Читать книгу A Life of William Shakespeare with portraits and facsimiles - Sir Sidney Lee - Страница 35

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Tradition and common-sense alike point to one of the only two theatres (The Theatre or The Curtain) that existed in London at the date of his arrival as an early scene of his regular occupation. The compiler of ‘Lives of the Poets’ (1753) [32c] was the first to relate the story that his original connection with the playhouse was as holder of the horses of visitors outside the doors. According to the same compiler, the story was related by D’Avenant to Betterton; but Rowe, to whom Betterton communicated it, made no use of it. The two regular theatres of the time were both reached on horseback by men of fashion, and the owner of The Theatre, James Burbage, kept a livery stable at Smithfield. There is no inherent improbability in the tale. Dr. Johnson’s amplified version, in which Shakespeare was represented as organising a service of boys for the purpose of tending visitors’ horses, sounds apocryphal.