Young—William Gager's Defence of Academic Stage. 593 
WILLIAM GAGER’S DEFENCE OF THE 
ACADEMIC STAGE 
KARL YOUNG 
The Puritan arraignment of the stage occupies a con¬ 
spicuous position in the history of Elizabethan literature, 
and no one has ever denied its importance both as a phe¬ 
nomenon in sectarianism and as a source of information 
in regard to Elizabethan dramatic conditions. Only of late, 
however, have the several aspects of Puritan activity been 
clearly differentiated, and the avenues of investigation 
clearly marked. It now appears that the chief divisions of 
the attack upon the drama are the following: (1) a pam¬ 
phleteering campaign, in which the earnest strictures of 
such men as Northbrooke, Gosson, and Stubbes were mildly 
answered by Lodge and Nashe; (2) legislative enactments of 
the civic authorities of large towns such as London, checked 
in some measure by influences from the Court; and (3) aca¬ 
demic censure uttered within the walls of the two Univer¬ 
sities. Of these three divisions of the conflict the one least 
adequately understood has been, until recently, the aca¬ 
demic. 1 Of this aspect of the controversy Mr. Boas has 
now given a thoroughly adequate account, 2 in the course of 
which he has classified the materials, isolated the centers of 
controversial activity, and prepared the way for the publi¬ 
cation of further documents. 
From Mr. Boas’s account it appears that the most im¬ 
portant phenomenon in the attack upon the academic stage 
1 In regard to the pamphleteering campaign of Northbrooke, Gosson, 
Stubbes, and others see, for example, E. N. S. Thompson, The Contro¬ 
versy between the Puritans and the Stage, New York, 1903. The legislative 
restraints upon the Elizabethan stage are admirably expounded by Virginia 
G. Gildersleeve, Government Regulation of the Elizabethan Drama, New 
York, 1908. 
2 F. S. Boas, University Drama in the Tudor Age, Oxford, 1914. 
