Mirrors for Princes: “How To Be A Power Player – Tudor Edition” at the Folger Library
by Larry Janezich
Posted February 24, 2025
Just inside the entrance to the exhibit entrance one is struck by the deep purple color scheme – reminding us that wearing the color in Elizabethan England was a privilege reserved for members of the nobility ranked earl or above. An Earl is third in the British peerage system, below a Duke and A Marquess.
Washington is filled with people who are attracted to power and who strive to capture the attention of its brokers. This is a reality of governance that is reflected in the practices of power players throughout history. According to Heather Wolfe, Folger’s Curator of Manuscripts, the term “Mirror for Princes” is a metaphor which would have been known and commonly understood in the Elizabethan era and refers to a literary genre of political writings – playbooks – which offered instruction or rules on how to join, maintain, or advance one’s position at court. They were “mirrors;” if the reader saw him or herself in the text – which might describe the consequences of an action or behavior in terms of success or failure in governance or court – they could modify their behavior accordingly.
This new Folger exhibit opened last Friday. It consists of more than 60 objects from the Library’s collection and focuses on 13 of the rules gleaned from several Renaissance playbooks including Machiavelli’s The Prince, and Castiglione’s The Book of the Courtier. Wolfe said that the number is arbitrary, limited by the number of display cases in the Stuart and Mimi Rose Gallery.
Modern names have been given to the rules to make the period more accessible and each reflects a skill you needed to thrive and survive in Queen Elizabeth I’s court. Like Washington today, the court is the place to do business and power players follow rules without thinking about them.
The 13 cases are each labeled with a rule and hold playbooks, the texts of which illustrate the rule displayed.
Here are some of them:
Study the Play Books (e.g. Bend the rules to get what you want, i.e., “the end justifies the means,” and “it is wiser to be feared than loved”) Pictured is a 1584 copy of The Prince.
Get on the Gift List (e.g. Not to receive, but to give to the queen on gift day – the 12 foot gift list of 1579 pictured here details who gave and what was given, including jewelry, clothing, books, gloves and delicacies.)
Hang on to Your Head. (e.g. The traitor list – Thomas Cromwell, Robert Devereaux and Walter Raleigh – featuring execution records)
Die a Noble Death. (e.g. A celebrity funeral. To help relieve the repetition of the static display of texts and objects, the exhibit continues in an adjacent room with a screen that depicts scrolling images of a series of 32 large detailed engravings of the funeral of Sir Philip Sidney, considered the ideal Renaissance man, who died in battle at 31 and whose procession featured hundreds of mourners.)
Wolfe says, “I hope visitors see the parallels between Tudor England and today. Cancel culture, brand management, nepotism, power dressing, and the idea of ‘fake it ’til you make it’ were all a part of life for people seeking a position in the queen’s inner circle. When I was selecting items for the exhibition, I was continually struck by the similarities between the self-help books for managers and leaders today and the how-to books for aspiring power players from the 16th century.”
The mirror forming the “O” in the word describing the theme of the exhibit is inscribed with a quote from Richard II: “O flattering glass, like to my followers in prosperity, thou dost beguile me.” A close look at the mirror reveals it does not return a true reflection, perhaps speaking to a deeper truth than the one perceived by the observer. Asked to comment on this presumed artistic license, Wolfe remarked that the slight distortion of the mirror’s reflection was not intentional.
The exhibit will run until July 2025, Sundays; 11am – 6pm; Tuesday and Wednesday; 11am – 6pm; Thursday, Friday, and Saturday: 11am – 9pm. For more, go here: https://www.folger.edu/whats-on/power-player-exhibition/
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