The English Clown Tradition from the Middle Ages to Shakespeare
By (author) Robert Hornback
Publication date:
17 September 2009Length of book:
256 pagesPublisher
D.S.BrewerISBN-13: 9781846157202
A new account of medieval and Renaissance clown traditions reveals the true extent of their cultural influence.
From the late-medieval period through to the seventeenth century, English theatrical clowns carried a weighty cultural significance, only to have it stripped from them, sometimes violently, by the close of the Renaissance when the famed "license" of fooling was effectively revoked. This groundbreaking survey of clown traditions in the period looks both at their history, and reveals their hidden cultural contexts and legacies; it has far-reaching implications not only for our general understanding of English clown types, but also their considerable role in defining social, religious and racial boundaries. It begins with an exploration of previously un-noted early representations of blackness in medieval psalters, cycle plays, and Tudor interludes, arguing that they are emblematic of folly and ignorance rather than of evil. Subsequent chapters show how protestants at Cambridge and at court, during the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward, patronised a clownish, iconoclastic Lord of Misrule; look at the Elizabethan puritan stage clown; and move on to a provocative reconsideration of the Fool in King Lear, drawing completely fresh conclusions. Finally, the epilogue points to the satirical clowning which took place surreptitiously in the Interregnum, and the (sometimes violent) end of "licensed" folly.
Professor ROBERT HORNBACK teaches in the Departments of Literature and Theatre at Oglethorpe University.
From the late-medieval period through to the seventeenth century, English theatrical clowns carried a weighty cultural significance, only to have it stripped from them, sometimes violently, by the close of the Renaissance when the famed "license" of fooling was effectively revoked. This groundbreaking survey of clown traditions in the period looks both at their history, and reveals their hidden cultural contexts and legacies; it has far-reaching implications not only for our general understanding of English clown types, but also their considerable role in defining social, religious and racial boundaries. It begins with an exploration of previously un-noted early representations of blackness in medieval psalters, cycle plays, and Tudor interludes, arguing that they are emblematic of folly and ignorance rather than of evil. Subsequent chapters show how protestants at Cambridge and at court, during the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward, patronised a clownish, iconoclastic Lord of Misrule; look at the Elizabethan puritan stage clown; and move on to a provocative reconsideration of the Fool in King Lear, drawing completely fresh conclusions. Finally, the epilogue points to the satirical clowning which took place surreptitiously in the Interregnum, and the (sometimes violent) end of "licensed" folly.
Professor ROBERT HORNBACK teaches in the Departments of Literature and Theatre at Oglethorpe University.
Hornback's highly original approach works; he offers a balanced, thorough analysis of the ideological underpinnings of a heretofore lost tradition of early English satirical clowning that manages to restore the historical complexity that New Historicists' readings frequently simplified. Moreover, the wealth of close readings combined with his use of many colorful primary texts renders this richly complex yet ultimately accessible work appropriate to scholar and student alike.