FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177  
178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   >>   >|  
d_ (1700), IV, xii: 'You are all camphire and frankincense, all chastity and odour.' * * * * * * * * * Cross-References from Critical Notes: _The Amorous Prince_ p. 121 _The Jig and Dance._ cf. note (on p. 43), Vol. III, p. 477: _A Jigg (The Town Fop)_. _Town Fop_ note: p. 43 _A Jigg._ There were, in Post-Restoration times, two interpretations of the word Jig. Commonly speaking it was taken to mean exactly what it would now, a simple dance. Nell Gwynne and Moll Davis were noted for the dancing of Jigs. cf. Epilogue to Buckingham's _The Chances_ (1682):-- The Author dreads the strut and meen Of new prais'd Poets, having often seen Some of his Fellows, who have writ before, When Nel has danc'd her Jig, steal to the Door, Hear the Pit clap, and with conceit of that Swell, and believe themselves the Lord knows what. Thus at the end of Lacy's _The Old Troop_ (31 July, 1668), we have 'a dance of two hobby horses in armour, and a Jig.' Also shortly before the epilogue in Shadwell's _The Sullen Lovers_ (1668) we read, 'Enter a Boy in the habit of Pugenello and traverses the stage, takes his chair and sits down, then dances a Jig.' But it must be remembered that beside the common meaning there was a gloss upon the word derived from Elizabethan stage practice. In the prologue to _The Fair Maid of the Inn_ (licensed 1626), good plays are spoken of as often scurvily treated, whilst A Jigge shall be clapt at, and every rhime Prais'd and applauded by a clam'rous chyme. The Pre-Restoration Jig was little other indeed than a ballad opera in embryo lasting about twenty-five minutes and given as an after-piece. It was a rhymed farce in which the dialogue was sung or chanted by the characters to popular ballad tunes. But after the Restoration the Jig assumed a new and more serious complexion, and came eventually to be dovetailed with the play itself, instead of being given at the fag end of the entertainment. Mr. W. J. Lawrence, the well-known theatrical authority to whom I owe much valuable information contained in this note, would (doubtless correctly) attribute the innovation to Stapylton and Edward Howard, both of whom dealt pretty freely in these Jigs. Stapylton has in Act V of _The Slighted Maid_ (1663) a 'Song in Dialogue' between Aurora and Phoebu
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177  
178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Restoration

 

ballad

 
Stapylton
 
twenty
 

licensed

 
rhymed
 

lasting

 
Elizabethan
 

embryo

 

practice


prologue
 

minutes

 

applauded

 

whilst

 

treated

 

scurvily

 

spoken

 

dovetailed

 

correctly

 

doubtless


attribute
 

innovation

 
Howard
 

Edward

 

contained

 
valuable
 

information

 

Dialogue

 

Aurora

 

Phoebu


Slighted

 

freely

 

pretty

 

authority

 

theatrical

 
assumed
 

complexion

 

popular

 

dialogue

 

chanted


characters

 

eventually

 

derived

 

Lawrence

 

entertainment

 
Lovers
 
dancing
 

Gwynne

 
simple
 

Epilogue