The Shoemaker Holiday Analysis

Writers have had a historically difficult time incorporating economic ideas into their works, a problem that still permeates modern works. Majority of works that have been successful, be it plays, televisions shows, or novels, must entwine other themes into it to draw an audience to the drama. While comedy, law, and crime can make works about the economy more enticing, one of the best methods to spice up a work is to add romance to the plot. Unfortunately, vanilla works about the economy are inherently uninteresting to society; there is hardly anything interesting about a mild mannered businessman’s life to an audience. By mixing in romance, love, and marriage, which itself can be viewed as an economic transaction, the early English authors

Craftsmen and their apprentices were at the very beginning of this basic economic system, as they are responsible for creating the actual products to be later traded and sold. However, this is also one of the most boring element to this economy, as there is no unknown, exotic element to craft. Therefore, by romanticizing the base of the economy, production, the author can make the whole economy more interesting. Dekker exemplifies this idea in the beginning of The Shoemaker’s Holiday and throughout the play. He is able to mix romance into all aspects of the play. For example, Dekker writes, “Thou knowest our trade makes rings for women’s heels: / Here take this pair of shoes cut out by Hodge, / Stitched together by my fellow, Firk, seamed by myself, / Made up and pinked, with letters for thy name. / Wear them, my dear Jane, for thy husband’s sake… Remember me, and pray for my return. / Make much of them, for I have made them so” (9). It is Dekker’s goal to romanticize and personalize a common good, in an effort to make it mean more than it is. By listing who made it each part, the shoe gains meaning to the beholder and ultimately becomes a token throughout the novel. Despite being nothing more than a common shoe, it suddenly holds importance to both Jane and her husband Ralph. This contrasts sharply with a sonnet or something else of a more eloquent nature that

Desire for material possessions and desire for romance become intertwined as one. Authors trying to portray economic principals demonstrate the power of desire first with romance, and then with money and material goods. Dekker does this simultaneously, by having his character Hammon attempt to “buy” Jane from the shop, and almost succeeding, after first browsing the shop for goods to buy. He eventually comes very close to marrying her, and even attempts to pay Ralph, her legal husband, so that he may have Jane. This also suggests the idea of marriage itself as a