In November, 1589, the company acting at the Blackfriars Theatre thought
it would be advantageous to their interests to send in to the Privy
Council a memorial, certifying that they had never given cause of
displeasure by introducing upon the stage 'matters of State or Religion'.
The actors who signed this memorial styled themselves 'Her Majesty's Poor
Players', and among them appears the name of William Shakspere. We here
meet the Poet's name for the first time after he had left his home at
Stratford-on-Avon, about four years previously. What his employment had
been in the intervening period is a question which few of his biographers
have cared to ask, and which not one has answered.
It is usually supposed that immediately upon his arrival in London he
became in some way associated with the Stage,--but there is no evidence of
this. On the contrary, we shall give reasons for believing that coming to
London poor, needy, and in search of employment, he was immediately taken
into the service of Vautrollier the Printer.
THOMAS VAUTROLLIER, entitled in his patents 'typographus Londinensis, in
claustro vulgo Blackfriers commorans', was a Frenchman who came to England
at the commencement of Queen Elizabeth's reign. He was admitted a brother
of the Stationers' Company in 1564, and commenced business as Printer and
Publisher in Blackfriars, working in the same premises up to the time of
his death, which occurred in 1588. His character as a scholar stands high,
and his workmanship is excellent. He had a privilege, or monopoly, for the
printing and sale of certain books, as all the chief Printers then had.
Shortly before his death he married his daughter to Richard Field, who for
this reason, and because he succeeded to the premises and business of the
widow, is erroneously supposed by Ames to have served his apprenticeship
to Vautrollier. But why bring in the name of Richard Field? The reply is
important. Field was Shakspere's own townsman, and being of about the same
age and social rank, the boys probably grew up together as playfellows.
Field's father, Henry Field, was a Tanner at Stratford-on-Avon, and
Halliwell says 'a friend of Shakspere's family'. Early in 1578 young Field
came up to London, and at Michaelmas was apprenticed for seven years to
George Bishop, Printer and Publisher. Being in the same trade as
Vautrollier, Field would naturally become acquainted with him; and in
1588, a year after he was out of his time, he married Vautrollier's
daughter. Here, then, we seem to have a missing link supplied in the chain
of Shakspere's history. In 1585 Shakspere came up to London in a 'needy'
state. To whom would he be more likely to apply than to his old playmate
Richard Field. Field, a young man nearly out of his apprenticeship, on
terms of intimacy with Vautrollier, could do nothing better than recommend
him to the father of his future wife. Once introduced we may be sure that
Shakspere, with his fund of wit and good humour, would always be a welcome
guest; and that this friendly feeling was maintained between him and the
Vautrollier-Field families receives confirmation from the fact that
Richard Field, who succeeded to the shop and business soon after the death
of his father-in-law, actually put to press the two first printed works of
the great Poet, the 'Venus and Adonis', 1593, and the 'Lucrece', 1594.
Here then, in Vautrollier's employ, perhaps as a Press-reader, perhaps as
an Assistant in the shop, perchance as both, we imagine Shakspere to have
spent about three years upon his first arrival in the metropolis. Placed
thus in Blackfriars, close to the Theatre, close to the Taverns, close to
the Inns of Court, and in what was then a fashionable neighbourhood,
Shakspere enjoyed excellent opportunities of acquiring a knowledge of men
and manners.
Field did not succeed Vautrollier immediately upon his death. His widow
endeavoured for some time to carry on the business alone; but for some
unknown reason the Stationers' Company withheld their license; and after a
fruitless effort to obtain it, she was succeeded by her son-in-law. These
business changes would probably be the occasion of which Shakspere eagerly
availed himself to join the Players at the neighbouring theatre.
The Sonnets, although not printed until 1609, are generally acknowledged
to be among Shakspere's earliest efforts, and we cannot help imagining
that Sonnet XXIV was written while in the employment of Vautrollier; or
at any rate, while the shop, hung round with prints, was fresh in the
Poet's memory. May be some of their warmth was inspired by the charms of
the buxom widow herself who was apostrophised by the Poet when wishing her
To find where your true image _pictured_ lies,
Which in my bosom's _shop_ is hanging still,
That hath his _windows_ glazed with thine eyes.
_Sonnet_ xxiv.
At any rate, we have here in three lines as many metaphors, and all
derived from just such employment as we suppose Shakspere at that time to
have been engaged in.
Then, again, to a Printer's widow, not over young, what more telling than
the following reference?
Or what strong hand can hold Time's swift foot back?
Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?
O, none, unless this miracle have might,
That in _black ink_ my love may still shine bright.
_Sonnet_ lxvi.
Note here, that the jet black ink which everybody admires in old
manuscripts was much too thick for a running hand, and had long been
superseded by a writing fluid which, in the 16th century, was far from
equalling the bright gloss of Printing Ink.
Before turning to the internal evidence supplied by Shakspere's writings
in support of our theory, let us glance at the list of works printed and
published by Vautrollier, and see if Shakspere reflected any trace of
their influence upon his mind.
From Herbert's 'Typographical Antiquities' we find that in the 'Shop'
would be the two following works:
_A brief Introduction to Music. Collected by P. Delamote, a Frenchman;
Licensed._
_London_, 8vo., 1574.
_Discursus Cantiones; quæ ab argumento sacræ vocantur, quinque et sex
partivm. Autoribus Thoma Tallisio et Guilielmo Birdo. Cum Privilegio._
_London_, oblong quarto, 1575.
Delamote's Introduction, as well as the Sacred Songs by Tallis and Bird,
were Vautrollier's copyright, and we have already seen how intimate an
acquaintance Shakspere had with music. Might not the above works have been
the mine from which he obtained his knowledge?
Of religious works, Vautrollier printed and published several, all in
accordance with the principles of the great Reformation, and the writer
who argued that from his intimate knowledge of the tenets of Calvin,
Shakspere must have been himself a Calvinist, would have found sufficient
explanation of his special knowledge in the following books from
Vautrollier's press:
_The Neu Testament, with diversities of Reading and profitable
annotations. An epistle by J. Calvin, prefixed._
4to., 1575:
_Institutio Christianæ Religionis, Joanne Caluino authorè._