ffostus ... xxxxiiijs
In modern English: [10th] October, 1594 ... Received at Dr Faustus ... 44 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 has brought Dr Faustus back after only a week. It is still doing well on its second outing: 44 shillings is a handsome result, representing an above average audience size.
What's next?
Henslowe's Diary has one too few entries for this week; his dates are muddled in general, but one interpretation is that the 11th October entry is missing. Henslowe's Diary ... as a Blog! will thus return on 12th October. See you then!
Henslowe writes: ye 8 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at Tasso ... xxvijs
In modern English: [9th] October, 1594 ... Received at Tasso ... 27 shillings
Tasso in the Madhouse
by Eugene Delacroix (1839)
Today, the Admiral's Men returned to Tasso's Melancholy, a lost play that dramatized the lovesick insanity of the Italian poet Torquato Tasso; you can read more about it in the entry for 13th August.
Last time, the players waited a fortnight before staging Tasso's Melancholy again. This time, they have waited three weeks. This has had no effect on the play's success, which remains at its below average level after the last performance's precipitous drop.
Henslowe writes: ye 7 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at phillipo & hewpolito ... xijs
In modern English: [8th] October, 1594 ... Received at Philippo and Hippolito ... 12 shillings
Two Young Men by Crispin van den Broeck, c.1590
Today, the company returned one last time to Philippo and Hippolito, their enigmatic lost play about two men of that name. You can read more about this play in the entry for 9 July.
This is the last known performance of Philippo and Hippolito. It debuted back in July and for three months it was one of the most frequently performed plays at the Rose. But its box office gradually shrank to untenable levels and the players have decided to let it go to its reward. Sadly, we will never know what this play was about or what adventures those two guys go up to.
Just for the hell of it, here's a graph of the box office records of the three plays that the company has recently ceased performing. Among other things, it brings out how much more frequent the performances of Philippo and Hippolito were.
Today, the company revived a play that Henslowe calls Godfrey of Bouillon. This was probably TheSecond Part of Godfrey of Bouillon, a lost sequel premiered about a month ago; you can read more about it in the entry for 19th July. Alternatively, it might have been the equally lost original play, sometimes identified by scholars with the mysterious Jerusalem, which you can read about in the entry for 22 March, 1592. Either way, today's play would have dramatized some aspect of the eponymous medieval warrior's capture of the city of Jerusalem from the Turks.
Godfrey of Bouillon has been doing solid work for the company, who have left it for a fortnight before reviving it. The box office has finally started to dip though, a sign that this play could be on the way out now.
Henslowe writes: ye 4 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the love of a gresyan lady ... xxvjs
In modern English: [5th] October, 1594 ... Received at The Love of a Grecian Lady ... 26 shillings.
Today, the company staged a play that we have not encountered before. It appears to be an old play, because Henslowe does not refer to it as "ne"; perhaps it arrived at the Rose in company with those other old plays, Tamburlaine and Dr Faustus. But unlike those plays, The Love of a Grecian Lady has aroused no nostalgic excitement, with a box office receipt below the Rose's average, and the play is now lost.
The Love of Helen and Paris
by Jacques-Louis David (1789)
What was it about? Probably a Greek lady fell in love; beyond that, we know nothing. However, in his catalogue of British drama, Martin Wiggins points out that Helen of Troy was commonly referred to a Grecian in the period. Could this be a comic tale set during the Trojan War?
The title of the play is puzzling. It is very reminiscent of The Love of an English Lady, which premiered last week, so much so that one might wonder whether the two plays were a pair. But next time Henslowe lists it, he will call it The Grecian Lady, and still later it will stabilize into The Grecian Comedy, which would seem to pair it more closely with The Venetian Comedy. The three plays might be connected in some way that we are no longer able to puzzle out.
Clearly, we don't know much about this play. But it is yet another sign that the Admiral's Men are introducing more comedy into their repertory, even if the project does not seem to be paying off.
What's next?
There will be no blog entry tomorrow, because 6 October was a Sunday in 1594, and the players did not perform. Henslowe's Diary ... as a Blog! will therefore return on the 8th for a week of old friends and one sad farewell. See you then!
FURTHER READING
The Grecian Comedy information
Martin Wiggins, British Drama, 1533-1642: A Catalogue, vol. 2 (Oxford University Press, 2012), entry 785.
Henslowe writes: ye 3 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the venesyon comodey ... xvijs
In modern English: [4th] October, 1594 ... Received at The Venetian Comedy ...17shillings
The Quack Doctor by Pietro Longhi (late
18th century)
Today, the Admiral's Men revived The Venetian Comedy, a play about which we know nothing beyond its title. You can read more about this play in the entry for 27 August.
This is the fifth performance of The Venetian Comedy and its box office has already sunk to disastrous levels. One must assume that it was not funny in the slightest.
Henslowe writes: ye 2 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at the Rangers comodey ... xs
In modern English: [3rd] October, 1594 ... Received at The Ranger's Comedy ... 10 shillings
An Elizabethan hunting scene; one
of the possible subjects of this play
Today, the Admiral's Men revived their lost Ranger's Comedy. We do not know what this play was about, as the word could refer to a gamekeeper, a rake, a wanderer, or an organizer of troops. You can read more about it in the entry for 2 April.
This is getting ridiculous. The Ranger's Comedy, which was presumably not funny at all, has received one of the lowest returns in this season of the Diary. Yet the wretched thing continues to be restaged time and again. It makes no sense.
Henslowe writes: ye 30 of septmbȝ 1594 ... R at docter ffostose ... iijll xijs
In modern English: [2nd October], 1594 ... Received at Doctor Faustus ... £3 and 12 shillings
Today is another blast from the past! The Admiral's Men staged Doctor Faustus, which may not have been seen in London since the late 1580s. Written by Christopher Marlowe, this adaptation of an old German legend tells of a scholar who sells his soul to the devil. Most of those in today's audience would have known this story well, for by 1594, Faustus was one of the most famous plays of its era, and it attracted a huge throng to the Rose playhouse.
The return of a play
Henslowe's diary entry is the earliest surviving reference to Dr Faustus in the historical record, but he doesn't label it "ne" (new), so we must be seeing again the same phenomenon that we encountered with Tamburlaine a few weeks ago: the triumphant return of an old play to the Rose. Dr Faustus was written by Christopher Marlowe, along with some collaborators, around the year 1588. It was originally staged by an older version of the Admiral's Men, with Edward Alleyn playing played the iconic title role. Alleyn then joined Lord Strange's Men and appears to have lost access to Dr Faustus during his time with that company. Now, back at the Rose with a rebooted version of the Admiral's Men, Alleyn has regained ownership of Dr Faustus and is able to bring the anguished philosopher back to the Rose.
The story
Wittenberg in 1536
The tale ofDoctor Faustus was not invented by Marlowe: it is an adaptation of an old German folk tale. In Marlowe's version, Faustus is a scholar of Wittenberg University. He has lost interest in the books he is supposed to read, and his curious mind leads him to tomes about necromancy. He uses them to conjure a devil, Mephistopheles, who offers to be his servant and let him achieve his greatest desires for a period of 24 years. The price? His soul. Faustus agrees, signing a contract in his own blood.
As a demonic henchman, Mephistopheles at first seems rather disappointing. He blows off Faustus's request for a wife, gives only old-fashioned answers to questions about astronomy, and when Faustus asks him where hell is located, gives him the worrying answer "where we are is hell, / And where hell is must we ever be". Faustus becomes concerned that he has made a mistaken, and considers repenting, but Lucifer himself appears and seduces him with a pageant of the Seven Deadly Sins.
Mephistopheles takes his 'master' to see the world;
from F.W. Murnau's Faust (1926)
Mephistopheles now takes Faustus on a globe-trotting adventure. They travel to Rome, where Faustus turns invisible and plays tricks on the Pope. In Germany, he impresses the Emperor by summoning the spirit of Alexander the Great. In Anhalt, he summons grapes from across the world for the Duchess. Along the way, he also torments a comic horse-courser. Back in Wittenberg, he impresses his fellow scholars by summoning Helen of Troy from the dead, and coming up with the legendary lines, "Was this the face that launched a thousand ships / And burnt the topless towers of Ilium? / Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss."
But after 24 years, Faustus's contract is nearly up, and he can only wait in terror as the clock ticks toward its midnight deadline. He cries to God to save him, but to no avail - "See, see, where Christ's blood streams in the firmament!", he sobs, "One drop would save my soul, half a drop!"
But it is all fruitless, and at midnight, devils emerge from the trapdoor to carry him down to hell. The play's last lines are spoken by the Chorus, who describes Faustus as a warning to us all:
Faustus is gone. Regard his hellish fall,
Whose fiendful fortune may exhort the wise
Only to wonder at unlawful things,
Whose deepness doth entice such forward wits
To practise more than heavenly power permits.
The impact
Dr Faustus had an enormous impact on the theatregoers of its day, and its influence can be seen on several of the plays described in this blog. We have already encountered Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, which is an obvious attempt at imitating Faustus (it too features necromantic scholars and magical sheningans), while smaller ideas and phrases from it turn up in A Looking Glass for London and Englandand A Knack to Know a Knave.
Faustus summoning Mephistopheles: from the
1616 text of the play
There are obvious reasons for the play's popularity. It is full of glortious theatrical spectacle, which can be glimpsed via its stage directions: "Enter [Mephistopheles] with devils, giving crowns and rich apparel to Faustus, and dance and then depart" or "[Faustus and Mephistopheles] beat the friars, and fling fireworks among them, and so exeunt." It was still being performed as late as 1620, when John Melton wrote in The Astrologaster that in "the tragedy of Doctor Faustus ... a man may behold shag-haired devils run roaring over the stage with squibs in their mouths, while drummers make thunder in the tiring-house, and the twelvepenny hirelings make artificial lightnings in their heavens".
But despite its simple story and spectacular effects, the play is a complex and challenging work that forces its audience to examine their own attitudes toward their own sins. As the Chorus tells us, Faustus's sin is pride, which he himself recognises at the end: he has blasphemously rejected the Bible, has gained immense power and has wasted it on frivolous things. His punishment seems richly deserved, yet it's hard not to have some sympathy with his ambitious desire to know more, and to inquire beyond the limitations placed on him. In 1676, Francis Kirkman, who had read or seen Faustus in his youth, recalled that he enjoyed it when the hero "travelled in the air, saw all the world, and did what he listed [liked]", but he was "much troubled" when the Devil came to claim him; "the consideration of that horrible end did so much terrify me that I often dreamed of it".
Much ink has been spilt on the play's murky theological orientation (it can be read as Catholic or Calvinist, depending on how you look at it) and the very uncertainty may have caused disquiet in its audience no matter their persuasion. In 2.3, the Evil Angel warns Faustus that "God cannot pity thee". Faustus insists that "God will pity me if I repent", assuming that no matter what sins he performs, a loving God will always forgive him if he expresses genuine regret before he dies. But the Evil Angel responds "Ay, but Faustus never shall repent", as if God's opinion is not really the issue: Faustus's true problem is the despair in his own soul that will not allow him to believe he truly deserves forgiveness. Such challenges to complacency could unsettle the most stolid believer.
An alarming stage devil
depicted on the title page
of Middleton and
Rowley's The World Tossed at Tennis (1620)
The play even developed a reputation for spooky occurrences during performances. In his Black Book of 1604, Thomas Middleton refers to an incident when "the old Theatre" (a playhouse in Shoreditch) "cracked and frighted the audience" during a show. Many years later in 1633, William Prynne, a fanatical Puritan campaigner against theatre (admittedly not the most reliable source) claimed in his interminable Histriomastix that once, "in Queen Elizabeth's day", when Dr Faustus was performed at the Belsavage playhouse in London, there was "a visible manifestation of the Devil on the stage", which caused the great amazement of both the actors and spectators". Prynne insists that this is a true story, which he had heard it "from many now alive, who well remember it, there being some distracted with [i.e. driven mad by] that fearful sight".
Intriguingly enough, this story links back to Henslowe's Diary. In 1673, John Aubrey retold a garbled version of Prynne's anecdote, although in his version the play was by Shakespeare and Edward Alleyn himself was in the production, playing a demon, "and was in the midst of the play surprised by an apparition of the devil". According to Aubrey, Alleyn was so disturbed that he vowed to give more to charity. This ultimately resulted in his founding Dulwich College, the school south of London in whose archives Henslowe's Diary remains to this day. So, if the Devil hadn't freaked out Alleyn during a performance of Dr Faustus, this blog might never have existed...
The play in performance
Dr Faustus has never left the stage since Marlowe wrote it, and it is undoubtedly the most popular play that we've encountered in Henslowe's Diary, excepting only those by Shakespeare. It can be performed in many different ways and can appear surprisingly modern: take a look at this (gruesome) trailer for Maria Aberg's amazing 2016 production for the Royal Shakespeare Company. In it, the two lead actors randomly chose who would play Faustus or Mephistopheles on any given night by burning matches, but my strongest memory of this incredibly disturbing production was the parallels it drew between drug addiction and Faustus's thirst for magic.
What we learn from this
The return of Faustus makes undeniable the overwhelming dominance of Christopher Marlowe in the repertory of the Admiral's Men. He may have been dead for over a year, but his Jew of Malta, his Massacre at Paris, and his two Tamburlaine plays have been stunningly popular throughout the various seasons at the Rose.
Henslowe may be gloating at the triumphant return of Tamburlaine and Dr Faustus. But at the other end of London, Shakespeare is ruling the roost at the Theatre in Shoreditch, and is about to produce such instant classics as Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night's Dream. Henslowe should be a little worried that his most successful plays were written by a man who is now deceased. The lack of new blood could be a concern for the future.
FURTHER READING
Doctor Faustus information
Thomas Middleton, The Black Book (1604)
William Prynne, Histriomastix (1633)
John Aubrey, The Natural History and Antiquities of the County of Surrey (1676)
Roma Gill, ed., The Complete Works of Christopher Marlowe, Volume II: Dr Faustus (Clarendon Press, 1990).
David Bevington and Eric Rasmussen, eds., Doctor Faustus: A- and B-Texts (1604, 1616) (Manchester University Press, 1993).
Andrew Gurr, Shakespeare's Opposites: The Admiral's Company, 1594-1625 (Cambridge University Press, 2009), 14-17,
Martin Wiggins, British Drama, 1533-1642: A Catalogue, vol. 2 (Oxford University Press, 2012), entry 810.
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