Sir Thomas More is based on Holinshed’s Chronicles and Nicholas Harpsfield’s biography of More. Sheriff More peacefully quells the riots of Londoners against resident foreigners on the ‘Ill May Day’ of 1517, and is appointed Lord Chancellor as a reward. In the Shakespearian Sc. 6, More persuades the rebels to surrender to the King, arguing for obedience to authority and challenging the rebels to consider their own plight if, like the strangers, they were to live in exile. A passage less securely attributed to Shakespeare is More’s bemused and wary soliloquy at the beginning of Sc. 8. The play elsewhere presents a series of serio-comic episodes dramatizing his wit in attempting to reform minor offenders, his credentials as a humanist, his practical joking, and his love of plays. More’s downfall and passage to the scaffold begin when he refuses the King’s demand that he sign unspecified articles. Later scenes, though sombre in tone, depict his almost light-hearted resolution to pursue death rather than yield to the King’s demands.

The play has been performed most notably by the Royal Shakespeare Company in 2005.

THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY

Thomas MORE, a sheriff of London, later Sir Thomas More and

Lord Chancellor

The Earl of SHREWSBURY

The Earl of SURREY

John LINCOLN, a broker

DOLL Williamson

WILLIAMSON, her husband, a carpenter

GEORGE BETTS

CLOWN BETTS, his brother, called Ralph

SHERWIN, a goldsmith

Francis de BARDE, a Lombard

CAVELIER, a Lombard or Frenchman

The LORD MAYOR of London

The LADY MAYORESS

Justice SURESBY

LIFTER, a cutpurse

SMART, the plaintiff against him

The RECORDER of London

Sir Thomas PALMER

Sir Roger CHOLMLEY

Sir John MUNDAY

A SERGEANT-at-arms

CROFTS, a messenger from the King

RANDALL, More’s manservant

Jack FALKNER, a ruffian

ERASMUS, a learned clerk of Rotterdam

MORRIS, secretary to the Bishop of Winchester

The Lord Cardinal’s PLAYERS, performing the roles of:

INCLINATION

PROLOGUE

WIT

A boy player of LADY VANITY

LUGGINS, player of Good Counsel

William ROPER, More’s son-in-law

LADY MORE, his wife

ROPER’S WIFE, one of More’s daughters

More’s OTHER DAUGHTER

CATESBY, More’s steward

GOUGH, More’s secretary

Doctor Fisher, Bishop of ROCHESTER

DOWNES, another sergeant-at-arms

LIEUTENANT of the Tower

A GENTLEMAN PORTER of the Tower

The HANGMAN

A poor WOMAN, a client of More

Other SHERIFFS

MESSENGERS

CLERK of the Council

OFFICERS

Lords, Ladies, Gentlemen, Aldermen, Citizens, Prentices, Servingmen, Warders of the Tower, and Attendants

NOTE ON SPECIAL FEATURES OF PRESENTATION

Complexities in the manuscript have led to the following modifications of standard Oxford Shakespeare presentation.

Rules across the column show where the text switches from the Original Text to a revision and back, or from one revision to another. Notes in the right margin above and below these rules specify the section of the manuscript and the hand.

Annotations in a second hand are preserved and printed in a special typeface. Passages in the manuscript explicitly or implicitly deleted are underlined in this edition, except where the final text as edited duplicates the deleted text (see Appendix B). Identifiable interventions by second hands are as follows:

Tilney: in Sc. 1, Sc. 3, Sc. 10.

Playhouse book-keeper: in Sc. 4, Sc. 6 (Addition II and 1. 234), Sc. 9.

Dekker: phrase at 8.232-3. Heywood(?): addition of Clown’s part in Sc. 6 and Sc. 7.

Angle brackets 〈 〉 indicate gaps in the text due to damage to the manuscript.

Stage directions reflect the wording of the manuscript unless enclosed in special brackets ⌈ ⌉.

The Book of Sir Thomas More

[Original Text (monday)]

[Tilney]

Leave out the insurrection wholly and the cause thereof, and begin with Sir Thomos More at the Mayor’s sessions, with a report afterwards of his good service done being Sheriff of London upon a mutiny against the Lombards—only by a short report, and not otherwise, at your own perils. E. Tilney.

Sc. 1 Enter at one end John Lincoln with George Betts and Clown Betts together. At the other end enters Francis de Barde and Doll, a lusty woman, he hauling her by the arm

DOLL Whither wilt thou haul me?

BARDE Whither I please. Thou art my prize, and I plead purchase of thee.

DOLL Purchase of me? Away, ye rascal! I am an honest, plain carpenter’s wife, and, though I have no beauty to like a husband, yet whatsoever is mine scorns to stoop to a stranger. Hand off then when I bid theel

BARDE Go with me quietly, or I’ll compel thee.

DOLL Compel me, ye dog’s face? Thou think‘st thou hast the goldsmith’s wife in hand, whom thou enticed’st from her husband with all his plate, and when thou turned‘st her home to him again mad’st him, like an ass, pay for his wife’s board.

BARDE So will I make thy husband too, if please me. Enter Cavelier, with a pair of doves, Williamson the carpenter and Sherwin following him

DOLL Here he comes himself. Tell him so if thou dar’st.

CAVELIER [to Williamson] Follow me no further. I say thou shalt not have them.

WILLIAMSON I bought them in Cheapside, and paid my money for them.

SHERWIN He did, sir, indeed, and you offer him wrong, both to take them from him and not restore him his money neither.

CAVELIER If he paid for them, let it suffice that I possess them. Beefs and brewis may serve such hinds. Are pigeons meat for a coarse carpenter?

LINCOLN [ aside to George Betts] It is hard when Englishmen’s patience must be thus jetted on by strangers, and they not dare to revenge their own wrongs.