Give an
account of the major trends in Post Shakespearean drama and account for its
decline.
Post-Shakespearean Dramatists Introduction -
Post Shakespearean drama/Jacobean
drama (that is, the drama of the age of James 11603-1625) was a decadent form
of the drama of Shakespeare and his contemporaries. The Elizabethan age was the
golden age of English drama. With the turn of the century the drama in England
also took a turn. It does not mean that there were no dramatists left. There
certainly was a large number of them, but none of them could come anywhere near
Shakespeare. Just as after Chaucer, poetry in England suffered a decline,
similarly after Shakespeare had given his best (that is, after the sixteenth
century) drama also suffered a decline. With the passage of time it grew more
and more decadent, till with Shirley in the age of Charles I the old kind of
drama expired and even theatres were closed (in 1642) by Puritans. Long says
"It was inevitable that the drama should decline after Shakespeare, for the
simple reason that there was no other great enough to fill his place."
Those Factors which are responsible
for the decline of Drama during the post Shakespearean period are as follows:
1)
The Change of Patrons - One of the reasons for the decadence in
Jacobean/Post- Shakespearean drama was its loss of national spirit and
patronage. In the Elizabethan period, drama was patronised by feudal lords.
From the time of James I, dramatists depended on the king and the queen and
royal domination. Dramatists wrote plays to cater to the taste of the court, so
the theatre was cut off from common life.
2)
Moral Decline - Loss of a national appeal was the growth of immortality in the
drama. The low standard of the audience frequenting the theatre was responsible
for the steep decline of moral standards. To please this riff-raff, unpleasant
themes such as incent and sexual infidelity were freely adopted. Chastity was a
virtue scoffed at by dramatists. The standard of morality suffered and with it
came the decline of drama.
