The 1769 Shakespeare Jubilee held at Stratford-upon-Avon is often seen as the point when he stopped being thought of as a popular dramatist, and became a god. This three-day celebration is also given credit for turning the Warwickshire town into a Shakespeare Mecca.   

David Garrick

David Garrick was a very famous actor of the time. He was wise when it came to public relations, and a huge Shakespeare fan. He knew he was on to a winner with Stratford (Shakespeare's birthplace) long before the Jubilee took place. Thomas Sharpe, a Stratford merchant, saw that trinkets carved from a mulberry tree said to have been planted by Shakespeare attracted theatre lovers. Garrick, motivated by Shakespeare and money, wanted to get in on the act.

A few years later, to thank Garrick for helping rebuild Stratford's town hall, he was offered the honorary key to the town. Garrick decided to turn this ceremony into a huge celebration dedicated to the reason he was interested in Stratford in the first place: Shakespeare.

Garrick saw this as a once-in-a-lifetime chance to pay tribute to his hero, while promoting himself. The town agreed to his ideas, and newspapers filled their pages with news of the upcoming Jubilee, despite some people thinking the whole thing was a bad idea.

Ye Olde Giftshop

The arrival of the Jubilee brought with it the mass production of Shakespeare souvenirs. Garrick's literary agent, Thomas Beckett, proclaimed himself the official bookseller of the Jubilee, but the plays, pictures and songbooks that he was selling were all directly related to Garrick and the Jubilee, rather than Shakespeare alone.

The first day of the Jubilee was a success but then it started to rain heavily. Garrick tried to continue the celebrations on the second day, but the rains proved to be too much. The firework display was ruined and the specially built rotunda (a replica of Garrick's personal shrine to Shakespeare) was submerged under half a foot of water.  

The rain only added to other problems, such as a lack of accommodation, huge amounts of traffic and the general chaos of the event. Garrick was forced to cancel the activities on the third day, much to the annoyance of many.

The one highlight was Garrick's performance of his Ode Upon Dedicating A Building And, Erecting A Statue, To Shakespeare, At Stratford-upon-Avon. Despite the rain and floods, people crammed into the rotunda to hear Garrick's now famous dedication – the greatest performance of his life.

Bardolatry

The Ode was often performed for many years after the Jubilee. It inspired the revival of William Shakespeare as a cultural icon, the start of Bardolatry (excessive worshipping of Shakespeare) and the growth of his cultural importance throughout Europe and the world. After the Jubilee, Shakespeare could no longer simply exist as an accomplished writer or thespian: he had become a commodity.

Reading Shakespeare was no longer confined to academics, but had moved into the world of the common reader. People who had never read or heard a line from any of his plays were now absorbed in reading about the man himself, and his birthplace. Bardolatry was becoming an industry.

Today all kinds of quirky books about the playwright are available, as well as tenuously related products. There's the William Shakespeare action figure. (Don't mess with him, he's armed with a quill.) And what self-respecting fan could live without Shakespeare's Blend Tea, with the tagline, "Just think how many more masterpieces Shakespeare could have written with this fabulous tea to sustain him!"