Conclusion: ‘A Historie of noble mention’

Summary

The Conclusion briefly addresses the Caroline publication of history plays, introducing three important points that clarify and expand the book’s main approach. First, by examining John Ford’s Perkin Warbeck and Philip Massinger’s The Roman Actor, it shows how Caroline playbooks regularly use their dedications, addresses to readers, and commendatory verses to put forward local readings of the histories they contain. Second, it suggests that patterns of investment shifted during the Caroline period and that dramatists and companies seem to become more involved in controlling the publication of their plays than in earlier periods. Finally, it evaluates the market for first and reprint editions, proposing that first-edition history plays catered to a demand for novelty and political relevance, whereas the reprinted history play editions published by Nathanial Butter and John Norton helped to establish an emerging canon of history plays that has continuing significance today.