Shakespearean Playhouses: A History of English Theatres from the Beginnings to the RestorationAdams, Joseph Quincy
History
Shakespearean Playhouses: A History of English Theatres from the Beginnings to the Restoration
Adams, Joseph Quincy
Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616 -- Stage history -- To 1625; Theaters -- England -- London -- History
Into the construction of the new playhouse went the timber and other
materials secured from the old Theatre; but much new material, of
course, had to be added. It is a mistake to believe that the Globe was
merely the old "Theatre" newly set up on the Bankside, and perhaps
strengthened here and there. When it was completed, it was regarded as
the last word in theatrical architecture. Dekker seems to have had the
Globe in mind in the following passage: "How wonderfully is the world
altered! and no marvel, for it has lyein sick almost five thousand
years: so that it is no more like the old _Theater du munde_, than old
Paris Garden is like the King's garden at Paris. What an excellent
workman therefore were he, that could cast the _Globe_ of it into a
new mould."[391] In 1600 Henslowe and Alleyn used the Globe as
the model of their new and splendid Fortune. They sought, indeed, to
show some originality by making their playhouse square instead of
round; but this, the one instance in which they departed from the
Globe, was a mistake; and when the Fortune was rebuilt in 1623 it was
made circular in shape.
[Footnote 391: _The Guls Hornbook_, published in 1609, but written
earlier.]
[Illustration: THE SITES OF THE BEAR GARDEN, THE ROSE, AND THE GLOBE
Marked by the author on a plan of the Bankside printed in Strype's
_Survey of London_, 1720.]
[Illustration: THE BEAR GARDEN, THE ROSE, AND THE FIRST GLOBE
Compare this view of the Bankside with the preceding map. (From an
equestrian portrait of King James I, by Delaram. The city is
represented as it was when James came to the throne in 1603.)]
A few quotations from the Fortune contract will throw some light upon
the Globe:
With such-like stairs, conveyances, and divisions [to the
galleries], without and within, as are made and contrived in
and to the late-erected playhouse ... called the Globe.
And the said stage to be in all other proportions contrived
and fashioned like unto the stage of the said playhouse
called the Globe.
And the said house, and other things before mentioned to be
made and done, to be in all other contrivations,
conveyances, fashions, thing, and things, effected, finished
and done according to the manner and fashion of the said
house called the Globe, saving only that all the principal
and main posts ... shall be square and wrought pilasterwise,
with carved proportions called satyrs to be placed and set
on the top of every of the said posts.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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