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Message: <blockquote data-quote="scolairebocht" data-source="post: 144721" data-attributes="member: 8">Anyway I am possibly reading too much into some of this but if so I am not the only one, many people are now saying that Shakespeare has included a lot of secret Catholic innuendos or clues in his text, including in this play. For example this is from the Guardian referring to the well known book on this by Clare Asquith:To get to our issue here, yes its a little more of a stretch to say that it was the Catholicism of Much Ado that offended, or would offend, the Commissioners, but it still could be that at least in part. Some of these Catholic codes are not that hard to spot, and again would be very offensive to a Protestant Bishop.Another interesting point is that when Sir Thomas Phillips is articulating his complaint here, he doesn’t tell us what actually caused offence and it seems a weak point without that? Is it actually enough for him to name the play, just stating that it was about Much Ado About Nothing will tell his readers what the argument was about, that it was seen as Catholic and/or Irish at that time and therefore his readers knew exactly what he was talking about?Finally I have to include one rather deflating but obvious point. Maybe the simple title of ‘Much Ado About Nothing’ caused offence, if it was meant as talking about the Commission and its work. Its possible that Phillips didn’t know it was a Shakespeare play and was just making his complaint based on that title, but still I cannot see the Londoners putting on a whole long and complex play just because they liked the title.Such is the debate anyway about this aborted performance of Much Ado About Nothing, the first reference to a Shakespeare play in Ireland.by Brian Nugent, <a href="http://www.orwellianireland.com" target="_blank">http://www.orwellianireland.com</a> .Footnotes1. Sir Thomas Phillips, Londonderry and the London companies, 1609-1629: being a survey and other documents submitted to King Charles I (Belfast, 1928), p.vi.2. Thomas Colby, Ordnance Survey of the County of Londonderry (Dublin, 1837), p.40.3. Sir Thomas Phillips, Londonderry and the London companies, 1609-1629: being a survey and other documents submitted to King Charles I (Belfast, 1928), p.4.4. Sir Thomas Phillips, Londonderry and the London companies, 1609-1629: being a survey and other documents submitted to King Charles I (Belfast, 1928), p.119-20.5. Bríd McGrath, Acts of the Corporation of Coleraine (Dublin, 2017), p.3.6. Sir Thomas Phillips, Londonderry and the London companies, 1609-1629: being a survey and other documents submitted to King Charles I (Belfast, 1928), p.5.7. “...and which includes several Irish airs, was compiled by William Ballet, a Dublin actor, about the year 1594. It is known in musical bibliography as ‘William Ballet’s Lute Book’, and is preserved in the library of Trinity College, Dublin.”(Captain Francis O’Neill, Irish Folk Music, A Fascinating Hobby (Chicago, 1910), p.233.8. <a href="https://www.sarsfieldsvirtualpub.com/threads/baron-of-delvin-newly-identified-as-an-unknown-irish-harp-lute-composer-of-c-1585.1354/" target="_blank">https://www.sarsfieldsvirtualpub.com/threads/baron-of-delvin-newly-identified-as-an-unknown-irish-harp-lute-composer-of-c-1585.1354/</a> .9. W. H. Grattan Flood in his History of Irish Music says:““Light o’ Love” is another English annexation from the Emerald Isle. Shakespeare, in his Much Ado About Nothing (Act III Scene IV) says “Clap us into ‘Light o’ Love’, that goes without a burden; do you sing it and I’ll dance to it.” Burden is the same as a drone or drone-bass...”( <a href="https://www.libraryireland.com/IrishMusic/XVII-2.php" target="_blank">https://www.libraryireland.com/IrishMusic/XVII-2.php</a> .)The music of this song is given in many places and the words are available at: Patrick Joseph McCall, Irish Fireside Songs (Dublin, 1911), p.83-6, which as the title indicates makes it a presumed Irish song.‘Light o’ love’ might be considered an Irish phrase as well, e.g.““...for here I am, and here’s for the lady”—he placed a bunch of rushes, in all the downy beauty of their seed, upon the cushion, and selecting one, blew off the down, which floated away like a small flake of snow—“De girls below in de glin, call it ‘light o’ love,’” he said, laughing,” and more call it a rush!””(Mr and Mrs Samuel Carter Hall, Ireland its scenery and character (London, 1841) vol i, p.186.)10. William Henry Grattan Flood, A History of Irish Music (Dublin, 1927), p.172.11. Sir Thomas Phillips, Londonderry and the London companies, 1609-1629: being a survey and other documents submitted to King Charles I (Belfast, 1928), p.106.12. Ulster Journal of Archaeology, 2nd series vol 2 (Belfast, 1896), p.131.13.  <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/aug/28/arts.books" target="_blank">https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/aug/28/arts.books</a> .</blockquote>

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