FIRST DAYS IN LONDON
Three hundred and twenty-four years have passed since William
Shakespeare set out to prove his fortune in London, and in those
far-away days that his genius makes so real for us the journey was long
and at times dangerous. Three days would suffice in fine summer weather,
while four or five might be required in winter time, when rivers were
swollen and fords were dangerous. Not only were roads bad, but bridges
were conspicuous by their absence. To send a letter from Stratford to
London and receive a reply to it would occupy nearly a fortnight, and
if, as some writers believe, Shakespeare had already made a certain name
by his skilled handling of other men's work when touring companies came
to his town, it is quite clear that his best chance of establishing
himself as a playwright would be found in the metropolis. Even if he had
not found trouble in his native place, he could not hope to thrive
there. It is thought that he travelled to town on foot by way of Oxford
and High Wycombe, and that once in the metropolis he sought a friend of
the family, one Richard Field of Stratford, who had left Warwickshire
seven years before, and after serving his apprenticeship to a
printer, had set up an office of his own in Blackfriars.
=THE EARL OF SOUTHAMPTON
In the National Portrait Gallery=
It is possible that he owed his introduction to the world of the London
theatre to Field, and that at one of the only two houses in the
metropolis, "The Theatre" in Shoreditch or "The Curtain" in Moorfields,
he served for a time in a very humble capacity, looking after the horses
of the men of fashion who rode to the play. The keen relish with which
he deals with the moods and thoughts of ostlers, stable-boys, and the
lower classes that frequented the stable and the theatre, lends a
certain countenance to the legend. A year later, when his friend Field
had been admitted a member of the Stationers' Company, Shakespeare found
his employment inside one of the two theatres--probably the house in
Shoreditch; some writers have said that his first work there was that of
a call-boy. It is certain, at least, that his apprenticeship was a hard
one, and that in those early days his contributions to the support of
the Warwickshire home must have been few and scanty.
When Shakespeare came to town there were some half-dozen companies of
licensed actors, that is to say, companies that enjoyed and exercised
their rights under an Act of Parliament (14 Eliz. c. 2). It said that
all actors, save those who held the licence of a peer of the realm or
other person of importance, were to be treated as rogues and vagabonds.
The company to which Shakespeare was admitted derived its rights from
the Earl of Leicester, and soon after he joined, if not before, it
passed under the support of the Earl of Derby, and in later years under
the supreme patronage of King James I., whose admiration for the poet
and his works was very large and real. James Burbage was owner of "The
Theatre," and it was in his time, we may presume, that Shakespeare acted
as ostler and call-boy. But he must have risen up from the ranks at no
small pace when his gifts became well known, for not only do we find him
a regular member of the company, but a friend of the leading members,
men like Richard Burbage, son of the proprietor, and Augustus Phillips.
And at "The Theatre" in Shoreditch he won some fame as a playwright,
though it was not at "The Theatre" but at "The Rose," a new house on the
Bankside at Southwark, that the poet's genius was to "blossom and bud
and fill the face of the world with fruit."
The close of the sixteenth century was a season of considerable activity
among actors; the destruction of the "galleons of Spain" had relieved
the country of a very real danger. Some of the leading companies
amalgamated for a time when in town; new houses were springing up. In
addition to "The Rose" there was one at Newington Butts, and in 1599 the
Burbages transplanted "The Theatre" to Bankside and called it "The
Globe." Here Shakespeare did the most of his work and made the most of
his reputation, acquiring considerable wealth the while.
James Burbage built the Blackfriars Theatre, to which Shakespeare
brought his company shortly before he retired to Stratford. He
gradually acquired certain interests in the theatres, so his profits
were not only those of actor and playwright. The wealth that was to be
his was drawn from three sources.