‘A Voice Amidst Mine Ears’: Silent Angels on the Early Modern Stage

Abstract

Unlike the carts that crawled with angels in the medieval pageant plays, angels of the early modern stage were a rare breed. Eventually they disappeared from the stage altogether; they did not, however, disappear all at once in a puff of celestial smoke. This article reveals a pattern of suppression in the representation of angels on the English stage, ranging from Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus in 1592 until 1645, three years after the closure of the theatres in England. This study examines plays that present angels as characters who contribute to the play's action and denouement; however, by noting plays that include allegorical and decorative angels too, it comprises the most comprehensive survey of angels within plays from the period to date. Angels do not appear in many plays performed at the commercial playhouses of Elizabethan and Jacobean England; but when they do, it becomes clear that early modern playwrights gradually developed more calculated ways of staging these controversial creatures. As stage angels assume more silent roles, but before angels leave the stage entirely, human characters begin to communicate with these celestial figures differently and encounters with angels become a far more intimate experience.