The Lady Mother

Last updated

The Lady Mother is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy generally attributed to Henry Glapthorne, and dating from the middle 1630s. Never printed in its own era, the play survived in a manuscript marked as a theatre prompt-book, revealing significant details about the stage practice of its time.

The Lady Mother was licensed for performance by the office of the Master of the Revels on 15 October 1635. [1] It was originally staged by the King's Revels Men at the Salisbury Court Theatre, and was acted for the royal court at Whitehall Palace that year.

Yet the play was not published for more than two centuries; it was first issued in 1883 by editor A. H. Bullen in his Old English Plays Vol. 2. Bullen first assigned the play to Glapthorne. [2] The Malone Society produced a modern text in 1959 (published then as edited by Arthur Brown but now acknowledged by the Society to have been significantly plagiarised by Brown from the 1953 BLitt Thesis of his student Patricia Davies [3] [4] ). The drama survived the centuries in manuscript form, part of MS. Egerton 1994 (folios 186–211) in the collection of the British Library. In the MS., the entrances and exits are consistently marked, the entrances in advance so that the prompter could cue the actors; the necessary properties are also marked, in advance of their needs. Cues for music and dancing are also included – all the details that the prompter would have needed to guide the performance. The MS. displays its license on the final page. [5] The MS. is a scribal copy, and shows repeated revision; it reveals Glapthorne working with his scribe to shape the final text. [6] [7] The Revels office (specifically William Blagrave, [8] the assistant of the Master, Sir Henry Herbert) demanded some changes in the text, [9] and several lines are crossed out, to be omitted from performance.

F. G. Fleay speculated that The Lady Mother was an alternative title for The Noble Trial, a Glapthorne play that was among those in the collection of John Warburton that were destroyed by fire.

Bullen argued that Glapthorne's play showed the influence of the drama of James Shirley, a dominant figure in Caroline drama. The play's plot involves the marital fortunes of Lady Marlove (the eponymous "lady mother") and her daughters Belisea and Clariana. One of her suitors is a foolish old country knight, Sir Geffrey – a figure who provides the play's lighter comic element. The more serious element of the plot involves Lady Marlove and her son facing execution for a supposed murder. The play concludes in a "death masque" in which a personified Death invokes despair and the Furies, only to be dispelled by Hymen, the god of marriage. It is then revealed that Thurston, the supposedly dead man, is alive and married to Clariana, resolving the narrative in a happy ending.

Notes

  1. ↑ Stevens, p. 523.
  2. ↑ In his Preface, Bullen calls the play "a piece of no particular merit" – he apparently chose to publish it because he found it "less tedious than any other of Glapthorne's pieces."
  3. ↑ Malone Society Annual Report 2022/2023
  4. ↑ "Credit Where It's Due: The Long, Strange Tale of Patricia Owtram and The Lady Mother", Somerville Magazine, 2023, pp. 12-13
  5. ↑ Stevens, p. 513.
  6. ↑ Long, p. 431.
  7. ↑ Ioppolo, pp. 139–40.
  8. ↑ As well as helping to regulate the drama, Blagrave was one of the builders of the Salisbury Court and the financial agent of the King's Revels Men. In modern terms, he had conflicts of interest, as Herbert did too.
  9. ↑ Bawcutt, p. 60.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">English Renaissance theatre</span> Theatre of England between 1562 and 1642

English Renaissance theatre, also known as Renaissance English theatre and Elizabethan theatre, refers to the theatre of England between 1558 and 1642.

The Master of the Revels was the holder of a position within the English, and later the British, royal household, heading the "Revels Office" or "Office of the Revels". The Master of the Revels was an executive officer under the Lord Chamberlain. Originally he was responsible for overseeing royal festivities, known as revels, and he later also became responsible for stage censorship, until this function was transferred to the Lord Chamberlain in 1624. However, Henry Herbert, the deputy Master of the Revels and later the Master, continued to perform the function on behalf of the Lord Chamberlain until the English Civil War in 1642, when stage plays were prohibited. The office continued almost until the end of the 18th century, although with rather reduced status.

Sir Henry Herbert was Master of the Revels to both King Charles I and King Charles II, as well as a politician during both reigns.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Brome</span> English dramatist (c. 1590–1652)

Richard Brome ; was an English dramatist of the Caroline era.

The King's Men was the acting company to which William Shakespeare (1564–1616) belonged for most of his career. Formerly known as the Lord Chamberlain's Men during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, they became the King's Men in 1603 when King James I ascended the throne and became the company's patron.

<i>Henry VIII</i> (play) Play by Shakespeare

Henry VIII is a collaborative history play, written by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher, based on the life of Henry VIII. An alternative title, All Is True, is recorded in contemporary documents, with the title Henry VIII not appearing until the play's publication in the First Folio of 1623. Stylistic evidence indicates that individual scenes were written by either Shakespeare or his collaborator and successor, John Fletcher. It is also somewhat characteristic of the late romances in its structure. It is noted for having more stage directions than any of Shakespeare's other plays.

Thomas of Woodstock and Richard the Second Part One are two names for an untitled, anonymous and apparently incomplete manuscript of an Elizabethan play depicting events in the reign of King Richard II. Attributions of the play to William Shakespeare have been nearly universally rejected, and it does not appear in major editions of the Shakespeare apocrypha. The play has been often cited as a possible influence on Shakespeare's Richard II, as well as Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2, but new dating of the text brings that relationship into question.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Warburton (officer of arms)</span> English antiquarian, cartographer and officer of arms (1682–1759)

John Warburton (1682–1759) was an antiquarian, cartographer, and Somerset Herald of Arms in Ordinary at the College of Arms in the early 18th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Salisbury Court Theatre</span>

The Salisbury Court Theatre was a theatre in 17th-century London. It was in the neighbourhood of Salisbury Court, which was formerly the London residence of the Bishops of Salisbury. Salisbury Court was acquired by Richard Sackville in 1564 during the last seven years of his life when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer under Queen Elizabeth; when Thomas Sackville was created Earl of Dorset in 1604, the building was renamed Dorset House.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Whitefriars Theatre</span>

The Whitefriars Theatre was a theatre in Jacobean London, in existence from 1608 to the 1620s — about which only limited and sometimes contradictory information survives.

Queen Henrietta's Men was an important playing company or troupe of actors in Caroline era in London. At their peak of popularity, Queen Henrietta's Men were the second leading troupe of the day, after only the King's Men.

The Woman's Prize, or the Tamer Tamed is a Jacobean comedy written by John Fletcher. It was first published in the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio of 1647, though it was written several decades earlier. There is no doubt that the play is the work of Fletcher alone; his highly distinctive and characteristic pattern of linguistic preferences is continuous through the text.

The Sisters is a Caroline stage play, a comedy written by James Shirley. It was the last of Shirley's plays performed in London prior to the closing of the theatres in September 1642, at the start of the English Civil War. "Slight in substance, The Sisters is excellent in matter of technique, and especially in...structural unity...."

The Changes, or Love in a Maze is a Caroline era stage play, a comedy of manners written by James Shirley, first published in 1639. It was one of Shirley's most popular comedies, especially in the Restoration era. The play is almost universally known by its subtitle.

The Country Captain, alternatively known as Captain Underwit, is a Caroline era stage play written by William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle, and first published in 1649. It has attracted critical attention primarily for the question of James Shirley's participation in its authorship.

The Honest Man's Fortune is a Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Nathan Field, John Fletcher, and Philip Massinger. It was apparently the earliest of the works produced by this trio of writers, the others being The Queen of Corinth and The Knight of Malta.

The Lovesick Court, or the Ambitious Politique is a Caroline-era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Richard Brome, and first published in 1659.

Edward Knight was the prompter of the King's Men, the acting company that performed the plays of William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, John Fletcher, and other playwrights of Jacobean and Caroline drama.

Richard Gunnell was an actor, playwright, and theatre manager in Jacobean and Caroline era London. He is best remembered for his role in the founding of the Salisbury Court Theatre.

Dick of Devonshire is an anonymous Jacobean era stage play, based on the autobiography of the real-life English sailor Dicke of Devonshire. Written in 1626, it survived as part of MS Egerton 1994; a manuscript collection prepared by the actor William Cartwright around 1642, and later presented by him to Dulwich College. The play was first published by A.H. Bullen in his Old English Plays series in 1885.

References

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.