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The Shoemaker's Holiday

Thomas Dekker
Contents (33)
  1. THE SHOEMAKER’S HOLIDAY
  2. CONTENTS
  3. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  4. INTRODUCTION
  5. FURTHER READING
  6. ABBREVIATIONS
  7. TO ALL GOOD FELLOWS, PROFESSORS OF THE GENTLE CRAFT, OF WHAT DEGREE SOEVER
  8. DRAMATIS PERSONAE
  9. THE PROLOGUE
  10. THE FIRST THREE-MAN’S SONG
  11. THE SECOND THREE-MAN’S SONG
  12. [SCENE 1]
  13. [SCENE 2]
  14. [SCENE 3]
  15. [SCENE 4]
  16. [SCENE 5]
  17. [SCENE 6]
  18. [SCENE 7]
  19. [SCENE 8]
  20. [SCENE 9]
  21. [SCENE 10]
  22. [SCENE 11]
  23. [SCENE 12]
  24. [SCENE 13]
  25. [SCENE 14]
  26. [SCENE 15]
  27. [SCENE 16]
  28. [SCENE 17]
  29. [SCENE 18]
  30. [SCENE 19]
  31. [SCENE 20]
  32. [SCENE 21]
  33. APPENDIX

NEW MERMAIDS

General editors:
William C. Carroll, Boston University
Brian Gibbons, University of Münster
Tiffany Stern, University of Oxford

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Reconstruction of an Elizabethan Theatre
by C. Walter Hodges

NEW MERMAIDS

The Alchemist

Mrs Warren’s Profession

All for Love

A New Way to Pay Old Debts

Arden of Faversham

The Old Wife’s Tale

Arms and the Man

The Plain Dealer

Bartholmew Fair

The Playboy of the Western World

The Beaux’ Stratagem

The Provoked Wife

Bussy D’Ambois

Pygmalion

The Changeling

The Recruiting Officer

A Chaste Maid in Cheapside

The Relapse

The Country Wife

The Revenger’s Tragedy

The Critic

The Rivals

The Double-Dealer

The Roaring Girl

Dr Faustus

The Rover

The Duchess of Malfi

Saint Joan

The Dutch Courtesan

The School for Scandal

Eastward Ho!

She Stoops to Conquer

Edward the Second

The Shoemaker’s Holiday

Elizabethan and Jacobean Tragedies

The Spanish Tragedy

Epicoene or The Silent Woman

Tamburlaine

Every Man In His Humour

Three Late Medieval Morality Plays

Five Restoration Comedies

Mankind

An Ideal Husband

Everyman

The Importance of Being Earnest

Mundus et Infans

The Jew of Malta

’Tis Pity She’s a Whore

The Knight of the Burning Pestle

Volpone

Lady Windermere’s Fan

The Way of the World

London Assurance

The White Devil

Love for Love

The Witch

Major Barbara

The Witch of Edmonton

The Malcontent

A Woman Killed with Kindness

The Man of Mode

A Woman of No Importance

Marriage A-la-Mode

Women Beware Women

NEW MERMAIDS

THOMAS DEKKER

THE
SHOEMAKER’S
HOLIDAY

Edited by Jonathan Gil Harris

Professor of English, George Washington University

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CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

INTRODUCTION

About the Play

Summary of the Plot

The Author

Dates and Sources

The Play

Going to Wittenberg

Staging Things: Dekker’s Lively Stage Properties

From ‘Skill’ to ‘Freebooters’: Artisanal vs. Capitalist Property

‘The Lord of Ludgate’: Monumental Time

Spectres of Debt

Performance History

A Note on the Text

FURTHER READING

ABBREVIATIONS

THE SHOEMAKER’S HOLIDAY

Preface

Dramatis Personae

The Prologue

First Three Man’s Song

Second Three Man’s Song

The Text

APPENDIX

Deloney’s Pleasant and Princely History of the Gentle Craft

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I owe a special debt of gratitude to the previous New Mermaids editors of The Shoemaker’s Holiday, D. J. Palmer and Anthony Parr, whose excellent editions I have made extensive use of in preparing mine. I also wish to thank Stanley Wells who, in addition to being one of the finest editors of the play, has directed me to some helpful materials about Dekker – including the unfairly neglected work of C. J. Sisson. Michael Neill first introduced me to English Renaissance drama more than twenty-five years ago, and he still models for me what it means to be a sensitive reader as well as editor of early modern plays. Much of my thinking about The Shoemaker’s Holiday has been shaped in dialogue with Henry Turner, Natasha Korda, Jean Howard, and Deborah Harkness. For various references as well as images, I thank Liza Blake, Gordon Turnbull, and the staff of the Folger Shakespeare Library. At New Mermaids, Jenny Ridout has been an attentive and patient production editor; I am grateful also to Brian Gibbons for inviting me to take on the project and, above all, to Bill Carroll for his invaluable editorial suggestions, which have saved me from many embarrassments. As always, my biggest debt is to Madhavi Menon, who knows a thing or two about a fine shoe.