ABSTRACT
James Shirley had good reason to be nervous at the première of his new play, St. Patrick for Ireland, at the Werburgh Street theatre in Dublin, Ireland in late 1639 or early 1640. By most indications, the play was about to fail. Some of Shirley’s fears are recorded in the play’s prologue, which includes several exasperated complaints by a playwright near the end of his tether. At the very start of the prologue, Shirley admits that he has no idea what his audience would like to see: ‘We know not what will take; your pallats are / Various’.1 In this essay, I wish to consider why Shirley failed to win over his Irish audiences and develop a sustainable theatre culture in Dublin. The question does not lend itself to a simple answer, but rather reveals how theatre in Ireland at the time (and long into the future) served as a nexus for such diverse concerns as aesthetics, religion, politics, and demographics.
