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Recently, the subject of play-endings--in particular, the way plays may have concluded differently at court and in the public theatre--has provoked a flurry of interest. Two possibly Shakespearean epilogues are behind this new preoccupation. James Shapiro has suggested, looking at the moment in the epilogue 2 Henry IV when the speaker kneels down But (indeed) pray for the (TLN 3350), that Shakespeare angled his epilogue towards court performance; he believes the epilogue the play we have it combines two texts, a public theatre epilogue, spoken by William Kemp and leading up a jig (Kemp's repeated mention of his legs and dancing signals that a jig ... is about begin), and a court epilogue, spoken by Shakespeare, ending in a prayer for the monarch (Shapiro, 38). (1) Michael Hattaway, looking at a freestanding epilogue sometimes attributed Shakespeare, As the diall hand tells ore / ye same howers had before, attributes its supplication the mighty Queen the fact that terminal prayers in the early Tudor period, continued occur later. He joins Shapiro in maintaining that prayers for the monarch at the end of plays were as common at court and private performances terminal jigs were in the amphitheatre playhouses (Hattaway, 163, 154). Both Shapiro and Hattaway do an important service in highlighting the complex relationship between monarch, prayer and epilogue, that is be found scattered throughout printed plays up at least 1619 when Two Wise Men and All the Rest Fools had an epilogue that maintains our hearts pray for the King, and his families enduring happinesse, and our countries perpetuall welfare (O2v). What this article will question, however, is the idea that a concluding prayer indicates specifically a court production. Though epilogues directed the monarch--and therefore necessitating his or presence--do exist, it will argue, there also seem have been public playhouse prayers about the monarch that did not demand the dignitary be there. Of these, it will agree that the Dial Hand was a prayer a monarch attending performance, but will suggest that the section of epilogue leading a prayer in Shakespeare's 2 Henry IV may reflect a public or touring performance. Exploring the notion that prayers were regularly spoken on public occasions, though irregularly recorded in playbooks, it will raise questions important theatre historians, editors and actors: on what words and opinions do plays of the time--in any variety of theatre--actually come an end, and which epilogues (and linked plays) record moments of popular production? References indicate a variety of addresses be said after (but sometimes in) an epilogue that necessitate the monarch's actual presence. They sometimes take the form of prayers, but are more often supplications the monarch (rather than God). Instances include the moments in which the Epilogue becomes cognisant of the audience and notices the monarch. (2) Such addresses, clearly for the court, often broadcast much in their titles. The epilogue at Court Thomas Dekker's Old Fortunatus entreats O deere Goddesse / Breathe life in our nombd spirits with one smile (L3v); at the presentation Queene E. of Ben Jonson's Every Man Out of his Humor, Macilente recites how Envie is fled my soule, at sight of her (175). On other occasions the dignitary is humbly acknowledged by the Epilogue; in the conclusion A Pleasant Comedie, shewing the Contention betweene, Liberalitie and Prodigalitie Vertue, Equitie, Liberalitie, Judge, and all come downe the (F4r), and Vertue prostrates himself before your Princely grace; the Dial Hand epilogue, which is called to ye Q. by ye players 1598, is of a similar kind: the speaker there bows yt Empresse ... now (Cambridge University Library, MS Dd.5.75). Other court epilogues are physically interactive; they force the monarch enter their semi-fiction by presenting him or with a gift. …
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