A Companion to Henslowe's Diary

Henslowe's 'diary' is a unique source of information about the day-to-day running of the Elizabethan repertory theatre. Philip Henslowe, a theatrical entrepreneur, kept records of his financial dealings with London companies and actors from 1592-1604. The diary itself is difficult to decipher. Neil Carson's analysis is based on a much more thorough correlation of Henslowe's entries than has been attempted before, breaking down into clear tabular form the main items of income and expenditure and drawing conclusions about the management procedures of the companies, the professional relationships of actors and playwrights and the ways in which plays were written, rehearsed and programmed. Previous speculation has dismissed Henslowe himself as ignorant, disorderly and grasping. Carson shows him to have been a benign and efficient businessman whose control over the actors' professional activities was much less extensive than has often been supposed.