Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Note on texts and dates
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 Work in sixteenth-century England
- Chapter 2 ‘Vpon the weke daies and worke daies at conuenient times’: acting as work in Elizabethan England
- Chapter 3 ‘Though he be a king, yet he must labour’: work and nobility in Shakespeare's histories
- Chapter 4 ‘We may shut vp our shops, and make holiday’: workers and playhouses, 1599–1601
- Chapter 5 ‘Work upon that now!’: labour and status on the stage, 1599–1610
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter 4 - ‘We may shut vp our shops, and make holiday’: workers and playhouses, 1599–1601
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 September 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Note on texts and dates
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 Work in sixteenth-century England
- Chapter 2 ‘Vpon the weke daies and worke daies at conuenient times’: acting as work in Elizabethan England
- Chapter 3 ‘Though he be a king, yet he must labour’: work and nobility in Shakespeare's histories
- Chapter 4 ‘We may shut vp our shops, and make holiday’: workers and playhouses, 1599–1601
- Chapter 5 ‘Work upon that now!’: labour and status on the stage, 1599–1610
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
When the Lord Chamberlain's Men first performed Henry V, in or around 1599, who, if anyone, was working in the playhouse?
On the basis of the Chorus's opening speech, it seems to be the actors themselves:
O, pardon! since a crooked figure may
Attest in little place a million,
And let us, ciphers to this great accompt,
On your imaginary forces work.
(Pro. 15–18)Elsewhere, however, it seems to be the audience who are asked to work:
Work, work your thoughts, and therein see a siege.
(III. Cho. 25)But now behold,
In the quick forge and working-house of thought,
How London doth pour out her citizens!
(V. Cho. 22–4)Earlier on in the speech before Act III, though, the audience is told not to work but to ‘Play with your fancies: and in them behold / Upon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing’ (III. Cho. 7–8). Yet, before the final act, the Chorus insists on his own status as a player: ‘myself have play'd / The interim, by rememb'ring you ‘tis past’ (V. Cho. 42–3).
As this selection of quotations demonstrates, the speeches of the Chorus in Henry V have frequent recourse to the language of work and of play when describing how dramatic illusion is created. However, they are also noticeably inconsistent about whether the playhouse is a place of work and, if so, who is doing the working.
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- Information
- Work and Play on the Shakespearean Stage , pp. 87 - 118Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2008