John L. Murphy is professor of English at the University of Colorado, Boulder. His previous publications include The Late Medieval Religious Plays of Bodleian MSS. Digby 133 and e Museo 160 (Oxford, E.E.T.S., 1982), Collections IX (Malone Society, Clarendon Press, 1972–77), and articles in English Language Notes, Shakespeare Quarterly, and Medium Aevum.
Listed in: Literary Criticism · Shakespeare · Literature
Darkness and Devils
Exorcism and King Lear
By John L. Murphy
Shakespeare’s King Lear appears twice in the records of dramatic performances before the closing of the theaters in 1642. The King’s Men played it before the King’s Majesty in Whitehall on December 26, 1606. The Lord Cholmeley’s Players gave it at Gowthwaite, a manor house of Sir John and Dame Julyan Yorke, Nidderdale, West Riding, in Candlemas, 1610.