A Revaluation of Horestes (1567)

Abstract

JJISTORIANS of English drama are generally agreed as to the 171 importance of John Pikeryng's Horestes in the development of Elizabethan tragedy. Tucker Brooke, for example, believes that this I567 adaptation of the Orestes legend stands the highest point attained by the transitional interlude in the development of dramatic unity and tragic purpose. Yet the historians have failed to agree on solutions to some of the basic problems that the play presents. They confess themselves frankly baffled as to the identity of the author named on the title page of the work. And they differ on such fundamental questions as whether the interlude was designed for a courtly audience or the popular theater, and whether it was intended to be simply a dramatization of the classical legend, or an allegory of events in the life of Mary Queen of Scots. A re-examination of the play in the light of contemporary English and Scottish political attitudes affords reasons for believing that Horestes was indeed designed to reflect at least those aspects of Mary's affairs in Scotland that were of particular concern to a learned English audience, and that the author was probably John Puckering, subsequently Speaker of the House and Lord Keeper in Elizabeth's government, and an ardent foe of Mary Stuart.