Gorboduc Now! The First English Tragedy in Modern Print and Performance

Abstract

Abstract This article surveys the modern reception of the first English tragedy Gorboduc, first reviewing references to Gorboduc in popular print and literature and then in performance. For a long time in the popular press, the play formed part of a framework of cultural knowledge that educated people were assumed to have or desire. Productions of Gorboduc grew out of that context. Implicitly hearkening back to the Renaissance ethos of ‘teach and delight’, they offered audiences an appealing way to reinforce their awareness of English drama. Beyond this dominant trend in the play’s reception, Gorboduc has circulated in another way – as a work that not only represents the past but which also speaks to contemporary times. While the play once represented general information that educated people ought to know, clearly this is no longer the case. Considering this fact, this article suggests that it is possible to rehabilitate the play by building on presentist understandings of the play already present in its modern reception in popular print and performance – that is, to emphasise why Gorboduc continues to be relevant by more explicitly framing it and other Tudor plays in relation to topics that dominate the sixteenth century and matter now, such as tyranny, counsel, and territorial disunion.