Isle of Dogs, The

Jonson, Ben and Nashe, Thomas(1597)

Historical Records

Henslowe's Diary

F. 232 (Greg, I.203)

The following entry does major work in providing a context for the lost Isle of Dogs. It gives a date which, in conjunction with the Privy Council letters and warrants, adds to the timeline of the events. It names William Birde ("borne"), who is here contracting with Edward Alleyn (and a witness named Robsone) to join the Admiral's men. It sets the terms of the contract. And it reveals why: the restraint against playing imposed by the Privy Council "by the means of playing the Jeylle of dooges." Although not every detail is equally relevant to the lost play, the entry is repeated here in its entirety in order to illustrate more fully the forgeries that had some credibility because of this legitimate entry.

M^rdom that the 10 of aguste 1597 w^m borne came & ofered

hime sealfe to come and playe w^th my lord admeralles mean

at my howsse called by the name of the Rosse setewate one the back

after this order folowinge he hathe Receued of me iij^d upon & a

sumsette to forfette vnto me a hundrethe marckes of lafull

money of Ingland yf he do not performe these thinges folowinge

that is presentley after libertie being granted for playinge to

come & playe w^th my lordes admeralles men at my howsse

aforesayd & not in any other howsse publicke a bowt london

for the space of iij yeares beginynge Jmediatly after this Re

straynt is Recaled by the lordes of the counsel w^ch Restraynt

is by the meanes of playinge the Jeylle of dooges yf he do not

then he forfettes this asumset afore or ells not wittnes to this

E Alleyn & Robsone

Forgeries in the Diary

John Payne Collier acquired access to Henslowe's Diary in 1830, the second theater historian to examine the manuscript (Edmond Malone was first). For three forgeries attributed to Collier concerning The Isle of Dogs, see Critical Commentary, below.

Acts of the Privy Council

28 July 1597 (Dasent, 27.313-13)

15 August 1597 (Dasent, 27.338)

8 October 1597 (Dasent, 28.33)

Theatrical Provenance

All indications are that The Isle of Dogs belonged to Pembroke's players at least by the summer of 1597. The company had arrived in London by February, where they leased the Swan playhouse on the Bankside. Francis Langley had had the playhouse built in the fall of 1594, and it was probably open for business by summer 1596. No documents reveal the identity of Langley's lessees until Pembroke's players arrive in February 1597. The company's run was abbreviated in late summer, in part if not entirely because of governmental distress at the playing of The Isle of Dogs.

Probable Genre(s)

Satirical comedy (Harbage)

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

None known.

References to the Play

Francis Meres, Palladis Tamia, 1598

"As Actæon was worried of his owne hounds: so is Tom Nash of his Isle of Dogs. Dogges were the death of Euripedes; but bee not disconsolate, gallant young Iuuenall, Linus, the sonne of Apollo died the same death. Yet God forbid that so braue a witte should so basely perish! Thine are but paper doggies, neither is thy banishment like Ouids, eternally to conuerse with the barbarous Getæ. Therefore comfort thyselfe sweete Tom, with Cicero's glorious return to Rome, and with the counsel Æneas gives to his seabeaten soldiers. Lib. I, Æneid (Smith, II.324).

Thomas Nashe, Nashes Lenten Stuffe, 1599

In the opening section ("The Praise of the red herring"), Nashe comments explicitly on the Isle of Dogs event: "The straunge turning of the Ile of Dogs from a commedie to a tragedie two summers past, with the troublesome stir which hapned aboute it, is a general rumour laid upon me, as had well neere confounded mee ...". He speaks of the exile enforced upon him and resultant melancholy caused by "the silliest millers thombe or contemptible stickle-banck of my enemies [who are] as busie nibbling about [his] fame as if [he] were a deade man thrown amongst them to feede upon." But he promises a revenge "hot a brooding" in the form of a pamphlet that will quiet the rumors. Circling back to fallout from the play, Nashe speaks of the "unfortunate imperfect Embrion of my idle hours, the Ile of Dogs before mentioned," the conception of which was so violent that it "was no sooner borne but [he] was glad to run from it [i.e., to Yarmouth]" (McKerrow 3.153) In a marginal note, Nashe adds: "An imperfect Embrion I may well call it, for I hating begun but the induction and first act of it, the other four acts without my consent, or the least guess of my drift or scope, by the players were supplied, which bred both their trouble and mine to (McKerrow 3.153-4)

Thomas Dekker, Satiromastix, 1601 (S. R. 11 November 1601; Q1602)

In an abrasive confrontation, Tucca, a blowhard captain, rails at Horace (Ben Jonson) that he has called Demetrius (Thomas Dekker) a "Iorneyman Poet"; Tucca then turns the insult on Horace: " but thou putst vp a Supplication to be a poore Iorneyman Player, and hadst beene still so, but that thou couldst not set a good face vpon't: thou hast forgot how thou amblest (in leather pilch) by a play-wagon, in the highway, and took'st mad Ieronimoes part, to get seruice among the Mimickes: and when the Stagerites banisht thee into the Ile of Dogs, thou turn'dst Ban-dog (villanous Guy) and euer since bitest, therefore I aske if th'ast been at Parris-garden, because thou hast such a good mouth, thou baitst well ..." (Google Books).

Critical Commentary

Privy Council Order

Wickham claims that the Swan "lost its license as a result of the performance of The Isle of Dogs in 1597 (vol.2, pt. 1, p. 134). [see xerox 2.1.279+ n#5 on "owners [of playhouses being brought] sharply to heel to reassure the government and admit of its entering upon a new agreement with the acting companies"; in note: companies "which acted regularly in London without inhibition after The Isle of Dogs affair of 1597 [were] the Lord Chamberlain's, another the Lord Admiral's and the third the Earl of Worcester's" (373, n. 5);

for more, see 2.part 2 xerox (whole chapter on 1597): p. 5 = "the performance ... which provoked an immediate Order from the Privy Council condemning both authors and actors to a spell in prison and authorizing the City Council to demolish all playhouses in and arund Londond." (2.2.5);

Forgeries

F. 29^v (Greg, I.57) (Collier, 94)

Lent the 14 may 1597 to Jubie vppon a notte

from Nashe twentie shellinges more for the Jylle

of dogges w^ch he is wrytinge for the company

In his edition of the diary, Collier appended a note to this entry, reinforcing his fraudulent point that Nashe was writing the play for the Admiral's men; he references the second forgery (F. 33, below), and refers the reader to a woodcut in Gabriel Harvey's "Trimming of Thomas Nash" which shows Nash in fetters.

F. 33 (Greg, I.62) (Collier, 98)

pd this 23 of aguste 1597 to harey porter

to carye to T Nashe nowe at this tyme in the

flete for wry tinge of the eylle of doggies ten

shellings to be paid agen to me when he cane

J saye ten shillings ............................. x^s

In his diary edition, Collier also appended a note to this forgery, referring readers to his 1831 History of English Dramatic Poetry in which he had first announced the contents of his forged entries (he referenced his Shakespeare as well).

F. 33^v (Greg, I.63) (Collier, 99)

pd vnto M^r Blunsones the M^r of the Reveles

man this 27 of aguste 1597 ten shillings for

newes of the restraynt beinge recaled by the

lordes of the Queenes counsel ............................. x^s

Collier's note in the diary on this third forgery merely rephrases the entry.

Works Cited

Bowers, Fredson. The Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker. 4 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1962.(Google Books, 1873 ed)

Collier, John Payne. The Diary of Philip Henslowe, from 1591 to 1609. London: Shakespeare Society, 1845.

Dasent, J. R., ed. Acts of the Privy Council of England. 32 vols. London:HMSO, 1890-1907. (British History Online)

Freeman, Arthur and Janet Ing Freeman. John Payne Collier: Scholarship and Forgery in the Nineteenth Century. 2 vols. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2004.

Ingram, William. A London Life in the Brazen Age: Francis Langley, 1548-1602. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1978.

McKerrow, Ronald B., ed. The Works of Thomas Nashe. 5 vols. London: A. H. Bullen, 1905. (Vol. 3)

Smith, G. Gregory, ed. Elizabethan Critical Essays. 3 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1904. (Meres excerpt)

Wickham, Glynne. Early English Stages, 1300 to 1660. 3 vols. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963.

Site created and maintained by Roslyn L. Knutson, Professor Emerita, University of Arkansas at Little Rock; updated 21 February 2012.