The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 17.0416  Monday, 8 May 2006

[1] 	From: 	David Kathman <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
	Date: 	Friday, 05 May 2006 14:22:30 -0500
	Subj: 	Re: SHK 17.0404 Stratford

[2] 	From: 	Robin Hamilton <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
	Date: 	Monday, 8 May 2006 05:45:38 +0100
	Subj: 	Re: SHK 17.0386 Stratford


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		David Kathman <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: 		Friday, 05 May 2006 14:22:30 -0500
Subject: 17.0404 Stratford
Comment: 	Re: SHK 17.0404 Stratford

John Briggs wrote:

 >David Kathman wrote:
 >
 >>Peter Bridgman wrote:
 >>
 >>I suspect the "local tradition" came from the fact that in the 19th
 >>century the western half looked something like a half-timbered
 >>Tudor building while the eastern half resembled a brick building
 >>with Georgian bay windows (see the early 19th century illustration,
 >>Plate 3, in Anthony Holden's biography).
 >>
 >>
 >>That brick facing was added on the outside of the eastern part at the
 >>beginning of the 19th century, when that part was still an inn called
 >>the Swan and Maidenhead, and was removed in the mid-19th-century
 >>renovation.  It was always the same building underneath.
 >
 >Dave Kathman is letting his enthusiasm outrun his expertise, in this case
 >in the field of English vernacular architecture.  The front wall of the
 >eastern building may or may not be a 'skin' (it is impossible to tell 
from
 >the photographs what happened to the other three walls), but at the very
 >least it replaced the complete timber frame of the front wall.  (The 
brick
 >wall is flush with the timber-framed wall of the western building, so it
 >cannot just be a 'skin' - it is structural.)

Actually, it doesn't look flush in the second photograph -- to me, it 
looks like the brick is noticeably farther forward than the wall of the 
western part, consistent with a layer of brick outside the original 
wall.  It's harder to tell in the first photograph, since it's a head-on 
shot.

 >The roof pitch is different, so the roof has been reconstructed at the 
same
 >time as the brick wall was built.  The present timber frame of the facade
 >of the eastern building is therefore a complete 'reconstruction.'  How
 >much of the rest of the structure of the eastern building is also a
 >confection is a separate question.

Well, the tiled roof was not part of the original building in any case, 
and no doubt the roof underwent extensive reconstruction when the gables 
were removed in the late 18th or early 19th century (and then again when 
the gables were put back in during the restoration).  So you won't get 
an argument there.  But all the sources I've seen say that the brick 
wall on the eastern part was only added to the outside of the existing 
wall, and that that existing wall was exposed again in the 
reconstruction (perhaps with some replacement of rotting timbers and the 
like, as Bearman notes).  I assume there are records at Stratford that 
bear on this question, and that Bearman is familiar with them.  I'm just 
going by the evidence that I'm aware of -- if you or somebody else has 
specific evidence that the front wall of the eastern building is a 
"confection", I'd be genuinely interested to see it.

 >The timber frames of the two shops which made up the western
 >building do not look obviously sixteenth-century in the
 >photographs - they could easily be seventeenth-century.  The only
 >obviously sixteenth-century feature is the relatively close spacing
 >of the upright timbers on the ground floor - I do wonder if that could
 >simply be the blocking of an earlier doorway.  The western building
 >may well always have been two separate dwellings.
 >
 >>No, I don't like "demolished", because it implies that the original
 >>structure was destroyed and replaced with something else, which
 >>clearly did not happen.
 >
 >It may not have happened - to say that it "clearly did not happen"
 >is a wild exaggeration.

OK, "clearly" was a bit much.  When faced with rhetoric as strong as 
Peter Bridgman's, I tend to respond with strong rhetoric of my own.  I 
should have said "there is no evidence that this happened."

Dave Kathman
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		Robin Hamilton <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: 		Monday, 8 May 2006 05:45:38 +0100
Subject: 17.0386 Stratford
Comment: 	Re: SHK 17.0386 Stratford

Terence Hawkes <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>

 >As it stands it would do equally well to describe a
 >grudge wrestling match.

What exactly is "a grudge wrestling match"?

Given that Western Professional Wrestling is one of the most highly 
choreographed items of the entertainment business (and that's even 
before we move East and note that most of the major Kung Fu filmstars 
are graduates of the Bejing Opera House), I quite fail to understand this.

        Boxing, yes ...

Baffled From Brigton

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