From the Librar🎃y of Clayre and&n🍰bsp;Jay Michael Haft

Prynne, William

Histrio-Mastix. The Players Scourge, or Actors Tragaedie. London: E.A and W.I for Michael Sparke, 1633 [but 1632]

Small 4to (194 x 142 mm). With 💜blank Nnnnn4; without initial blank, title fore-edge chipped 👍and browned, intermittent browning and occasional foxing. Contemporary English blind-ruled calf, spine in 5 compartments with four raised bands; spine restored, light wear at extremities.

First edition, second state with the list of "Errataes" on ***4 verso (only a very few copies are known of the first issue). Prynne’s Puritan attacks on the plays and theaters of his era include his famous remark on Shakespeare that "Shackpeers Plaies are printed in the best Crowne paper, far better than most Bibles." The title is falsely dated 1633: the book appeared in late 1632 and its sale was already prohibited by January 1633. A passage on the character of female actors was thought to be an aspersion to the Queen and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Cottington, ordered Histriomastix to "be burnt, in the most public manner that can be” (an innovative act of public෴ censorship at the time).𒐪 Prynne was eventually pilloried and imprisoned and the book was burnt publicly.

REFERENCE:

Bartlett 360; Lowe, Arnott & Robinson 276; Pforzheimer 809; 🎃STC 20464a; ESTC S115316

PROVENANCE:

Early notes on plays (referencing page numbers) on last blank, perhaps this reader’s underlinings and annotations, some🐷times substantial,💖 throughout the second half of the volume, starting with “Scena Duodecima” — George Chalmers (armorial bookplate)