ALPHONSVS, KING OF ARRAGON

Alphonsus (on-line text) is a play printed in 1599 - but, seeing as it was written by Robert Greene (who died somewhat earlier) it is safe to assume it was in fact printed only after its useful stage life was over and the last drop of profit for the theatre company which owned it, came from the disreputable act of selling the text on.
One date given as a possible performance is 1587 - and by the Queen's Men. This puts it firmly in the realms of Shakespeare acting territory - at least one scholar suggests Shakespeare acted with the Queen's men - and he surely would know the play anyway.
It's not a bad play - its not the sort of play I'd give stage room to myself, but I can see the attraction - it is entertaining: It has all the elements needed for killing an hour or two before bedtime, and the language is quite good.
And straight away I'm into the entertainment at the end of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'!
I couldn't stop thinking of 'The Dream' as I read - a snippet here, a sound there - and an idea or two.
If you want to know where Bottom gets his idea of declamatory acting from - and such delightful alliteration - read no further than here - Boom Boom Boom!
Amazon fighting and winning love doing injury - well, it's almost here.
And women being meant to flee, not chase - 'were not meant to woo' - almost word for word - almost - here.

But it's not only 'The Dream' - and the words: There's the stage action - there's a good dynamic at times - a flow of action, a movement of scene to scene.

I was reminded of the early History plays - the movement of armies - especially in the second two parts of Henry VI.

Fascinating too was the 'speechifying' - Here I was thrown back all the way to Beowulf, and the Anglo-Saxon penchant for self promotion - half the battle is in a good speech.

Well, tomorrow I'll be delivering two of the greatest - from Henry V - along with a couple of anti-dotes from Richard II - and Mr Greene is going to be haunting the party too.
Technorati Tags: Shakespeare, Robert Greene, Complete Works

Johannes Factotum

Yes, trust them not, for there is an upstart crow, beautified with our feathers, that, with his Tygers heart wrapt in a Players hide, supposes he is as well able to bumbast out a blanke verse as the best of you; and being an absolute Johannes Factotum, is in his owne conceit the onely Shake-scene in a countrie.


Back to Mr Greene's outburst.

I've been reading a couple of his plays - and, by the standards of the time, they were not bad - in fact, they were made for a specific audience and served that audience well.

What has upset Mr Greene? And, as the Bordolators have done an effective knife job on his reputation, how can we look at this comment - fairly?

We all assume (meaning, I do) that the above quote is aimed at Shakespeare the writer - but I'm not so sure. That 'bombast out a blanke verse', the more I look at it, and the more I re-read of the plays of the time, seems a comment on Shakespeare the actor rather than Shakespeare the writer. Was Shakespeare in a Greene play - and 'bombasting away? Or did Greene see him in Marlowe (and it must have been a big role) mangling the verse? Was Shakespeare ham acting for the crowd?

You know, I wouldn't be surprised: One thing that makes his plays so successful is his attention to the groundlings.

And that 'Shake-scene'? That's a full throat shouting out the lines performance if ever I saw one.

Was Shakespeare guilty of something worse - dare he add extra lines to an already written play?

And was that a Greene play?

And was it a "popular" alteration?

I'll post soon on the couple of Greene plays I recently read (only a partial re-read this time) but I do actually suspect Mr Greene had something to complain of ...

... not the plagiarism that we see with hindsight - but the actor messing up the text (after all, what did Hamlet say on that?).

Technorati Tags: Shakespeare, Upstart Crow, Robert Greene

Things coming together!

A picture of the route has almost been formed - and a starting day set: It won't, I imagine, come as a surprise to people to know I will take the first steps on 'St George's Day'.
A surge of ancestor pride - I refuse to accept it as Nationalism, and patriotism is too sexist for my tastes (distinctly "Macho" if you live here in Romania).

A couple of interesting points and ideas have popped up as I've researched.

One concerns the ubiquitous 'Greensleeves'.

I had, along with countless others always thought this was possibly composed by Fat Henry (8th King of the name in the English realms).

Apparently not. Too modern for him to have done. But quite possibly written around the time Shakespeare was starting out as a sonnet writer - remember that.

I am also, as you might have guessed from that little snippet, working my way through the music of the period too - and came across a great double cd - Celebrating Shakespeare: This World's Globe.

I'm also getting heavily tied down in the church music of the period and taking every excuse to listen to William Byrd.

And final snippet (No 3, for those counting) - Dido, Queen of Carthage! By Mr Marlow (e-refused).
Not a play I know well, possibly the first Mr M. wrote - with another (so Elizabethan).
What got to me was the almost opening - after a prologue of gods and things, there is a Storm.
Now, read that if you dare and refuse to connect with Shakespeare's 'Tempest' opening. Replace Prospero for Jupiter - Hermes - Ariel; We've got a daughter and a man washed up on shore - with his son ... all echoing the latter play - and all so much poorer!

I am tempted to suggest that this could well be a play Shakespeare acted in.
(If I was really pushing it - and speculation is firmly drifting into dreamland now - I'd be tempted to say it could well be the first play Shakespeare acted in! And did he play Jupiter?)

The final scattered thought comes from slightly later in the same play - Aeneas has one of those speeches which point out beautifully the difference between Shaksper and Marlow (e-less in Timisoara): The mighty line.
It's a great speech to 'Bombast' out. Is this the sort of thing Shakes was trying to copy early on?



Technorati Tags: Shakespeare

Hack adaptor?

First play on my list is going to be Two Gentlemen of Verona: And just to prepare the ground, I thought I better check out the sources.

One of those intriguing snippets has poopped (poo, not pop) out about the story - In the words of Wiki, where I checked the original, Shakespeare, "... could have learned of it from an anonymous English play of 1585, The History of Felix and Philiomena, which is now lost."

Hold on ... yesterday we decided Young Will was an actor - he was on stage in other people's plays, and they are going to have an influence on what he writes ...

Today we get his first play is possibly an adaptation of an already written adaptation of a 'prose romance' (Diana Enamorada by the Portuguese writer Jorge de Montemayor).

And hiding in the wings is the second play - The Shrew! Which could also have a source in a previous play - although Wiki ain't good on that: Will someone go and correct them please?

I suspect there is a theme developing here - was Shakes employed to steal and do cover versions of the successes of other theatres?

Makes sense of the way both he and his theatre group kept close his own later works - he learnt from his own experiences.

It also gives a certain piquancy to the much vilified Robert Greene:

There is an upstart crow beautified with our feathers that, with his 'tiger's heart wrapped in a player's hide,' supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blank verse as the best of you; being an absolute Johannes Factotum, in his conceit the only shake-scene in a country.

Robert Greene
Groatsworth of Wit (1592)