Cymbeline - eTheses Repository - University of Birmingham

i.
Introduction.
Theatrical criticism of Cymbeline during the nineteenth
century rarely brought forth any insights which diverged
substantially from those offered by literary critics. It
seldom failed to arouse discussion of the idea that certain
of Shakespeare's works were unfitted for representation,
not because of profanity or bad taste, but because they had
an "un-dramatic l! form. Antony and Cleopatra and The Tempest
were the most notoriously "un-dramatic", and the latter
received so few performances in its unadulterated form
before Macready, Lean and Phelps, that Macready was able to
write with satisfaction concerning his production:
It has given the public a play of Shakespeare
which had never been seen before. 1
Cymbeline had been more frequently performed, but with the
exception of relatively short periods in the fifties,
sixties and nineties (after the production of thelps, Helen
Faucit's Drury Lane appearances, and Irving's Lyceum
staging) it was likely that most members of an audience at
one of the revivals would not have had the opportunity to
see the play. A manager might console himself with this
reflection on a duty fulfilled to art, as he counted the
receipts, for towards the end of the century the unprofitable
nature of Shakespearean production was widely and
frequently discussed. In 1864, vhen Helen Faucit appeared
in the last "fashionable" production of the play before
1896, the Drury Lane management was "bein,: prair-ed for its
stoic devotion to the performance of classics (a policy
soon abandoned) and pessimists (with in some cases a vested
interest akin to that of Alfred iiunn) were fiiiuin t . comfort
in the fulfilment of a prophecy made by 'Jibber:
This voluptuous expedient ... of indulging
the taste with several theatres, vill amount
to much the same variety as that of a certain
oeconomist, who, to enlarge his hospitality,