The Queen and Concubine

Last updated

The Queen and Concubine is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Richard Brome and first published in 1659. It has sometimes been called Brome's best tragicomedy. [1]

Contents

Publication and date

The play was first printed when it was included in the 1659 Brome collection Five New Plays, issued by the booksellers Andrew Crooke and Henry Brome (no relation to the dramatist). Its date of authorship and earliest stage production is uncertain; scholars have generally placed it c. 1635 [2] or in the 1635–40 period. [3]

Genre

Of Brome's sixteen surviving plays (including The Late Lancashire Witches , his collaboration with Thomas Heywood), the vast majority are comedies; only three are tragicomedies. (Along with The Queen and Concubine, the others are The Lovesick Court and The Queen's Exchange .) Brome may have chosen the tragicomic form for Queen and Concubine because it allowed him to make, in a limited form and degree, a political commentary. Critics have noted that Queen and Concubine is a critique of royal tyranny and courtly sycophancy, [4] issues that were pertinent in the 1630s, when King Charles I was conducting his period of personal rule and Parliament was prorogued. Brome is directly critical of religious support for tyrannous rulers: "priests are but the apes to kings, / And prostitute religion to their ends."

The play's strong theme of royal sexual immorality clearly did not apply to Charles, and would have given Brome an obvious defence against anyone who argued for an application of his critical views to the English scene. Yet this cover may not have been adequate: The Queen and Concubine has been suggested as the play that inspired the only suppression of the theatres in the Caroline era, when William Beeston was imprisoned and lost control of his theatre company in 1640. [5]

Brome has never had a reputation as a dramatic poet; his verse generally does not rise above the perfunctory and prosaic. The verse in Queen and Concubine is far more formal and self-conscious than what is typical of Brome, and shows a greater effort of artistic composition. The play features two of the final uses of dumbshow in English Renaissance drama. [6]

Sources

Brome adapted the plot of Queen and Concubine from Penelope's Web (1587), a prose romance by Robert Greene. [7] Greene's prose romances have received limited attention from scholars, critics, and readers of English literature; but they were fruitful in inspiring other writers – the most famous example of this being Shakespeare's use of Greene's Pandosto (1588) for his The Winter's Tale .

Synopsis

Set in Sicily, the play centres on the rule of a fictional king named Gonzago. At the start of the play, Gonzago's army has just won a major victory over an unspecified foreign enemy. The victory, however, was nearly a defeat: the outcome of the battle was turned when the Sicilian general Sforza personally rescued Gonzago from the enemy forces that were about to overwhelm him. The celebrations of the victory dwell on Sforza's courage and prowess – to a degree that offends the touchy ego of the king. Capriciously, Gonzago decides to remove the popular and powerful Sforza from command and replace him with an old and superseded rival, Petruccio.

This decision presents the king with two complications. Sforza is a countryman of his queen, Eulalia, a faithful and devoted wife; and Sforza has a young and attractive daughter named Alinda. Eulalia has taken the young woman under her wing as a lady of her court. The king capriciously and ruthlessly sends Sforza to prison, and takes Alinda as his mistress; he mounts a false accusation of adultery against Eulalia, claiming that she and Sforza have had an affair. Gonzago's motive is to replace Eulalia as queen with Alinda – a move that Alinda herself supports: she quickly shows a ruthless ambition that matches the king's lack of principle.

These events at court are observed and commented upon by two courtiers, Lodovico and Horatio, who embody two contrasting responses. Lodovico is faithful and sincere, while Horatio is a sycophant who supports the king in whatever the king does, no matter how contemptible.

Gonzago stages a show trial on his queen's alleged infidelity. Eulalia is convicted on the perjured testimony of suborned witnesses, and exiled from the court. Citizens of the kingdom are forbidden from offering her any help; even food and drink are proscribed. Her followers are driven out of the court along with her; the most loyal of them, Lodovico and the fool Andrea, seek out Eulalia to offer her sustenance – but Eulalia is so loyal to the king that she refuses to violate his command by accepting their aid. While she is asleep, Eulalia is visited in a dream by her personal genius, her guiding spirit. The genius bestows a range of spiritual gifts upon her, including the ability to heal the sick, and he advises her on how to proceed in her exile. Eulalia sets herself up as a patron to the peasants of the countryside, healing their diseases and teaching young girls.

Back in the capital, Gonzago orders Petruccio to behead the imprisoned Sforza. Petruccio considers the order dishonorable, and when he interviews Sforza he finds that Sforza shares his own code of martial honour. Petruccio fakes Sforza's execution; and when the king turns against his own son and heir for the boy's continued loyalty to Eulalia, Petruccio conceals the prince (also named Gonzago) and spreads a false report that the boy is dead.

Alinda repeatedly sends assassins to murder Eulalia, though their attempts are frustrated by Eulalia's insight and the watchfulness of her peasant supporters. Alinda even acquiesces in her father's supposed execution. Eventually her guilty conscience effects her: she begins to show symptoms of mental breakdown, what Horatio calls "a moonflaw in her brains." Her ravings cool the king's ardor for her. When the soldiers mutiny over Sforza's reported execution, the king regrets his actions; Petruccio pacifies the revolt by showing that Sforza is still alive.

A now-repentant king seeks out Eulalia in her countryside retreat, and restores her queenship. (An element of comedy is injected by Horatio's increasingly desperate attempts to stay on the king's side as the king's fortunes veer wildly.) Under Eulalia's influence, Alinda's mental illness is cured; the young woman repents her sins and retires to a religious life. Gonzago also repents, and abdicates his throne in favour of his son; he too expresses his intention to retire to a monastery.

Related Research Articles

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

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

<i>Locrine</i> Elizabethan play

Locrine is an Elizabethan play depicting the legendary Trojan founders of the nation of England and of Troynovant (London). The play presents a cluster of complex and unresolved problems for scholars of English Renaissance theatre.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Fletcher (playwright)</span> English playwright (1579–1625)

John Fletcher was an English playwright. Following William Shakespeare as house playwright for the King's Men, he was among the most prolific and influential dramatists of his day; during his lifetime and in the Stuart Restoration, his fame rivalled Shakespeare's. Fletcher collaborated in writing plays, chiefly with Francis Beaumont or Philip Massinger, but also with Shakespeare and others.

The Young Admiral is a Caroline era tragicomedy written by James Shirley, and first published in 1637. It has often been considered Shirley's best tragicomedy, and one of his best plays.

The Arcadia is James Shirley's dramatization of the prose romance The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia by Sir Philip Sidney, one expression of the enormous influence that Sidney's work exercised during the 17th century. Shirley's stage version was first published in 1640.

The Queen, or The Excellency of Her Sex is a Caroline era tragicomedy. Though published anonymously in 1653, The play is now generally attributed to John Ford – making it a significant addition to the very limited canon of Ford's works.

The Duke's Mistress is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy written by James Shirley and first published in 1638. It was the last of Shirley's plays produced before the major break in his career: with the closing of the London theatres due to bubonic plague in May 1636, Shirley left England for Ireland, where he worked under John Ogilby at the Werburgh Street Theatre in Dublin for four years.

The Weeding of the Covent Garden, or the Middlesex Justice of Peace, alternatively titled The Covent Garden Weeded, is a Caroline era stage play, a comedy written by Richard Brome that was first published in 1659. The play is a noteworthy satire on the emerging ethos of Capitalism as reflected in real estate and urban development in the early modern city.

The Faithful Shepherdess is a Jacobean era stage play, the work that inaugurated the playwriting career of John Fletcher. Though the initial production was a failure with its audience, the printed text that followed proved significant, in that it contained Fletcher's influential definition of tragicomedy. Like many of Fletcher's later tragicomedies, The Faithful Shepherdess deals with the darker side of sexuality and sexual jealousy, albeit within a comic framework.

The Queen of Corinth is a Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy in the canon of John Fletcher and his collaborators. It was initially published in the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio of 1647.

Aglaura is a late Caroline era stage play, written by Sir John Suckling. Several aspects of the play have led critics to treat it as a key development and a marker of the final decadent phase of English Renaissance drama.

The Loyal Subject is a Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy by John Fletcher that was originally published in the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio of 1647.

<i>The Devils Charter</i>

The Devil's Charter is an early Jacobean era stage play, a tragedy written by Barnabe Barnes. The play recounts the story of Pope Alexander VI.

The English Moor, or the Mock Marriage is a Caroline era stage play, a comedy written by Richard Brome, noteworthy in its use of the stage device of blackface make-up. Registered in 1640, it was first printed in 1659, and, uniquely among the plays of Brome's canon, also survives in a manuscript version.

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

The Queen's Exchange is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Richard Brome.

The Prisoners is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Thomas Killigrew. It was premiered onstage c. 1635, acted by Queen Henrietta's Men at the Cockpit Theatre; and was first printed in 1641. Killigrew's first play, The Prisoners inaugurated its author's playwriting career.

The Swisser is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Arthur Wilson. It was performed by the King's Men in the Blackfriars Theatre in 1631, and is notable for the light in throws on the workings of the premier acting company of its time.

The Deserving Favourite is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Lodowick Carlell that was first published in 1629. The earliest of Carlell's plays "and also the best," it is notable for its influence on other plays of the Caroline era.

The City Nightcap, or Crede Quod Habes, et Habes is a Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy written by Robert Davenport. It is one of only three dramatic works by Davenport that survive.

References

  1. ↑ Felix Emmanuel Schelling, Elizabethan Drama 1558–1642, 2 Volumes, Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1908; Vol. 2, p. 337.
  2. ↑ Clarence Edward Andrews, Richard Brome: A Study of His Life and Works, New York, Henry Holt, 1913; p. 74.
  3. ↑ Schelling, Vol. 2 p. 337.
  4. ↑ Ira Clark, Professional Playwrights: Massinger, Ford, Shirley & Brome, University Press of Kentucky, 1992; pp. 15, 162.
  5. ↑ N. W. Bawcutt, ed., The Control and Censorship of Caroline Drama: The Records of Sir Henry Herbert, Master of the Revels 1623–73, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1996; p. 205.
  6. ↑ Dieter Mehl, The Elizabethan Dumbshow: The History of a Dramatic Tradition, London, Routledge, 1982; p. 166.
  7. ↑ Andrews, pp. 78–9.
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.