Recent scholarship suggests that the data available about lost plays from Shakespeare’s lifetime has never been greater, better assembled or more accessible. What can be done with all this new knowledge? In this Introduction, I examine the numerous and varied reasons why plays become lost – fire, vandalism, censorship (including self-censorship), legal notoriety, the logistics of publishing or preserving a play – and dispel the myth that survival is associated with quality. Indeed, the example of Shakespeare’s ‘Love’s Labour’s Won’, examined here as a case study, contradicts every generalisation about why plays become lost. Accordingly, I argue that a revaluation of the role played by lost drama in the repertories of early modern playing companies is urgently needed. I approach the question of coping with loss by thinking in pragmatic terms about how scholars can and should incorporate discussion of lost plays into their work on substantially extant texts. I introduce the metaphor of ‘Rubin’s Vase’, a visually experienced figure derived from the work of Danish psychologist Edgar Rubin, as a means of understanding the relationship between lost and extant plays. Lost plays, as a kind of ground or negative space, bring our picture of early modern drama into sharper relief.

Two temporary sites of performance for the Chamberlain’s Men (Newington Butts and the Curtain) provide me with the opportunity to reconsider the theatrical context in which Shakespeare was operating in the early part of his career. Attending to lost plays and performance details from this period helps adjust our view of the company’s theatrical activity and enriches our understanding of the company’s formative years. It is the lost plays – ‘Hester and Ahasuerus’ in particular – that give a meaningful shape to the Newington repertory and help make sense of the dramatic offerings at that venue. An equally important ‘formative moment’ for Shakespeare’s company is its eviction from what had become its regular venue – the Theatre – and the period of transition encompassing its tenancy of the Curtain and eventual move to the Globe. I argue that reconsideration of the physical and economic constraints faced by the Chamberlain’s Men in this period, and attention to lost plays in the Chamberlain’s and in the Admiral’s repertories for additional context, stand to significantly revise scholarly opinion on the conditions under which Shakespeare operated prior to his company’s move to the Globe.