Marriott's List (1653)

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Background

In late 1653, the printer Richard Marriott entered twenty-one plays on the Stationers' Register. The entry is dated 29 November, although it appears between entries dated 22 and 30 December, so that it may well be misdated by a month. Only three of the plays, probably, are extant:

Glapthorne, The Parricide (printed by Marriott himself in 1654).
The Eunuch, which Bentley identifies with William Heminge's The Fatal Contract, printed by "J.M.", probably John Marriott, in 1653. This identification has been accepted by Carol A. Morley in her recent and definitive edition of Heminge (239-54).
The Thracian Wonder, printed in 1661 by Francis Kirkman with a (generally doubted) attribution to John Webster and William Rowley.

The other eighteen are lost, although at least five of the titles are also known from other references to those plays (The Proxy, A Fool and Her Maidenhead Soon Parted, The Younger Brother, The Noble Trial, and The Florentine Friend). "All in all, the list is an odd one which, taken as a whole, throws no light on any of the individual titles. One would like to guess that the list represents part of the repertory of some company, but the evidence is against it… In the absence of evidence one can only assume that Marriott had assembled a miscellaneous group of manuscripts which he intended to publish, but that he later abandoned nearly all of them" (Bentley, 5.1446).

Transcription

Cited from Bentley, 5.1445. Stationers' Register, 29 November 1653.

Rich: Marriott Entred for his copies the severall playes following (vizt)
The Paraside or Revenge for honor. by Henry Glapthorne.
The fflorentine friend
The Proxe or Loues after Game
The Eunuch a Tragedy
The Conceits
Salisbury Plaine a comedy.
The Womans Master Piece
Pitty the Maid
The Royall Choice by Sr Robt. Stapleton.
The Noble Rauishers
A Foole & her maiden head soone Parted
Supposed Inconstancy.
The Womans Law.
The Diuorse
The Bond Woman
Castara or Cruelty without hate
The Thracian Wonder
The Blacke Wedding.
The Law Case
The Younger Brother
The Noble Triall


Works Cited

Heminge, William. The Plays and Poems of William Heminge, ed. Carol A. Morley. Madison: Farleigh Dickinson University Press, 2006.


Site created and maintained by Matthew Steggle: updated, 3 December 2009.