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B
y the time the theaters
reopened after the plague
epidemic of 1592–94, the
literary success Shakespeare had
achieved with the publication of
Venus and Adonis in 1594 helped
him engineer a uniquely secure
position in the theater world.
With the theaters back in
business, Lord Hunsdon, the Lord
Chamberlain, reconstituted his
theater company as the Lord
Chamberlain’s Men. It brought
together leading actors of the day,
such as the tragedian Richard
Burbage, who would launch some
of Shakespeare’s greatest roles;
the clown William Kemp, who
triumphed as the comic creation
Falstaff; and Shakespeare himself.
Crucially, the leading actors all
owned shares in the company;
Shakespeare had a 10 percent stake.
That stake ensured Shakespeare had
an income of between £200 and £700
($325 and $1000) a year—by no means
a fortune, but far above any other
playwright’s earnings. Shakespeare
chose to live frugally, renting various
places to live in London, and by 1597,
he had saved enough to buy his family
a large house in Stratford—New
Place. He went on to buy land nearby,
and even a coat of arms.Creative drive
Shakespeare’s position in the
company gave him a platform for
his plays—and he made the most of
it. In the two-year break caused by
the plague, he had honed his poetic
and dramatic skills, and over the
next nine years, he wrote 17 plays,
ranging from the romantic
comedies A Midsummer Night’s
Dream and Twelfth Night to thestirring history of Henry V and the
tragedy of Hamlet. Many thousands
packed the theater to watch them.
Evidence for the dating of the
early plays is limited, but reference
to several of Shakespeare’s plays
is made by the little-known writer
Francis Meres in a book called
Palladis Tamia: Wit’s Treasury
published in 1598. Meres asserts
that “Shakespeare among the
English is the most excellent for
the stage; for comedy, witness his
Gentlemen of Verona, his Errors,
his Love Labour’s Lost, his Love
Labour’s Won, his Midsummer’s
Night Dream, and his Merchant of
Ven ice; for tragedy, his Richard II,
Richard III, Henry IV, King John,
Titus Andronicus, and his Romeo
and Juliet.” T hus schola rs have been
given a date by which all of these
plays must have been written.INTRODUCTION
1594
1595
1596
1596
1595
1596
1597
Spanish troops capture
Calais. Queen
Elizabeth expels all
Africans from England.Richard II, Romeo and Juliet,
and A Midsummer Night’s
Dream are written.Privateer Sir Francis
Drake departs on his
final voyage, a campaign
against the Spanish
Empire in the Caribbean.London theaters are
closed for months
when The Isle of Dogs,
by Ben Jonson and
Thomas Nashe is
labeled seditious.The Life and Death of
King John, The
Merchant of Venice,
and Henry IV Part 1
are written.London theaters
reopen in May after a
plague epidemic.
Love’s Labour’s Lost
and The Comedy of
Errors are written.The Merry Wives of
Windsor and Henry IV,
Part 2 are written.
Shakespeare buys
New Place as his
Stratford family home.The Lord Mayor of
London bans actors
from the city and tears
down inn-theaters; the
ban is lifted the
following year.1597