To accompany the back stage photos for the medieval drama from the Magna Carta in Clare celebrations we include the programme notes for Pride and Dame Sirith.
THE PRIDE OF LIFE:
The Pride of Life is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, surviving play in the English language.
There are many caveats to the above sentence.
Firstly, there are other surviving texts which come from about the same period in time, though it’s very difficult to put an exact date to these things. Pride comes somewhere around 1350.
Secondly, it doesn’t quite survive - not fully. There are big gaps in the text we have and the second half / third is completely lost, so it can’t be classed as an extant play.
Thirdly, though in English, the text is Irish in origin – at the very least by adoption, as this is where the manuscript was copied in the form which has come down to us.
So, on the face of it, not a very appropriate entertainment for a medieval banquet in 1215.
But what else is there? When I was first approached to do something for the Magna Carta celebrations I racked my brains as to what was most appropriate. We haven’t got any surviving plays in English prior to 1350 – and I didn’t think that the average persons knowledge of Latin would be up to it. Thinking a little sideways I considered some later plays about King John. But all three King John plays from the early modern period have one major deficiency.
They don’t mention Magna Carta. At all.
So I made a compromise – the earliest play that was doable and which features at least a thematic link to the story of King John. The Pride of Life is, as the title suggests, about pride and a prideful King at that. It resonates nicely.
For all the incompleteness of the text, it is performable thanks to the detail afforded by the banns that open the play – a prologue that tells the whole of the plot, including the ending. To make the play more whole I have added a section of another early English play – from an East Anglian Mystery play about the death of Herod – to round off the story dramatically, as well as a playless Epilogue that has survived as a fragment. It is possible this Epilogue has never been performed as part of a production for six hundred years as, being without a play to perform before it, why would anyone use it? One can never be certain of such things, someone else might have had the idea before me, but it’s an exciting thought.
The Pride of Life has been performed more recently than the mid 14th Century, though I haven’t had a chance to hunt out any specific productions – either student or professional. The BBC produced a reasonably accurate version for the Third Programme in the 1950’s as part of their The First Stage series. It used the prologue throughout the play (which, short as it was, was cut down and heavily modernised) to cover the gaps in the text. Sadly this recording is only currently available if you can find the LP release of the series (which thanks to ebay I have) – which I doubt will get a wider airing. I have therefore recorded our cast performing our text of the play and this audio recording (and video footage we hope to make of the last rehearsals and performance) will be put online for free to introduce interested people to the play.
As part of this production I have endeavoured to retain as much of the original text as possible and not overly modernise it. We have only cut four lines from the extant play and altered some readings where the corrupted text gave me some license to be bolder with changing lines. I have written two additional lines to one speech where a gap in the text doesn’t complete the rhyming scheme – though this reconstruction is based on patterns found in other plays of the period. For those who are interested the original play ends with the final lines of Mirth, just as Death kills him. Sadly none of the original dialogue for Death survived, which is a shame as he’s a marvellous conversationalist in most medieval texts.
I would like to thank the Magna Carta in Clare committee for hosting this Before Shakespeare* production and for producing such a welcoming atmosphere.
[*Our original incarnation - Ed]
[*Our original incarnation - Ed]
Some rehearsal shots for Pride of Life - first full tryout with costumes.
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| Adam reading from his medieval mobile phone... |
A Magna Carta Mumming
The first part of the
evening is a completely true account of the story of Magna Carta – told in the
fashion of a Mumming. Mumming is a
slippery term, it can mean a lot of different things depending when it was produced
and who it was for. It could involve
song, dance or drama. We’ve used a
loose folk ritual to create something new, something special for this
event. It isn’t an historical re-enactment;
it is a reimagining of a form designed to illicit a few cheap laughs, created
in the spirit of the medieval
entertainments of the day, not in absolute fact.
The Mummers Are: Michelle
Allen, Robert Crighton, Pat Curtis, Katie Landon, Beth Norris, Clarissa Seeley,
Alban Smith-Adams & Kate Terry. Costumes
by Mary Denton.
Dame Sirith
Edited
and performed by Robert Crighton
Dame Sirith isn’t quite a
fable, if only because it doesn’t have a moral.
It tells the story of a monk, Wilekin, who takes a fancy to the wife of
a merchant, one Dame Margery. When the
merchant is away the monk tries to woo Margery but she’s having none of it and
sends him away with a flea in his ear.
About to give into despair he meets a friend who recommends Dame Sirith
the hend (wise) to help him.
He goes to her and, after a
little bartering, she agrees to get Margery to relent. To do this she uses a small dog and a jar of
mustard... but we wouldn’t want to ruin the ending for you by saying
anymore.
Unlike our very fake
Mumming, Dame Sirith is genuinely medieval, appearing towards the end of the 12th
Century, and so is something that would have been about at the time of King
John.
This version is only lightly
modernised, so features many old words (gange is one of our favourites) and
unfamiliar phrasing – but hopefully through the modern day translation service
of the storyteller’s backchat it will be both clear and amusing.
