Rogues' licence: counterfeiting authority in Early Modern literature

Dunne, Derek ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8860-5239 2017. Rogues' licence: counterfeiting authority in Early Modern literature. Shakespeare Studies 45 , pp. 137-143.

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Abstract

ON JANUARY 13,1580 "a man was drawn to St. Thomas of Watring's, & there hanged, headed, & quartered, for begging by a license, whereunto the Queen's hand was counterfeited."1 For imitating the monarch's hand, the beggar's head is cut off. In the space allotted, I wish to demonstrate the significance of the early modern license in its myriad forms to the drama of Shakespeare and his contemporaries. It was the license of the Master of the Revels that enabled the originary performance of early modern drama. Licenses were issued for begging, to victims of fire or shipwreck, or as permission to collect fuel, in an effort to curb the activities of "rogues, vagabonds and sturdy beggars."2 Players required separate licenses for performance, touring, printing, and the theater building itself. While the necessity of licensing early modern drama is well known,3 little work has been undertaken on the material license itself, and how an intimate knowledge of such bureaucratic procedures may have left its mark on the composition of early modern literature. In particular, by looking beyond dramatic licenses, and examining how this type of document was used more widely in early modern England, it is possible to shed fresh light on drama's engagement with larger issues including social mobility, fear of forgery, and the fragile construction of authority in early modern England. While a detailed analysis of early modern literature is not possible here, I hope to prove the potential of this approach across a spectrum of plays and authors.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	English, Communication and Philosophy
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PR English literature
Publisher:	Fairleigh Dickinson University Press
ISSN:	0582-9399
Last Modified:	23 Feb 2023 15:39
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/106545

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