humanities.lit.authors.shakespeare

I was browsing for some plot parallels
that might be used to refute the Oxfordians
(in my project to save Strachey) when I
noticed ithe following in the search
results:

Page 15
William Strachey asserted, wonderingly, that
"the better sort, even our governor and admiral
themselves, not refusing their turn ... '

which refers, of course, to the men of the
Sea Venture letting go of their class distinctions
to bail to save their lives.

(Parenthetically, one of Oxford's high nobility
would never think to write that class-leveling
scene),

The snip reminded me
of the 'tempest' that was then raging inside
the Virginia Company, mainly provoked
by Gayley's hero Sandys who took an
uncompromising position on the question
of an established Church in North America.


It was probably Sandys' railing which
provoked the King to throw out the 'civil
governance' faction that included Bacon
and Strachey.

As a result, in one of those 'stroke of the
pen' moments, James I handed Virginia
over to the Anglican imperialists (this is
what Symondes and Purchas were bent on),
the 'torture-murder' faction that would,
in a couple of years, find itself facing
charges in London (except Southampton,
earls rarely pay).


It occurred to me that A True Repertory
was not intended solely as a Virginia
Company pamphlet to distract the
investors from the disasters but may have
also been written to 'hold up a mirror' to
the 'tempestuous' politics inside the
Virginia Company.

In the chatter of the Rival Poets from the
1580's onward, someone that really irritates
the Rival Poets is always 'holding up a mirror.'

The Tempest, played at Court, would serve
the same 'mirrouring' purpose because it's
comedy makes fools of the factions,
the most powerful of which would be
at Court to see the play.

The Tempest was staged just two weeks before
James I would sign the Third Charter (the timely
Bermoothes reference alludes to the acquisition
of Bermuda by 'Britain' as James liked to prematurely
call his empire).

The New Atlantis, which Bacon strictly
forbade to be printed, is obviously one
of those 'mirrors.' Bacon could not be
seen to be printing a private work he
had written only for James I (who thought
of himself as a 'Solomon' like the Jewish
'Solomon' on the Island, let me just say
that the comparison is not apt, but
perhaps the author hoped James would
take a lesson from it).


After James I died, Dr. Rawley printed
The New Altantis.