Елизаветинская Англия
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snydersВторая тем, что в ней есть то, что странно выглядит в биографии великого поэта и драматурга. Про Шекспира просто почти ничего не известно, не известно ходил
ли он в школу и откуда почерпнул глубокие познания в латинском и истории на уровне студента Кембриджа. От человека, написавшего много томов, не осталось ни строчки текста (
что в порядке вещей для тех времен*), а 6 подписей под разными официальными бумагами выглядят весьма странно. В его завещании на 3-х страницах (каждая страница подписана по-разному) ничего о его литературном труде не сказано и его произведения никак не упомянуты. Книги вообще не упомянуты. Одно из самых сильных противоречий в том, как характер крепкого менеджера, диллера (согласно документам о купле продаже, судах) мог сочетатся с поэзией и философией его пьес и сонетов.
Биография Кристофера Марлоу скорее похожа на детектив: большой поэт, выпускник Кембриджа, шпион, фальшивомонетчик, чтец для будущей королевы, которая королевой так и не стала.
Триста лет, считалось, что в 29 лет Марлоу был убит в пьяной драке в кабаке, т.к. имел скверный нрав. Потом в 1925 году всплыл интересный документ**.
Эти противоречия в биографиях породили десятки кандидатов***, на роль "настоящего Шекспира", и вряд ли мы уже сможем разобратся во всем до конца. Вполне возможно, что Шекспир - это все-таки сам Шекспир, просто профессия драматурга в те времена была ближе к ремеслу, чем к искусству. Пьесы строгали одну за другой, как сегодня голивудские боевики и относились к этим продуктам шоу-бизнеса без особого пиетета. И все равно надо искать, спорить, потому, что в процессе узнаешь столько интересного об это темной, живущей на острие ножа Англии елизаветинского времени, что это стоит того.
*No manuscript of any play has survived in the autograph of Kyd, Greene, Jonson, Chapman, Dekker, Heywood, Marston, Webster, Beaumont, Fletcher, or Ford -- to name only the better known dramatists....We may start with a truism: care will be taken to preserve those things recognized as possessing value -- and only those things.
**
The official account came to light only in 1925 when the scholar Leslie Hotson discovered the coroner's report of the inquest on Marlowe's death, held two days later on Friday 1 June 1593, by the Coroner of the Queen's Household, William Danby.[33] Marlowe had spent all day in a house in Deptford, owned by the widow Eleanor Bull, and together with three men: Ingram Frizer, Nicholas Skeres and Robert Poley. All three had been employed by one or other of the Walsinghams. Skeres and Poley had helped snare the conspirators in the Babington plot and Frizer would later describe Thomas Walsingham as his "master" at that time[34] although his role was probably more that of a financial or business agent as he was for Walsingham's wife Audrey a few years later.[35] These witnesses testified that Frizer and Marlowe had argued over the bill (now famously known as the 'Reckoning') exchanging "divers malicious words" while Frizer was sitting at a table between the other two and Marlowe was lying behind him on a couch. Marlowe snatched Frizer's dagger and wounded him on the head. In the ensuing struggle, according to the coroner's report, Marlowe was stabbed above the right eye, killing him instantly. The jury concluded that Frizer acted in self-defence, and within a month he was pardoned. Marlowe was buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard of St. Nicholas, Deptford immediately after the inquest, on 1 June 1593.
The complete text of the inquest report was published by Leslie Hotson in his book, The Death of Christopher Marlowe, in the introduction to which Prof. G. L. Kittredge said "The mystery of Marlowe's death, heretofore involved in a cloud of contradictory gossip and irresponsible guess-work, is now cleared up for good and all on the authority of public records of complete authenticity and gratifying fullness", but this confidence proved fairly short-lived.
Hotson himself had considered the possibility that the witnesses had "concocted a lying account of Marlowe's behaviour, to which they swore at the inquest, and with which they deceived the jury" but came down against that scenario.[36] Others, however, began to suspect that this was indeed the case. Writing to the Times Literary Supplement shortly after the book's publication, Eugénie de Kalb disputed that the struggle and outcome as described were even possible,[37] and Samuel A. Tannenbaum (a graduate of the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons) insisted the following year that such a wound could not have possibly resulted in instant death, as had been claimed.[38] Even Marlowe's biographer John Bakeless acknowledged that "some scholars have been inclined to question the truthfulness of the coroner's report. There is something queer about the whole episode" and said that Hotson's discovery "raises almost as many questions as it answers."[39] It has also been discovered more recently that the apparent absence of a local county coroner to accompany the Coroner of the Queen's Household would, if noticed, have made the inquest null and void.[40]
One of the main reasons for doubting the truth of the inquest concerns the reliability of Marlowe's companions as witnesses.[41] As an agent provocateur for the late Sir Francis Walsingham, Robert Poley was a consummate liar, the "very genius of the Elizabethan underworld",[42] and is even on record as saying "I will swear and forswear myself, rather than I will accuse myself to do me any harm."[43] The other witness, Nicholas Skeres, had for many years acted as a confidence trickster, drawing young men into the clutches of people in the money-lending racket, including Marlowe's apparent killer, Ingram Frizer, with whom he was currently engaged in just such a swindle.[44] In other words, despite their being referred to as "generosi" (gentlemen) in the inquest report, they were all professional liars.
***например Edward de Vere
