Cromwell vs. Shakespeare: The Puppet Years

There’s actually some fascinating dramaturgy around puppets and Shakespeare. When Oliver Cromwell banned Shakespeare being performed in 1648, no one bothered to ban people from doing puppet versions of Shakespeare. Apparently they considered puppetry to be such a low art farm, that no one stooped to ban it. Therefore, for a good bit, if people wanted to see Shakespeare, there only choice was to go see underground puppet versions of it.