Dear Me,

    Another rousing addition to the biography of a most clever and witty man.

Cheers

Murielle

Shakespeare: A Biography

by

Peter Ackroyd

Part One

Chapter 13:  That's Not So Good Now

In the early years of Shakespeare's schooling his father persevered in illegal dealings in wool and in money-lending.  They were in a sense conventional offences, and not likely to hurt John Shakespeare's reputation.  They were noted in the public records but but he continued with his normal civic duties.  In 1572 there was a dispute with the lord of the manor, the Earl of Warwick.  A few months later John Shakespeare was in Warwick to attend a post-mortem on a local miller. Throughout his period he attended the requisite "halls" when the council met for business.

There is a pretty story concerning Shakespeare and his father on a journey.  Elizabeth I was engaged in one of her periodic progresses, when, in the summer of 1575, she arrived at Kenilworth Castle.  The Earl of Leicester's Men were there to entertain her.  One of these theatrical interludes included the presentation of a mermaid and various nymphs, followed by Arion riding a on a dolphin.  Many of Shakespeare's biographers have insisted that it inspired a reference in Twelfth Night to "Arion on the Dolphine's backe"  It is at least suggestive.  And a pretty story does no harm.

It cannot be said that John Shakespeare's fortunes in this period were in anyway declining.  In 1575 he bought two houses in Stratford £40.  It seems likely that these were adjoining houses to the house in Henley Street, in which he could enlarge for his ever-growing family.  His relative affluence makes his subsequent conduct all the more puzzling. 

At the beginning of 1577, he left the council abruptly.  He had been present at all the deliberations for the last thirteen years, but after 1577 he only appears in "hall" once.  This strange withdrawal does not seem to have been prompted by personal animosities.  His colleagues treated him with patience and forbearance.  He was excused from the fines that were generally given for being absent and he remained on the list of aldermen for a further ten years.

There have been many reasons given for this absence, ranging from ill-health to possible drunkenness.  It was unlikely that he was in any financial trouble and seems to have remained prosperous throughout his son's time in Stratford.  A far more likely cause may have been his possible adoption of the old religion.  The year before his withdrawl from council a grand ecclesiastical commission was established by the Privy Council to investigate the religious affairs of the nation.

John Shakespeare's position was all the more precarious because of his marriage into the Arden family.  During this time the very Catholic Edward Arden, was engaged in a full feud with the Protestant Earl of Leicester, who had charge of the county.  Any member of the Arden family, however removed, could become an object of suspicion.  So the world of religious politics conspired against Shakespeare's father and obligated him to withdraw from public life.  His colleagues were reluctant to see his departure, but understood his reasons.

Shakespeare was thirteen when his father relinquished his public office.  Any effect on him can only be guessed, but at that age, rank and status were important to his peers.  In such a small and very hierarchical society, it seems he would have felt his father's departure from public life sharply.  Shakespeare's plays are filled with authoritative men who have failed, which could be seen as the very definition of tragedy.  The failure does bring about bitterness or anger of the writer, quite the contrary in fact.  It is probably the case that Shakespeare sympathises with failure.  It also could be that his father's public decline also became the context for his son's preoccupation with gentility and the restoration of the family honour. 

In the next four years John Shakespeare became entangled in further difficulties.  In 1580 the Shakespeares were selling land to relatives while arranging for its later reversion to them.  In the following year they sold their portion of the property in Snitterfield, once belonging to Robert Arden, to their nephew.

The most logical explanation to these complicated arrangements lies in John Shakespeare's position as a know recusant.  He was cited as some one who refused to attend church services and one of the penalties of this was the confiscation of land.  The situation was made worse by the death of Shakespeare's sister Anne, in 1579.  She was only eight years old.  The sorrows of the Shakespeare family are not open to inspection.