Reconsidering the Boredom of King James: Performance and Premodern Histories

The royal entry of King James I into London in 1604 serves as an opportunity to reconsider the relationship between public, urban performance and the primary sources that ostensibly document it. The author revisits his own past study of this occasion, revising and expanding previous conclusions about early modern English performance in light of new research and theory. The article deploys new thinking about performance historiography, arguing that such perspectives unsettle the easy placement of an event in historical chronology, disrupt archival logic, and insist on a degree of historiographical ambiguity. The legacy of new historicism is considered in tandem with current theories of performance history, and a hybridization of new historicism and performance theory is considered in relation to historiographic practice.