General Introduction

Abstract

As with so much of the medieval period, our knowledge of the drama of the Middle Ages remains sporadic, vague and frustratingly incomplete. Outside the general problems of the survival of texts in manuscript from this period, it must also be considered that drama itself is a form which does not lend itself to written record or fixture. Much of drama in the broadest sense is spontaneous and transient and cannot be written down even in the present day environment of literacy and the printed word. Even in our current society of books, films, tape and video-recorders it is interesting to review what among the many forms of drama and entertainment is recorded and registered for posterity: theatre plays, television drama, soap opera, films, TV advertisements, alternative theatre, pub shows, comedians’ routines, street theatre, school plays, improvisations, festival theatre, satirical reviews, buskers … and this is still ignoring almost all of the types of musical entertainment which also involve drama, such as opera, dance theatre, musicals, rock concerts, pop or rock videos and so on. Very often we record only what we feel to be worthy, important or instructive to others rather than the forms of entertainment which we know best and experience most frequently and which very probably reflect our feelings, understanding and organisation of our world in a much more accurate and revealing manner.