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Shakespeare's audiences
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From the Roxburghe Ballads.
The public theatres were built to cater to a wide variety of levels of income*, from the "groundlings" to those who paid far more to sit in the "Gentlemen's rooms" or the "Lords' room." Apprentices* who could not read would have watched the same play as a member of the Court with a University education. Queen Elizabeth herself saw many of Shakespeare's plays in special performances at Court.
The range of social and educational levels in the audience was about as wide as it could be, especially since the brothels of London were close to where the theatres were built. And since the plays attracted a wide range of social levels, it is likely that a similar degree of variety in opinions and beliefs would have been present; it is one of the great strengths of Shakespeare's plays that they make remarkably few assumptions about the audience's responses to the great questions of that (or our) day. (The range of belief in the audience is explored further in the section on the supernatural.)
Perhaps the most sophisticated members of Shakespeare's audience would have been the actors for whom he wrote the parts; it was two actors who supervised the publication of the First Folio, and ever since it has been actors not scholars who have kept the plays on the stage.
1.The cost of a trip to the theatre
An apprentice could pay one penny to be a groundling, while a wealthy patron could spend twelve times as much (a shilling) to see the play from the Lord's Room.
More about how much this might mean in today's money.
2.Apprentices and "hard handed men" at the plays
Catherine Loomis reminded those on the Shaksper discussion list of an early reference to the tastes of Shakespeare's audience.
"Antony Scoloker, in the splenetic preface to Daiphantus, or the Passions of Love (1604), comments on genre and audience:
... yet your Genius ought to live with an honest soule indeed. It should be like the Never-too-well read Arcadia, where the Prose and Verce, (Matter and Words) are like his Mistresses eyes, one still excelling another and without Corivall; or to come home to the vulgars Element, like Friendly Shake-speares Tragedies, where the Commedian rides, when the Tragedian stands on Tip-toe. Faith it should please all, like Prince Hamlet. But in sadnesses, then it were to be feared he would runne mad.
Scoloker's scorn for the vulgars and their element, and for Shakespeare's ability to please all, supports the conjecture that, however they were paying for it, hard-handed men were getting to the theater" (posted on Monday, 15 Feb 1999).
The cost of a trip to the theatre
An apprentice could pay one penny to be a groundling, while a wealthy patron could spend twelve times as much (a shilling) to see the play from the Lord's Room.


The first Globe
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Detail of the previous view of London, showing the first Globe.
This view of the first Globe by the Dutch engraver J.C. Visscher was printed in 1625, but must be taken from an earlier drawing, since the first Globe was burnt to the ground* in 1613 at the first performance of Shakespeare's Henry VIII. There is substantial evidence that Visscher simplified the appearance of the theatre by portraying it as octagonal: most scholars now believe that it had twenty sides, thus making it seem more circular than in this engraving.
The first Globe was built in 1599 from the timbers of the old Theatre.
One of the first plays performed at the Globe, in September 1599, was Julius Caesar. Thomas Platter, a Swiss traveller, visited a performance: "[ I ] saw the tragedy of the first emperor Julius Caesar with nearly fifteen characters very well acted. At the end of the comedy [!] they danced* gracefully. . . , two dressed in men's and two in women's clothes."
The flag of the Globe depicted Hercules with the world on his shoulders. The playhouse motto was "Totus mundus agit histrionem," roughly translated as "All the world's a stage." See Jacques' well-known aria on the subject, As You Like it, 2. 7. 138-65.
1.How to put out a fire
In a letter dated July 2, 1613, Sir Henry Wootton recounted: "yet nothing did perish but wood and straw, and a few forsaken cloaks; only one man had his breeches set on fire, that would perhaps have broiled him, if he had not by the benefit of a provident wit put it out with bottle ale."
(More on the fire)
2.Graceful dancing
Platter is describing a Jig--a comic song and dance routine often performed after plays, in particular tragedies, to send the audience home happy.
Interestingly enough, the great Greek tragedies seem similarly to have been followed by jigs, or "satyr plays."





Shakespearian fool
The Shakespearian fool (or Shakespearean fool) is a recurring character type in the works of William Shakespeare.
'The Fool… the uncanniest character in Shakespeare… humanizes Lear, and makes the dread king accessible to us.'
Harold Bloom, Shakespeare: The invention of the human

Shakespearean fools are usually clever peasants or commoners that use their wits to outdo people of higher social standing. In this sense, they are very similar to the real fools, clowns, and jesters of the time, but their characteristics are greatly heightened for theatrical effect. They are largely heterogeneous. [1] The "groundlings" (theater-goers that were too poor to pay for seats and thus stood in the front by the stage) that frequented the Globe Theater were most likely particularly drawn to these Shakespearian fools or clowns. However they were also favoured by the nobility. Most notably, Queen Elizabeth I was a great admirer of the popular clown, Richard Tarlton. For the Bard himself, however, actor Robert Armin may have proved vital to the cultivation of his fools.[2]
The Changing Trope of the Fool:
The fool was not a new character on stage. Indeed, a tradition of jesters had long prevailed in aristocratic courts. The jester, however, was a dynamic and changing part of royal entertainment. Shakespeare both borrowed from the new motif of the jester and contributed to its rethinking. Whereas the jester of old often regaled his audience with forms of clowning--tumbling, juggling, stumbling, and the like--Shakespeare's fool, in sync with Shakespeare's revolutionary ideas about theatre, began to depart from a simple way of representation. Like other characters, the fool began to speak outside of the narrow confines of exemplary morality, to address themes of love, psychic turmoil, and all of the innumerable themes that arise in Shakespeare, and indeed, modern theater.
Perhaps central to the Bard's redrawing of the fool was the actor Robert Armin:
...Shakespeare created a whole series of domestic fools for [Armin]. [His] greatest roles, Touchstone in "As You Like It,"(1599), Feste in "Twelfth Night,"(1600), and (the) fool in "King Lear,"(1605); helped Shakespeare resolve the tension between thematic material and the traditional entertainment role of the fool. Armin became a counter-point to the themes of the play and the power relationships between the theatre and the role of the fool--he manipulates the extra dimension between play and reality to interact with the audience all the while using the themes of the play as his source material. Shakespeare began to write well-developed sub-plots expressly for Armin's talents. A balance between the order of the play and the carnevalized inversion factor of festive energy was achieved. Armin was a major intellectual influence on Shakespeare's fools. He was attuned to the intellectual tradition of the Renaissance fool yet intellectual enough to understand the power of the medieval tradition. Armin's fool is a stage presence rather than a solo artist. His major skills were mime and mimicry; even his improvisational material had to be reworked and rehearsed. His greatest asset was as a foil to the other stage actors. Armin offered the audience an idiosyncratic response to the idiosyncrasies of each spectator.[3]
Dramatic function:
'That, of course, is the great secret of the successful fool - that he is no fool at all.'
Isaac Asimov, Guide to Shakespeare.[4]
Some have argued that the clowning in Shakespeare's plays may have been intended as "an emotional vacation from the more serious business of the main action"[5]. Clowning scenes in Shakespeare's tragedies mostly appear straight after a truly horrific scene: The Gravediggers in Hamlet after Ophelia's suicide; The Porter in Macbeth just after the murder of the King; and as Cleopatra prepares herself for death in Antony and Cleopatra. Nevertheless, it is argued that Shakespeare's clowning goes beyond just 'comic relief', instead making the horrific or deeply complex scenes more understandable and "true to the realities of living, then and now"[6] by shifting the focus from the fictional world to the audience's reality and thereby conveying "more effectively the theme of the dramas"[7].


Jean Dagnan-Bouveret - Hamlet and the Gravediggers
List of Shakespearian fools:
Bottom in A Midsummer Night's Dream
Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing
Touchstone in As You Like It
The Fool in King Lear
Trinculo in The Tempest
Costard in Love's Labours Lost
Feste in Twelfth Night
Launcelot Gobbo in The Merchant of Venice
Lavache in All's Well That Ends Well
Yorick in Hamlet
A Fool in Timon of Athens
Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream
Thersites in Troilus and Cressida
Clown in Othello
Dromio of Syracuse and Dromio of Ephesus in The Comedy of Errors
Speed in Two Gentlemen of Verona
Launce in Two Gentlemen of Verona
The Gravediggers in Hamlet
Citizen in Julius Caesar
Pompey in Measure for Measure
Clown in The Winter's Tale
Grumio in The Taming of the Shrew
Fools described:
TrinculoTrinculo is considered to be a jester, but as he is only seen with the drunken butler and Caliban, he does not have the stage time to act out the qualifications of a traditional fool. At the end of the play, however, it is revealed that he works for both Stephano and the King of Naples. He is a domestic buffoon, and is outfitted accordingly.
Launce and SpeedSpeed is a clever and witty servant, while Launce is simple and pastoral. There is no mention of specific dress, or any indications of the two being a domestic fool or jester.
FesteFeste is a hired and domestic fool for Olivia. He is referred to as "an allowed fool," "a set fool," and "the jester, that the Lady Olivia's father took much delight in." Feste claims that he wears "not motley" in his brain, so even though he dresses the part of the fool, he is not an idiot, and can see through the other characters. There is no other mention of his dress, other than what can be deduced from this quote.
Pompey - Measure for MeasureWhile this clown is the employee of a brothel, he can still be considered a domestic fool.
CostardThis clown is referred to as a "fool" in Act V, scene ii, but the word in this context simply refers to a silly man. He is not simple enough to be considered a natural fool, and not witty enough to be considered an artificial one. He is rather just a man from the country.
Launcelot GobboNowhere in the play does Gobbo do anything that qualifies him as an official fool or jester. Still, he is considered as such, perhaps because he is called a "patch" and a fool. It is possible that these terms refer rather to the idea of the clown. Either way, Gobbo is proof that Shakespeare did not necessarily constantly discriminate in his qualifications of clowns, fools, and jesters.
TouchstoneTouchstone is a domestic fool belonging to the duke's brother Frederick, and is one of the witty (or "allowed") fools. Accordingly, he is often threatened with a whip, a method of punishment often used on people of this category.
LavacheHe is a domestic fool, similar to Touchstone.
Clown - The Winter's TaleHe is simply a country booby.
The Fool - King LearThe Royal Shakespeare Company writes of the Fool:
There is no contemporary parallel for the role of Fool in the court of kings. As Shakespeare conceives it, the Fool is a servant and subject to punishment ('Take heed, sirrah - the whip ' 1:4:109) and yet Lear's relationship with his fool is one of friendship and dependency. The Fool acts as a commentator on events and is one of the characters (Kent being the other) who is fearless in speaking the truth. The Fool provides wit in this bleak play and unlike some of Shakespeare's clowns who seem unfunny to us today because their topical jokes no longer make sense, the Fool in King Lear ridicules Lear's actions and situation in such a way that audiences understand the point of his jokes. His 'mental eye' is the most acute in the beginning of the play: he sees Lear's daughters for what they are and has the foresight to see that Lear's decision will prove disastrous.[8]
Writes Jan Cott, in Shakespeare Our Contemporary,
The Fool does not follow any ideology. He rejects all appearances, of law, justice, moral order. He sees brute force, cruelty and lust. He has no illusions and does not seek consolation in the existence of natural or supernatural order, which provides for the punishment of evil and the reward of good. Lear, insisting on his fictitious majesty, seems ridiculous to him. All the more ridiculous because he does not see how ridiculous he is. But the Fool does not desert his ridiculous, degraded king, and accompanies him on his way to madness. The Fool knows that the only true madness is to recognize this world as rational.
Costumes:
“Motley is the only wear.”
--Shakespeare: As You Like It, ii. 7.
The costumes worn by Shakespearean fools were fairly standardized at the Globe Theatre. The actor wore a ragged or patchwork coat. There were often bells along the skirt and on the elbows. They wore closed breeches with tights, with each leg a different color. A monk-like hood, covering the entire head was positioned as a cape, covering the shoulders and part of the chest. This hood was decorated with animal body parts, such as donkey's ears or the neck and head of a rooster. The animal theme was continued in the crest worn as well.
The actor had props. Usually he carried a short stick decorated with the doll head of a fool or puppet on the end. This was an official bauble or scepter, which had a pouch filled with air, sand, or peas attached as well. He wore a long petticoat of different colors, made of expensive materials such as velvet trimmed with yellow.
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Book IX (1104 lines): Satan enters the serpent and persuades Eve to eat from the forbidden tree. Eve, disordered in her passions, comes to Adam and persuades him to eat, or he persuades himself to join her in a common doom since he cannot resist the bond of flesh between them (left rib, in Milton's version). They eat, they mess around some, and they discover guilt, which apparently requires clothing and a huge fight.