ABSTRACT
The last decade of the Elizabethan period saw an upsurge in the appropriation from longue duree histories of short segments of the English past for dramatic and performative purposes in such plays Woodstock and Richard II. Woodstock tends to focus on the unprecedented extraction of taxes through the blank charters mentioned in most historical accounts, and emphasizes the explicitly exploitative, self-interested practices and plots of the king's favorites. John Hayward's account is interesting in its own right, providing a lively, sharply focused and generally critical overview of the major events in the reign of Richard II, paying especial attention to the final years and the deposition. Elizabeth had been inducted into the ranks of those "famous men" whose lives served as "lively patterns" that could be brought to bear on the political scene of which she was no longer a living participant.
