ABSTRACT
This chapter shows that playwrights resorted to addressing readers very seldom, with the notable exception of Thomas Heywood, reserving prefatory space for dedications to noblemen, aristocrats, and friends of various kinds. It focuses on the aristocrats and friends who, at least based on texts, provided some kind of patronage in this last decade before Parliament in 1642 closed the theaters, recording a victory for anti-theatrical forces, inspired in part by Puritan opposition. Philip Massinger constructs a dedication of A New Way to Pay Old Debts as an old way to pay new debts, citing the example of divers Italian princes and "Lords of eminent rancke in England" who have "not disdain'd to receave, and read Poems of this Nature." Massinger moves back into the Lady Katherine Stanhope galaxy by dedicating Emperor of the East to John Lord Mohune, Baron of Okehampton, and Lady Stanhope's son-in-law.
