Martin Wiggins…

Martin Wiggins is a professor at the Shakespeare Institute. Invariably whilst I was a student there, he was dressed in black with a shock of silver hair. His intelligence and learning are humbling. His love of his subject matter cloaks his being. A good professor in other words.

Every student he has ever had, has personal stories of their encounters with him. Many are best told over a pint. His lesson on the death of Edward 2nd is a treat and every class that gets it, will never forget it. Never!

Martin Wiggins is probably the most vociferous anti-conspiracist I have ever met. As well as being a Marlowe scholar, he is well-versed in the Elizabethan underworld, and by now has probably read every extant play manuscript of the Jacobethan period. His publications can be perused here.

Every thursday evening at the Institute a small group lead by Martin and John Jowett would gather to read a contemporary of Shakespeare. Throw in some wine after Act 3 and everyone’s latent actor appears for the final Acts. Afterwards retire to the Windmill pub and discuss. For a Renaissance nerd, no better fare anywhere!

Books.google allows you to dip into books and I found this whilst surfing the other day. Shakespeare and the drama of his time you can read its introduction called ‘The Permeable Bard’, which is well worth reading. As an anti-conspiracist, this kind of scholarship is exciting.

It outlines the practice of Jacobethan playwrights and how much they depended on one another. Shakespeare was not an isolated phenomenon. He did not write in an ivory tower tuning into the prism of bright genius. He is steeped instead in the ink of many writers and the thoughts of everyman, through Ancient history to his own time.

Another book I found and now want to read is The English Renaissance stage : geometry, poetics, and the practical spatial arts 1580-1630 by Henry S. Turner. The whole spatial symbolism is an aspect of Elizabethan society we tend to miss.

The eosterica of the time was far more closely aligned with the new-appearing inquiries of Science. Practical science, such as architecture and engineering, is adorned with forgotten reasons for designing in a specific way.

I spent monday afternoon in the Univ. of Amsterdam’s special book collection looking for W.W. Greg’s work on printers of the 16th/17thC. What a scholar! He furthers the scholarship of people before him and expects the future will hold another scholar to succeed him. Looking to his sources provides a tradition of scholarship that quickly leads you away from Shakespeare and into the period as a whole.

Actually I really needed A W Pollard, found his bibliography of Quartos and Folios, put it in a queue and wait for an e-mail. Then to fall to photographing facsimiles of Sh’s Quarto Title-Pages printed between 1594 and 1616. And that result should then be visible above in the banner in a day or two, three.

Now I learned a superficial lot about early modern printing today. Most importantly about Thomas Vautrollier, the Huguenot master printer working out of Blackfriars. His only english apprentice was Richard Field. When he died in 1587 his apprentice married his widow.

Many biographers amend this to possibly his daughter, Jacklin. Today I read a transcript of Vautrollier’s Will. And there is no mention of a daughter, only 4 sons. His wife Jaklin is mentioned, ergo Richard Field married Vautrollier’s widow. Unless the Will is another Collier forgery!

Vautrollier was allowed into the Stationer’s Company as an alien because of the quality of his work. He was also allowed to have 6 apprentices either French or Flemish. Besides his Press near Ludgate in Blackfriars, Vautrollier was a bookseller in Edinburgh from the late 1570’s. He had many well-connected customers for his wares.

He finally established his own press in ‘auld reekie’ in 1584, which he dismantled and brought back to London the year before his death in 1587. His son inherited it. The Scots don’t like to admit it, but he is credited with teaching them the ‘art’ of printing.

I’ll take better notes next time i visit. Uncovered, also new to me, some information about early presses in Norwich, apparently a place to flee religious persecution for mainland Europeans in the 1570’s. Also the Bristol book trade was mentioned and the Scottish and Irish printers too.

Don’t forget book-lovers, the Frankfurt Book Fair was happening every year Shakespeare was alive!

Oh yeah, I added a quiz on the Sonnets under the Quiz on the first lines of the plays in the top bar, above. Obviously!