ABSTRACT
Jacobean playwright Robert Daborne was not a prolific writer. Of seven plays that may be attributed to him either as author or collaborator, only two – A Christian Turned Turk (printed in 1612) and The Poor Man’s Comfort (performed 1616–17 but printed in 1655) – have survived. 1 The extant plays are worthy of attention in themselves, but critical interest in Daborne has been more concerned with his correspondence with the theatrical entrepreneur Philip Henslowe, 2 which has given us some valuable insights into the sometimes strained business relationship between Henslowe and the playwright in the years 1613–14. Daborne was no stranger to poverty: 3 his father had died in debt and he lived a pen-to-mouth existence, writing to support a wife and family in the hectic, cut-throat London theatrical world. In his dealings with Henslowe, which were mostly financial and contractual, Daborne was able to mitigate the parlous state of his domestic affairs by being proficient in gaining advances (and in some cases loans beyond the agreed sum) for the promise of work to be completed. 4 The relationship is thus characterized by deals, exchanges, contracts, understandings, negotiations, re-negotiations, deadlines and the failure to meet deadlines. The Poor Man’s Comfort is a rare example from the early modern period of a play that deals in some depth with the processes of poverty, and that demonstrates how questions of justice are involved with any discussion of the poor in a community. The business transactions between the two men formed, I believe, the basis for Daborne’s examination of poverty in his play and I will deal with this before proceeding to a discussion of the play itself. 5 My argument is that The Poor Man’s Comfort offers a remarkable analysis of the ways by which the discrepancies between the rich and the poor are maintained.
