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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 March 2011
FREEDOM AND SLAVERY IN MASSINGER
Philip Massinger's Believe As You List (1631) includes in its Prologue a thoroughly disingenuous disclaimer, saying that ‘what's Roman here’ should not be interpreted as having any English or contemporary relevance.
yf you finde what's Roman here,
Grecian, or Asiaticqe, draw to nere
a late, & sad example, tis confest
hee's but an English scholler at his best,
a stranger to Cosmographie, and may erre
in the cuntries names, the shape, & character
of the person he presents.
Believe As You List is one of several plays by Massinger that ran into trouble with the censors. In January 1631 an earlier version of the play was refused a licence because it included potentially ‘dangerous’ material, direct or indirect commentary on recent events. The Master of the Revels ‘did refuse to allow of a play of Messinger's, because it did contain dangerous matter, as the deposing of Sebastian king of Portugal, by Philip the [Second], and ther being a peace sworen twixte the kings of England and Spayne’. Massinger rewrote the play, changing its setting to the Roman world, and renaming the principal character Antiochus, a deposed king of Lower Asia, instead of Don Sebastian of Portugal. In its revised form, the play was approved four months later, and was acted by the King's Men, Shakespeare's old company, in 1631.
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