Historical Context

The Rebirth of Learning Sometime around the year 1350, at the end of the Middle Ages, Italian city-states) such as Venice and Genoa, began to trade extensively with the East. With trade came more knowledge and growing curiosity about the world. Soon, Italy was leading the way in a flowering of European learning known as the Renaissance (REHN uh sons). Commerce, science, and the arts blossomed as people shifted their focus to the interests and pursuits of human life here on earth. The astronomers Copernicus and Galileo questioned long-held beliefs to prove that the world was round and that it circled the sun, not vice versa, Navigators, including Christopher Columbus and Ferdinand Magellan, braved the seas in tiny boats to explore new lands and seek new trade routes. Religious thinkers, such as Martin Luther and John Calvin, challenged the authority of the Roman Catholic Church and spurred the Protestant Reformation. Artists, including Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, painted and sculpted lifelike human beings. Writers, such as Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare, wrote insightfully about complex human personalities in fiction and drama.

The Renaissance in England The Renaissance was slow to come to England. The delay was caused mainly by civil war between two great families, or houses, claiming the English throne- York and the House of Lancaster. The conflict ended in 1485, when Henry Tudor of the House of Lancaster took the throne as King Henry VII. After a successful rule in which English commerce expanded, he was succeeded by his son Henry Vill, whose reign was filled with turmoil. Henry sought a divorce from the Spanish princess Catherine of Aragon so that he could remarry and possibly have a son. He was convinced that only a male would be strong enough to hold the throne. When the Pope refused to grant the divorce, Henry renounced the Roman Catholic Church and made England a Protestant nation. Ironically, his remarriage, to a woman named Anne Boleyn, produced not a son but a daughter, Elizabeth. Even more ironically, when Elizabeth took the throne, she proved to be one of the strongest monarchs that England has ever known.

The symbol of the House of York was a white rose, while the symbol of the House of Lancaster was a red rose. For that reason, the civil wars fought between the two houses were called the Wars of the Roses. Shakespeare wrote several plays about English monarchs involved in these conflicts.

England's defeat of the Spanish Armada was a popular subject in fine art for centuries after the events. This print from 1850 shows one artist's imagining of the scene.

The Elizabethan World The reign of Elizabeth | is often seen as a golden age in English history. Treading a moderate and frugal path, Elizabeth brought economic and political stability to the nation, thus allowing commerce and culture to thrive. Advances in mapmaking helped English explorers sail the Old World and claim lands in the New. Practical inventions improved transportation at home. Craft workers created lovely wares for the homes of the wealthy. Musicians composed fine works for the royal court, and literature thrived, peaking with the plays of William Shakespeare.

London became a bustling capital on the busy River Thames (tehmz), where ships from all over the world sailed into port. The city attracted newcomers from the countryside and immigrants from foreign lands. Streets were narrow, dirty, and crowded, but they were also lined with shops where vendors sold merchandise from near and far. English women enjoyed more freedoms than did women elsewhere in Europe, and the class system was more fluid as well. To be sure, those of different ranks led very different lives. Yet even the lowborn were able to attend one of the city's most popular new amusements, the theater.

Elizabeth I and the Spanish Armada

Elizabeth I and the Spanish Armada In 1588, King Philip of Spain sent an armada, or fleet of military ships, to invade England At the time, Spain was the most powerful nation on earth. Nevertheless, the English soundly defeated the invading forces. The victory cemented Elizabeth's popularity with her people. Prior to the battle, the Queen visited her troops to inspire them to fight.

Theater in Elizabethan England

Audience members ate and drank while they watched the plays and apparently made a lot of noise. In 1900, archaeologists found the remains of the foundation of the original Globe Theatre. They also found the discarded shells of the many hazelnuts audiences munched on while watching performances.

Elizabethan audiences included all levels of society, from the "groundlings," who paid a penny entrance fee, to the nobility.

During the Middle Ages, simple religious plays were performed at inns, in castle halls, and on large wagons at pageants. In early Elizabethan times, acting companies still traveled the countryside to perform their plays. However, the best companies acquired noble patrons, or sponsors, who then invited the troupes to perform in their homes. At the same time, Elizabethan dramatists began to use the tragedies and comedies of ancient Greece and Rome as models for their plays. By the end of the sixteenth century, many talented playwrights had emerged, including Christopher Marlowe, Ben Jonson, and of course, William Shakespeare.

England's First Theater England's first successful public theater opened in 1576. Known simply as the Theatre, it was built by an actor named James Burbage. Since officials had banned the performance of plays in London, Burbage built his theater in an area called Shoreditch, just outside the London city walls. Some of Shakespeare's earliest plays were first performed here, including The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, which probably starred James Burbage's son, Richard, as Romeo.

When the lease on the Theatre expired, Richard Burbage, in charge of the company after his father died, decided to move the company to Southwark (SUHTH uhrk), just across the River Thames from London proper. The Shoreditch landlord had been causing problems, and Southwark was emerging as a popular theater district. Using timbers from the old theater building, Burbage had a newer theater built, bigger and better than the one before. It opened in 1599 and was called the Globe. Under that name it would become the most famous theater in the history of the English stage, for many more of Shakespeare's plays were first performed there.

Theater Layout No floor plans of the Theatre or the Globe survive, but people's descriptions and sketches of similar buildings suggest what they were like. They were either round or octagonal, with a central stage open to the sky. This stage stretched out into an area called the pit, where theatergoers called groundlings paid just a penny to stand and watch the play. The enclosure surrounding this open area consisted of two or three galleries, or tiers. The galleries accommodated audience members who paid more to watch the play while under shelter from the elements, and with some distance from the groundlings. The galleries probably also included a few elegant box seats, where members of the nobility could both watch the play and be seen by the masses.

Staging the Play The enclosure directly behind the stage was used not for seating but for staging the play. Actors entered and left the stage from doors at stage level. The stage also had a trap door through which mysterious characters, such as ghosts or witches, could disappear suddenly. Some space above the backstage area was used for storage or dressing rooms. The first gallery, however, was visible to the audience and used as a second stage. It would have been on a second stage like this that the famous balcony scene in The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet was performed.

These open-air theaters did not use artificial light. Instead, performances took place in the afternoon, when it was still light outside. There was also no scenery in the theaters of Shakespeare's day. Instead, the setting for each scene was communicated through dialogue. With no need for set changes, scenes could follow one another in rapid succession. Special effects were simple-smoke might billow at the disappearance of a ghost, for example. By contrast, costumes were often elaborate. The result was a fast-paced, colorful production that lasted about two hours.

The Blackfriars In 1609, Shakespeare's acting company began staging plays in the Blackfriars Theatre as well as the Globe. Located in London proper, the Blackfriars was different from the earlier theaters in which Shakespeare's plays were performed. It was an indoor space with no open area for groundlings. Instead, it relied entirely on a wealthier clientele. It was also one of the first English theaters to use artificial lighting, an innovation that allowed for nighttime performances.

Background of Romeo and Juliet

Written in 1594 or 1595, when Shakespeare was still a fairly young man, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet is a play about young love. The basic plot is simple: Two teenagers from feuding families fall in love and marry against their families' wishes, with tragic results. The story is set in Verona, Italy, and is based on an Italian legend that was fairly well known in England at the time.

Elizabethan writers deeply respected Italy as the birthplace of the Renaissance and often drew on Italian sources for inspiration, In 1562, an English poet named Arthur Brooke wrote The Tragicall History of Romeus and Juliet, a long narrative poem based on the Romeo and Juliet legend. Three years later, a prose version of the legend also appeared in England, Scholars believe, however, that Brooke's poem was Shakespeare's chief source.

That poem contains a great deal of moralizing, stressing the disobedience of the young lovers, along with fate, as the cause of their doom. Shakespeare's portrayal of the young lovers is more sympathetic, but he does stress the strong role that fate plays in their tragedy. In fact, at the very start of the play, the Chorus describes Romeo and Juliet as "star-crossed lovers," indicating that their tragic ending is written in the stars, or fated by forces beyond their control.

Of all the love stories ever written, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet may well be the most famous. Acting celebrities down through the centuries have played the leading role Edwin Booth and Ellen Terry in the nineteenth century, for example, and John Gielgud and Judi Dench in the twentieth. There have been dozens of film versions of the play, numerous works of art depicting its scenes, over twenty operatic versions, a famous ballet version by Tchaikovsky. The play is often adapted to reflect the concerns of different eras: West Side Story, for example, adapts the story as a musical set amid the ethnic rivalries of 1950s New York City; Romanoff and Juliet is a comedy of the Cold War set during the 1960s. One of the most recent popular adaptations was the 1996 film Romeo + Juliet starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes, which sets the play in the fictional location of Verona Beach, California.

The Globe Theatre

In 1599, the famous Globe Theatre was buitt. Referred to by Shakespeare as a "wooden Globe” could hold up to 3,000 spectators, and had as many as 20 sides. Using the Globe Terms, examine this unique theatre with its tiered slages, hidden doors, and unusual con The Globe Theatre burned down during a production of Henry VIll in 1613; reconstruction that same year. In 1664, the Globe was finally torn down.

1. Flag-signified which type of play was being potformed. black for tragedy, white for comedy, and red for history. The flag was flown high enough to most of London could see it waving from the top of the Globe. This was important because the theatre was located on the outskirts of the city across the Thames River.

2. The “Heavens”- celling over the stage that protected the actors from too much sun or rain. It also represented the sky and heavens and was painted blue with golden stare. Actors who played angols or spirits desconded from the hut on top of this "roof" to the main stage. The hut was also used for storage and addzional sound effects such as alarm balts, cannon fire, and thunder.

3. Tiring House-dressing and storage rooms. Actors rested here between scones and changed into lavish costumes. All large propa wore stored hero. The doors to the tiring house also served as actors' main entrances and exits.

4. Upper Stage-this "chamber" was used for most bedroom and balcony scanet.

5. Galleries-three covorad soating sections. Audiences paid more to ait on those tered wooden benchas undar n thatchad roof to keep out the sun and rain. For an additional ponny, a patron could borrow a cushion to sit on.

6. Main Stago-whero the main action of the piny took place, aspecially outdoor scenes of battlefields, forests, Or cityscapos. It was often called an "apron" stapo because audiences could sit around all threo sides. Tie stage was intentionally built four to five feet high so the audience could not jump up and into the action. For a larger fee, patrons could sometimes sit up on the stage next to the actors.

7. Inner Stage-this stage was used mostly for indoor scenes. It had a curtain that could be opened or closed for scene changes.

8. Open Yard-audiences paid one penny to stand here and watch the performance. rain or shine. Often those patrons, or groundlings, would participate in the play by cheering, shouting, or throwing snacks at the actors.

9. Support Pillars- these wooden pillars supported the root and were painted to look like marble. Actors used those pillars to hide on the main stage and observe other characters while speaking in “asides" to the audience.

10. Trap Door-actors playing ghosts or witches could rise or descend through this door built into the main stage. The cellarage underneath was referred to as "hell."

11. Entrance-"gatherers" stood at tho singlo antranco to collect one penny from onch patron por performanco. Patrons put thair pennies into a box, honce the term "box offico." I look audiences at loast hall an hour to file into the theatre.

12. Brick Foundation-the Globe’s foundation needed to be constructed of brick, as it was built on wet, marshy land close to the Thames River.