English Household Fools

: Within and Without the Early Modern Theatre

Abstract

This thesis examines household fools within and without the early modern theatre, exploring connections between what we know of historical fools, of actors’ folly personations, and of fool depictions in print. Examining the interplay between the lived everyday reality and the theatrical performance of fools, it considers how fool identities like William Somer, Jane the Fool, Henry Patenson and John of the Hospital were transmuted into literary works. It attends especially to the fools’ accommodation within domestic spaces: how such accommodation is achieved, where accommodation breaks down, and what motivates fools and their masters to come to these arrangements. Operating from a position of perpetual social and physical ambiguity within households, I demonstrate that fools function in varying capacities, from passive symbols of human folly to functional entertainers to rational social commentators. The thesis also explores the vocabulary of fools and folly, and finds through the study of various literary works, including pamphlets and plays written for the early modern theatres, a wealth of terms that reflect changing attitudes to social bonds and normative behaviour. As I argue, theatre players such as William Kemp and Robert Armin capitalised upon folly for their own personal prosperity: Kemp’s Nine Daies Wonder emphasises the mobility and marketability of human folly while Armin’s Nest of Ninnies demonstrates the philosophical and moral capacities of fool depictions. William Shakespeare’s fool characterisations each demonstrate distinctive human difficulties within their household employments, varying in their recognition of, and responses to, notions of service, reliance, conflict and rivalry. By first setting out the challenges of writing about early modern fools and fooling and by going on to sustained readings of a selection of Shakespeare’s plays, then, this thesis studies household fools as individuated entities who, by responding to their surroundings as active beings, both invite and resist categorisation, and participate in dynamic ways with the wider world. Seeing the world from the perspective of the household fool, this thesis argues, provides insight into early modern understandings of entertainment, service, hierarchy, social precarity, emotional connection and human worth.

Date of Award	30 Sept 2025
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Bristol
Supervisor	Laurence J W Publicover (Supervisor) & Tamsin T Badcoe (Supervisor)