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[CHAPTER THREE
THE MIDDLE COMEDIES (I)
A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merry Wives of Windsor
and
The Merchant of Venice]
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- - - II - - -
Recognition of the sexual nature of the conflicts in A Midsummer Night's Dream has helped to explain the mechanism by which harmony is achieved in that play, where Titania is taught loyalty and obedience to
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Oberon as a result of her sexual infatuation with Bottom. A similar observation may be made of Shakespeare's next comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor, which Partridge has placed close behind Much Ado about Nothing as 'the sexual-worst of the Comedies'. 3.50 Roberts has recognised the central concern of The Merry Wives of Windsor: it is 'a true domestic drama, focused on marriage - the problems of achieving it and the perils of maintaining it', 3.51 and to illustrate these issues Shakespeare uses the conventional plot device already encountered in earlier plays, a daughter's opposition to a marriage arranged by her parents. 3.52 To this he adds the intrigues resulting from the sexual advances of an avaricious and libidinous Falstaff on the two merry wives, Mrs Ford and Mrs Page.
The play opens with a presentation of the conflict between Falstaff and Shallow, a scene in which, according to Dover Wilson, 'a great effort is made to link the play on to Henry IV', 3.53 with Shallow's main function being 'that of a hyphen between Falstaff as the Master of Revels and Falstaff as the slave of Venus', 3.54 after which he 'drifts aimlessly through the rest of the play'. 3.55 This assessment does not do justice to Shakespeare, and is typical of how a preoccupation with the ways in which characters in the chronicle plays are related to those in The Merry Wives of Windsor can obscure critical judgement. 3.56 Shallow's part is small, but not aimless: he acts as one of the mediators in the conflict between Evans and Caius, and, more importantly, promotes Slender's wooing of Anne Page; and just as the opening scene helps to reveal Falstaff's character, so it also establishes the characters of Shallow, Slender and Evans, lightly drawn in as they are. Perhaps what led Dover Wilson to his conclusion about Shallow is the fact that his quarrel with Falstaff is dropped completely from the plot after the first scene; but Shakespeare never intended this conflict to be developed - it is simply a convenient and effective dramatic device with which to open the play, and its dramatic potential is used to the full. It is also, as I shall show, thematically relevant. To start with, Shallow, in his anger, wants to 'make a Star-Chamber matter of it' (I.i.1-2), exercising the full weight of his authority as justice of the peace to punish Falstaff. Shallow stands very much on his dignity here, and the conversation turns to an erudite but humorous discussion of heraldry, with many errors on the parts of Slender and Evans, leading to:
Slen.
I may quarter (Coz).
Shal.
You may, by marrying.
Euans.
It is marring indeed, if he quarter it.
(I.i.22-24)
This introduces the central theme of the play, marriage. Evans' 'marring' is a complete misunderstanding of the implications of heraldic quartering by marriage, but his slip humorously alerts the audience to the undesirability of Slender's marrying, which would be 'marring indeed' in view of the stupidity revealed in his earlier speeches. Despite his low opinion of Slender it is Evans who shortly provides Shallow with the motive for dropping his contention with Falstaff, suggesting that Slender should marry Anne:
It were a goot motion, if we leaue our pribbles and prabbles, and desire a marriage between Master Abraham, and Mistris Anne Page.
(I.i.51-53)
It is this 'motion' which guides Shallow (with Slender in tow) through most of the play, particularly as it is aimed at 'seuen hundred pound of Moneyes, and Gold, and Siluer' (I.i.47-48), a not uncommon reason for marriage in Elizabethan England.
The presence of conflict at the start of the play quickly creates dramatic tension, especially as violence is hinted at in Shallow's 'Ha; o' my life, if I were yong againe, the sword should end it' (I.i.37-38). Each time the dispute is mentioned the aged, absent-minded Shallow has a fit of anger, but it is not until some hundred lines into the scene that the audience is finally allowed to know what exactly Shallow's grievances are:
Knight, you haue beaten my men, kill'd my deare, and broke open my Lodge.
(I.i.103-104)
Falstaff's reply to this, 'But not kiss'd your Keepers daughter?' (I.i.105) (his first words in the play), not only associates him at once with lasciviousness, but also provides an important thematic link between sexuality and the deer. If, as has been suggested, 3.57 Shallow's accusation and Falstaff's reply are quotations from a popular deer-stealing ballad, now lost, then we may further surmise that the ballad was bawdy, and would have pointed the connection between lust and the deer. 3.58 Observant members of the audience would have related this to an earlier reference to deer in the scene, there disguised as venison:
I wish'd your Venison better, it was ill killd: how doth good Mistresse Page?
(I.i.75-76)
The link between the deer and lust would have been further confirmed by a
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fortuitous quibble on the word 'venery', meaning either the sport of hunting, or sexual indulgence; 3.59 and so Shallow's speech inadvertently and comically places venison (and thus lechery, and Falstaff, who killed the deer) in close proximity to Mrs Page. The same image appears a little later:
Fal.
Mistris Ford, by my troth you are very wel met: by your leaue good Mistris.
Mr.Page.
Wife, bid these gentlemen welcome: come, we haue a hot Venison pasty to dinner; Come gentlemen, I hope we shall drinke downe all vnkindnesse.
(I.i.174-178)
On the surface, Page's invitation to dinner has the usual Shakespearean implications of harmony, 3.60 and since all do go in to eat, we may take it that the conflict between Shallow and Falstaff ends here, when they 'drinke downe all vnkindnesse'. However, the 'hot Venison pasty' has undertones of venery (in both senses), and the equivalent passage in the bad 1602 quarto reads:
Fal.
Mistresse Foord, I thinke your name is,
If I mistake not.
Syr Iohn kisses her.
Mis.Ford.
Your mistake sir is nothing but in the
Mistresse. But my husbands name is Foord sir.
(Q I.i)
While there are no associations of venery here, Mrs Ford's play on 'Mistresse' makes it clear that Falstaff's kiss represents some form of sexual advance, and Oliver is surely wrong when he takes this as 'no more than a polite salutation'; 3.61 Falstaff's later comment reveals what he thought at their meeting:
I spie entertainment in her: shee disourses: she carues: she giues the leere of inuitation: I can construe the action of her familier stile, & the hardest voice of her behauior (to be english'd rightly) is, I am Sir Iohn Falstaffs.
(I.iii.41-45)
Thus the conflict between Shallow and Falstaff is used to introduce the idea of sexual pleasure, hunting and the deer, all closely associated.
As may be expected in a comedy, the opening conflict also gives rise to some humour before it is disposed of. The initial dialogue relating to heraldry arises directly from Shallow's indignation at Falstaff's effrontery: in saying 'he shall not abuse Robert Shallow Esquire' (I.i.3-4), he prompts Slender to elaborate on Shallow's social standing by giving him the comically incorrect designations 'Rato lorum' and
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'Armigero' (I.i.8 and 9), blunders typical of his slender wit. 'Rato lorum' is Slender's version of custos rotulorum or 'custalorum', the latter form already mentioned by Shallow himself (I.i.7); 'Armigero' is meant to be armiger, having the same significance as 'esquire' (also previously mentioned by Shallow at I.i.4) - one entitled to a coat of arms. 3.62 These humorous touches also serve the function of character delineation: in the matter of the conflict, Evans, while he 'makes Fritters of English' (V.v.144) much to our amusement, is consistently a man of peace:
... if Sir Iohn Falstaffe haue comitted disparagements vnto you, I am of the Church and will be glad to do my beneuilence to make attonements and compremises between you.
...
It is petter that friends is the sword, and end it ....
...
It were a good motion, if we leaue our pribbles and prabbles ....
(I.i.28-30, 39 and 51-52)
Falstaff is witty, but belligerent and totally without remorse:
Shal.
Tut, a pin: this shall be answer'd.
Fal.
I will answere it strait, I haue done all this: That is now answer'd.
Shal.
The Councell shall know this.
Fal.
'Twere better for you if it were known in councell: you'll be laugh'd at.
Eu.
Pauca verba; (Sir Iohn) good worts.
Fal.
Good worts? good Cabidge.
(I.i.106-113)
Falstaff's pun on 'Councell', 3.63 ('in councell', meaning 'in secret') is impertinent, but Evans in his philanthropic way recognises it as good advice, an encouragement to Shallow to drop his action and restore peace. Falstaff's comically rude rejoinder shows that he neither needs nor wants peace, a fact made evident as the conflict develops:
Fal.
... Slender, I broke your head: what matter haue you against me?
Slen.
Marry sir, I haue matter in my head against you, and against your cony-catching Rascalls, Bardolf, Nym and Pistoll.
Bar.
You Banberry Cheese.
Slen.
I, it is no matter.
Pist.
How now, Mephostophilus?
Slen.
I, it is no matter.
Nym.
Slice, I say; pauca, pauca: Slice, that's my humor.
Slen.
Where's Simple my man? can you tell, Cosen?
Eua.
Peace, I pray you.
(I.i.113-124)
The verbal violence of insult should be supported by physical abuse, as implied in the dialogue: Falstaff's initial question to Slender is sheer
braggartism, for he knows Slender is too feeble in body and spirit to offer any resistance. Despite this, Slender's reply is full of righteous indignation, instantly deflated when Bardolph calls him a 'Banbery Cheese', the implication being that Slender is a weakling, slightly built. 3.64 However, the insult in itself is not enough to reduce Slender convincingly to his ineffectual reply, 'I, it is no matter': Bardolph should offer some show of physical violence by pushing Slender as he insults him, sending him reeling towards Pistol, who backs his 'How now, Mephostophilus?' with a thrust towards Nym. Oliver remarks that Nym's 'Slice' could be an extension of the 'Cheese' metaphor, 'suggesting that Slender be sliced up'; 3.65 this is quite correct, and Nym should draw his sword, comically attempting to stab Slender while shouting 'pauca, pauca' to support his action. This Latin word was picked up from Evans a few moments before, and spoken by that peace-loving Welshman, 'pauca' could have resembled the English 'poker', suggesting the violence to which Nym resorts. The situation is now desperate for Slender, who can only take refuge behind Shallow, wondering why Simple has not come to his rescue. When the charge of robbing Slender is then put to Pistol, Nym and Bardolph, each in turn denies it in his characteristic way, Pistol by delivering a challenge in an excess of verbiage; Nym by threatening obscurely in an excess of humours; Bardolph by offering an apparently logical explanation, but so racily expressed as to be almost incomprehensible.
Slender's reaction to the conflict and violence of the first episode in this scene is inconsistent with his account of himself to Anne Page later on, showing he is also capable of a measure of braggartism, in his case comically ineffectual. That he has no concept of what love for a woman is, is revealed in his anxious desire to 'doe that that is reason' (I.i.192) when prompted by Shallow and Evans to woo Anne. He fails dismally, however, in his first attempt to impress her with his manliness:
... I bruiz'd my shin th' other day, with playing at Sword and Dagger with a Master of Fence (three veneys for a dish of stew'd Prunes) and by my troth, I cannot abide the smell of hot meat since.
(I.i.259-263)
The violence associated with fencing, even in sport, proves too much for Slender, but provides Shakespeare the opportunity for a bawdy quibble, revealing Slender's ineptitude at love: the 'stew'd Prunes' and 'hot meate' which he 'cannot abide' are both euphemisms for prostitutes. 3.66
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After this, Slender's boasting 'I haue seene Sackerson loose, twenty times, and haue taken him by the Chaine' (I.i.270-272) is patently absurd, since a man who is put off fencing by a bruised shin, and cannot stand up to the likes of Bardolph, Nym and Pistol in their denials of his accusations, is most unlikely to have taken a vicious bear by the chain.
The audience will see from the manner in which the crimes of Bardolph, Nym and Pistol have been denied (or, in Falstaff's case, confessed to), that all are guilty, but show no contrition. Slender's final comment on the matter is interesting:
... Ile nere be drunk whilst I liue againe, but in honest, ciuill, godly company for this tricke: if I be drunke, Ile be drunke with those that haue the feare of God, and not with drunken knaues.
(I.i.163-166)
The absurdity of Slender's notion of 'honest, ciuill, godly company' is comic: such people are most unlikely to be found drunk or associate with drunkards, and the same observation applies to 'those that haue the feare of God'. The serious implication is the converse, that Falstaff and his followers, being given to drinking, cannot be considered 'honest, ciuill, godly company'. In this scene their violence and insubordination, as well as their lies, show that they are agents of disorder, causing civil strife in the Windsor community. Furthermore, they are outsiders, as seen later when Mrs Page remarks, 'why, hee hath not beene thrice In my Company' (II.i.25-26) and Mrs Ford wonders 'What tempest (I trou) threw this Whale, (with so many Tuns of oyle in his belly) a'shoare at Windsor?' (II.i.61-63). However, it is only Falstaff, the leader, who remains outside the Windsor community and continues to act as an agent of disorder, for, when we next encounter the group, Bardolph is accepted as a tapster by the Host of the Garter, and Pistol and Nym clash with Falstaff over the delivery of his love letters, deserting him as a result. This conflict manifests itself in a predictable way, with Pistol pompously standing on his honour, and Nym on his humours:
Pist.
Shall I Sir Pandarus of Troy become,
And by my side weare Steele? then Lucifer take all.
Ni.
I will run no base humor: here take the humor-Letter;
I will keepe the hauior of reputation.
(I.iii.71-74)
This is important, because it provokes Pistol and Nym to their 'humors of reuenge' (I.iii.85), in which they reveal to Page and Ford Falstaff's plans for seducing the wives. In this way Nym and Pistol set in motion
the reaction to Falstaff's machinations: Pistol, at least, is believed by Ford; and Nym's rejection by Page serves to demonstrate how a man would be expected to react to such accusations if his relationship with his wife were based on trust, so highlighting Ford's jealousy. Thus Falstaff becomes an isolated figure, the principal agent of disorder in the main plot.
To close his exposition Shakespeare introduces the sub-plot: Simple is detected by Caius while delivering Evans' letter to Mistress Quickly under circumstances which invite a display of comic violence from the doctor who, always preoccupied with rapiers, 3.67 drags Simple out of the closet, probably beating him as he does so:
O Diable, Diable: vat is in my Closset? Villanie, La-roone: Rugby, my Rapier.
(I.iv.62-63)
This moment of violence has been carefully prepared for, with mounting tension: the first time Caius needed something from the closet, Mistress Quickly fetched it herself, commenting:
I am glad hee went not in himselfe: if he had found the yong man he would haue bin horne-mad.
(I.iv.43-45)
When the inevitable discovery takes place, Caius is indeed 'horne-mad', because he himself is in love with Anne Page, as Mistress Quickly discloses to Simple. To further complicate matters, he thinks that his rival in love is Evans, not Slender, and promptly sends Rugby off with a challenge:
I will cut his troat in de Parke, and I will teach a scuruy Iack-a-nape Priest to meddle, or make ... by gar I will cut all his two stones: by gar, he shall not haue a stone to throw at his dogge.
(I.iv.103-108)
So Simple's hostile reception by the doctor is but a prelude to further threats of violence, which reach their climax in the threat of death: 'by gar, I vill kill de Iack-Priest' (I.iv.111-112). The intensely sexual nature of Caius' jealousy is indicated in his threat of castration, preceded by the reference to the 'Iack-a-nape Priest': a 'jackanapes' was a tame ape or monkey, 3.68 and, as with Oberon's 'medling Monkey', 'meddle' has sexual connotations, while to 'make' could be an act of generation. Caius is a figure of fun, being irascible yet unable to give full expression to his anger because of his limited knowledge of English: to
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make his point he usually resorts to over-statements which, rather than inspiring fear or respect as they are intended to, are usually laughable. These violent sexual references and threats reveal the debased nature of Caius' love, showing him to be an unworthy suitor to Anne. By contrast Fenton's love, introduced at the close of the scene, is pure, in the romantic tradition.
At the opening of the second act the main plot is advanced when the wives receive their letters from Falstaff and decide to be revenged on him for the improper nature of his advances, so becoming, as Roberts points out, 'not merely women whose virtue has been affronted but defenders of the social order'. 3.69 This is true as far as their own personal conflict with him goes, a conflict, as they see it, based on sexual appetite: their best mode of action will be 'to entertaine him with hope, till the wicked fire of lust haue melted him in his owne greace' (II.i.64-66). Unknown to them, however, Falstaff's true motive is money, with sex merely incidental to it - when he first announces his intentions to Pistol and Nym he makes the point: 'I am about thrift' (I.iii.39-40). He knows that the wives both have access to their husbands' money, and his intentions are unmistakable:
... She is a region in Guiana: all gold, and bountie: I will be Cheaters to them both, and they shall be Exchequers to mee: they shall be my East and West Indies, and I will trade to them both ... we will thriue (Lads) we will thriue.
(I.iii.64-70)
To heighten the comic effect the wives' plans deal with this aspect as well: unknown to Falstaff, they intend to bankrupt their victim while tormenting him:
... let's appoint him a meeting: giue him a show of comfort in his Suit, and lead him on with a fine baited delay, till hee hath pawn'd his horses to mine Host of the Garter.
(II.i.90-94)
Falstaff's actions lead to disorder in the Windsor community, with Ford needlessly suspecting the chastity of his wife and making a public spectacle of himself as he tries to trap her in compromising circumstances. The wives, as agents of order, deliberately set out to thwart Falstaff in his disruptive advances; but there are other disorderly forces in Windsor besides Falstaff, two of them concerning the domestic affairs of the Page and Ford families, and central to the comic action. As will be seen later in the play, Page and his wife are at odds over who
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should marry Anne, with Page in favour of Slender because of his money, and Mrs Page supporting Caius in his suit because of his social standing. The fact that Anne herself loves Fenton is of no importance to either. In the case of the Fords it is Ford's jealousy that is a cause of domestic disorder, and this is revealed during the discussion of Falstaff's letters:
Mi.Ford.
... oh that my husband saw this Letter: it would giue eternall food to his iealousie.
Mis.Page.
Why look where he comes; and my good man too: hee's as farre from iealousie, as I am from giuing him cause, and that (I hope) is an vnmeasurable distance.
Mis.Ford.
You are the happier woman.
(II.i.97-103)
While there is a touch of pathos in Mrs Ford's reflection, 'You are the happier woman', she is nevertheless mischievous in wishing that her husband could see Falstaff's letter simply to torment him with a groundless cause of suspicion. When the men are told of Falstaff's plans, Ford's jealousy is finely drawn, contrasting with Page's complete trust in his wife:
Page.
... if hee should intend this voyage toward my wife, I would turne her loose to him; and what hee gets more of her, then sharpe words, let it lye on my head.
Ford.
I doe not misdoubt my wife: but I would bee loath to turne them together: a man may be too confident: I would haue nothing lye on my head: I cannot be thus satisfied.
(II.i.173-180)
The words 'lye on my head' refer to the cuckold's horns, and the nagging suspicion shown in Ford's speech which closes the scene, where he plans to disguise himself to test Falstaff, breaks into a full-blooded jealous fury at the close of the following scene, revealing in a long soliloquy the inner conflict of a suspicious husband:
What a damn'd Epicurian-Rascall is this? my heart is ready to cracke with impatience: who says this is improuident iealousie?
(II.ii.276-278)
The audience is by now well aware that Ford's jealousy, fuelled by Falstaff's advances, threatens to be a major disruptive force in the play, jeopardising Ford's marriage, while the dispute between the Pages over Anne's proposed husband is a second disruptive force, marring the prospect of Anne's future happiness.
Having presented the major conflicts of the play Shakespeare sustains
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tension by devoting his attention to the conflict between Caius and Evans, which is worked out in two consecutive scenes, the last of Act III and the first of Act IV. There is much humour as Caius waits, with increasing anger, for the arrival of Evans; at one stage he even proposes to demonstrate his skills on poor Rugby:
Cai.
By gar de herring is no dead, so as I vill kill him: take your Rapier, (Iacke) I vill tell you how I vill kill him.
Rug.
Alas sir, I cannot fence.
Cai.
Villanie, take your Rapier.
(II.iii.11-15)
Once again Caius' broken English is a vehicle for humour, and with it there is the doctor's irrational urge to vent his anger on his servant - a different treatment of the theme of beating servants, as here Caius knows very well that Rugby has done nothing to deserve punishment, unlike his forebears in earlier comedies. 3.70 Violence is averted and Rugby saved by the arrival of the Host and his friends, who take much delight in inciting the doctor to greater heights of anger and promises of revenge on Evans. In this the Host is particularly effective with his 'Castilion-king-Vrinal', 'Mounseur Mockewater' and 'Clapper-claw' (II.iii.31, 53-54 and 61), all insults which Caius fails to understand. To further the cause of disorder and heighten the comedy, the Host misconstrues 'Mockewater' and 'Clapper-claw' as 'Valour' and 'make ... amends' (II.iii.56 and 63), precisely the opposite of their real meanings. In complete contrast to the violent doctor, Evans is found in the next scene to be 'full of Chollors ... and trempling of minde' (III.i.11-12), and there is much humour in the fact that this man of peace should be forced to contemplate violence for a cause he cannot possibly fully understand. His speech and nervous singing are full of sexual innuendo, out of character and quite unintentional: the doctor's 'Vrinalls' (III.i.14) are glass vessels for examining urine, but here they, and also the 'Vrinal' at line 81, could be interpreted as male sexual organs through which urine is passed; and 'Peds of Roses', 'sat in Pabilon' and 'vagram Posies' (III.i.18, 23 and 24) all have bawdy double meanings. 3.71 These are comically inappropriate coming from a parson, and point to the disorder implicit in the proposed duel between doctor and clergyman, while also serving to remind the audience of the sexual nature of Caius' quarrel. This is further highlighted by the absurd interjections from the supposedly love-struck Slender, who can do no more than sigh 'O sweet Anne Page' (III.i.38, 66 and 105) at intervals throughout
the scene. The discovery by Caius and Evans that they have been made to look foolish is an anticlimax, as our expectations of comic violence are not fulfilled. Nevertheless, we are amused at the pretence of anger by Evans as he tries to explain to the genuinely angry Caius that they have been tricked, and this leads to yet another conflict as they vow revenge on the Host. Neither the Quarto nor the Folio gives us a full understanding of what form the revenge takes, but it appears that Evans and Caius are involved in a plot to steal the Host's horses. Little is made of this, although we do enjoy the Host's comic distress in IV.v, where Evans and Caius gleefully tell him of his losses.
Once Evans and Caius have been put out of their misery in III.i, Shakespeare returns to the Falstaff plot. Here Ford's jealousy acts as a catalyst to Falstaff's plans because his enjoyment of Mrs Ford will be so much the greater if the husband is suspicious of his wife's chastity. The jealous husband was often the subject of comic plots, and in Heywood's Johan Johan such is the passion of Johan Johan, who correctly suspects his wife, Tyb, of having an affair with the priest, Sir Johan, that a violent slanging match results:
Tyb.
Ye! horson dryvyll! get the out of my dore!
Johan.
Nay! get thou out of my house, thou prestis hore!
Sir J.
Thou lyest, horson kokold, evyn to thy face!
Johan.
And thou lyest, pyld preest, with an evyll grace!
Tyb.
And thou lyest!
Johan.
And thou lyest!
Sir J.
And thou lyest agayn!
(Johan Johan 655-659)
This verbal abuse is comic in itself, but even more amusing is the physical violence into which it degenerates, indicated in the stage direction, 'Here they fyght by the erys a whyle' (Johan Johan 664). Sir Johan's accusation, 'Thou lyest, horson kokold', is self-contradictory: if Johan Johan were lying, he would not be a cuckold. This type of humour, centring on the indictment of cuckoldry, appears so frequently in Elizabethan drama that we must conclude that it was found irresistibly funny. It was often associated with the cuckold's horns, as we see in the jealous humour of Kitely in Jonson's Every Man in His Humour, where he complains of the little caps women wear:
Ile change 'hem streight, in mine. Mine shall no more
Weare three-pild akornes, to make my hornes ake.
(Every Man in His Humour III.iii) 3.72
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Kitely is an excellent example of a man infected with a jealous humour, as is Ford:
... like a pestilance, it doth infect
The houses of the braine. First, it begins
Solely to worke vpon the phantasie,
Filling her seat with such pestiferous aire,
As soone corrupts the iudgement ....
(Every Man in His Humour II.iii)
What amuses us in such afflictions is that the disease 'soone corrupts the iudgement' and the sufferer unwittingly goes to ridiculous lengths, usually to confirm his cuckoldry rather than his wife's innocence. So it is with Ford, who plans revenge:
Well, I will take him, then torture my wife, plucke the borrowed vaile of modestie from the so-seeming Mist. Page, divulge Page himselfe for a secure and wilfull Acteon, and to these violent proceedings all my neighbours shall cry aime.
(III.ii.35-40)
Ford fails to appreciate the virtue of either his wife or Mrs Page, but feels his efforts in exposing them are praiseworthy. His intention to 'torture' his wife points to a degree of cruelty: although the torture implied may be only verbal, he does refer to 'violent proceedings' and therefore is under no misconceptions about the effects his actions might have. He sees Page as a 'wilfull Acteon', a classical allusion to the young hunter who came across Diana, the hunting goddess, bathing. She turned him into a stag, resulting in his being set upon and killed by his own hunting dogs. The Elizabethans associated Actaeon with cuckoldry, presumably because he was seen as a sexual threat to Diana, and because, as a stag, he would have had horns; 3.73 and so Ford's reference to Page as a 'wilfull Acteon' implies that he is a cuckold, with Falstaff as the interloper. Falstaff had also been connected with Acteon earlier, by Pistol:
Ford.
Loue my wife?
Pist.
With liuer, burning hot: prevent:
Or goe thou like Sir Acteon he,
with Ring-wood at thy heeles:
O, odious is the name.
Ford.
What name Sir?
Pist.
The horne I say: Farewell.
(II.i.113-119)
Here Falstaff himself is identified with Actaeon, and so the 'horne'
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could be Falstaff's (that is, an image of the phallus), or it could refer to the cuckold's horns which will metaphorically grow on Ford's head - in either case, 'odious is the name'. Both references to Actaeon emphasise the sexual side of Falstaff's advances and their associated disorder; and consequently the sexual nature of Ford's inner, jealous conflict, and also his overt conflict with Falstaff.
That Ringwood, one of Actaeon's hounds, should be (according to Pistol) at Ford's heels, not Falstaff's, is curious, bearing in mind that it is Falstaff Pistol identifies with Actaeon. In Golding's translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses, Ringwood is the last of many dogs mentioned, and he has 'a shyrle loud mouth the which he freely spent' (Golding: Metamorphoses III.270). His vocal qualities are also found in Ovid, where 'acutae vocis Hylactor' (Metamorphoses III.224) is the corresponding final dog on the list; it would seem then, that as well as punishing Ford for his cuckoldry by biting him, Ringwood will make a public spectacle of Ford by drawing attention to him with his 'shyrle loud mouth'. The allusion to Ringwood and Actaeon is a complex one, for if Ringwood chases Ford, then he, too, must be associated with Actaeon as a buck - and his horns, although this is not directly stated. What Pistol implies is that Ford may become a cuckold if he does not take some preventive action.
I have already mentioned that Falstaff is an agent of disorder, and Roberts sees the association with Actaeon as confirming this:
... both Actaeon and Falstaff become sexually threatening to the social order, and the order does not tolerate such menaces. Actaeon is torn to pieces by dogs; Falstaff is symbolically castrated. 3.74
There is, however, a duality in Falstaff's role, and Roberts finds that his other function is that of a scapegoat, 'a nearly innocent victim', 3.75 also noting that Actaeon himself can be seen as a scapegoat. 3.76 This view helps to explain Falstaff's harsh treatment, particularly in the final scene. Ovid stresses the innocence of Actaeon:
at bene si quaeras, Fortunae crimen in illo,
non scelus invenies; quid enim scelus error habebat?
(Metamorphoses III.141-142)
By comparison, the innocence of Falstaff is manifestly in question, an important point if we remember that a scapegoat should be innocent. Furthermore, the innocent victim should be punished and rejected, but Falstaff's rejection by the Windsor community is only temporary, for at
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the end Mrs Page specifically includes him in her invitation:
Good husband, let vs euery one go home,
And laugh this sport ore by a Countrie fire,
Sir Iohn and all.
(V.v.238-240)
The important aspect in which Falstaff does resemble a scapegoat is that he exerts a regenerative influence, since while he is being purged of his own sins, he is also inadvertently restoring harmony and order to those punishing him. With this in mind it will be instructive to take a closer look at the three occasions of Falstaff's punishment.
The carefully laid plans for the first punishment are revealed just before they are carried out, augmenting the audience's anticipation of comic violence. When Ford unexpectedly arrives on the scene, we watch with delight as the wives, unperturbed, relish the real danger of Falstaff's position. He is made to climb into a washing basket containing dirty linen:
Looke, heere is a basket, if he be of any reasonable stature, he may creepe in heere, and throw fowle linnen vpon him, as if it were going to bucking: Or it is whiting time, send him by your two men to Datchet-Meade.
(III.iii.119-123)
Shakespeare's indulgence in farce here does not prevent him from loading the action with a deeper significance. When Falstaff recounts his experiences in the buck basket he makes much of the fact that he is intimately mixed with the dirty laundry, 'stopt in like a strong distillation with stinking Cloathes, that fretted in their owne grease' (III.v.103-105), so that 'there was the rankest compound of villanous smell, that euer offended nostrill' (III.v.82-84), and Mrs Ford refers to his dirtiness in significant terms (although she has the unsavoury results of excessive fear in mind):
I am halfe affraid he will haue neede of washing: so throwing him into the water, will doe him a benefit.
(III.iii.168-170)
The repeated references to dirt, smell and grease all point to Falstaff's lechery, as does the fact that he is carried out in a buck basket, with 'buck' being associated with sexual licence as well as having its literal meaning relating to the cleaning of foul linen. Grease, in particular, has connotations of gluttony and sexual misbehaviour, as seen in Falstaff's account of the 'greasie Napkins' (III.v.81-82) and the linen's
'owne grease', which recall Mrs Page's earlier description of Falstaff as 'this greasie Knight' (II.i.104-105) - 'greasie' meaning in the first instance simply 'dirty', but in the second, 'lecherous'. 3.77 Mrs Page's suggestion that Falstaff and the dirty linen are going to bucking then becomes a sexual quibble, 3.78 which she quickly amends by suggesting 'it is whiting time'; white being an image of sexual purity, it is evident that Falstaff is about to be chastised. In view of this Mrs Ford's remark that he 'will haue neede of washing' which will 'doe him a benefit' takes on an added significance, as does Falstaff's recounting of his violent, symbolic washing:
And in the height of this Bath (when I was more then halfe stew'd in grease (like a Dutch-dish) to be throwne into the Thames, and coold, glowing-hot, in the serge like a Horse-shoo; think of that; hissing hot.
(III.v.108-113)
Falstaff's being 'stew'd in grease' points to his sexual guilt, as do 'glowing-hot' and 'hissing hot', 3.79 and the punishment inflicted by the wives is designed to cool his sexual ardour, cleansing him of his sins in a mock baptism. Unfortunately the cleansing, cooling effect of the Thames waters is only temporary, and Falstaff is soon planning his next assault.
Apart from being the first means of attempting a violent purging of Falstaff, the buck-basket gives rise to an amusing show of Ford's jealousy:
M.Ford.
... You were best meddle with buck-washing.
Ford.
Buck? I would I could wash my selfe of ye
Buck: Bucke, bucke, bucke, I bucke: I warrant you Bucke.
And of the season too; it shall appeare.
(III.iii.144-147)
Once again the buck is associated with sexuality, 'And of the season' meaning 'ready for mating'. The buck in question is Falstaff, recalling his earlier association with Actaeon: but when Ford refers to washing himself 'of ye Bucke' he also means ridding himself of the horns of cuckoldry on his own forehead. The basket features in Falstaff's second punishment as well, but there its association with 'buck' is forgotten: it is simply a device to make Ford's jealousy look ridiculous as he needlessly throws the dirty linen about the stage. This, indeed, was a function of the first episode, with Ford being humiliated in front of his wife and friends because of his false accusations; but, like Falstaff's
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lechery, his jealousy remains unpurged at the end of the first punishment.
As an interlude between Falstaff's recounting of his first ordeal to Ford and the inflicting of his second, there is a short scene in which young William Page is rehearsed in his Latin grammar. The grammar lesson can be found elsewhere in English drama, and as far back as Redford's morality Wyt and Science (ca. 1530), we find the irascible Idleness trying to teach Ignorance in an episode which threatens to culminate in violence:
Idle.
And whats half 'Ingland'?
Heeres 'ing,' and heeres 'land.' Whats tys?
Ingn.
Whats tys?
Idel.
Whats tys, horeson? whats tys?
Heeres 'ing,' and heeres 'land.' Whats tys?
Ingn.
Tys my thum.
Idel.
Thy thum? 'Yng,' horeson, 'ing,' 'ing'!
Ingn.
Yng, yng, yng, yng.
Idel.
Foorth! Shall I bete thy narse, now?
(Wyt and Science 457-465) 3.80
A similarly comic threat of violence also features in the lesson in The Merry Wives of Windsor, the main function of which is to separate two Falstaff scenes, dramatically signifying the passing of time. There is much bawdy humour, pointed by Mistress Quickly's comments and heightened by the fact that pastor Evans is the unsuspecting source of such humour. The relevance of the scene to the play is slight: an obvious link is the sexual nature of the quibbles, emphasised in Evans' final rehearsing of the relative pronoun:
It is Qui, quie, quod; if you forget your Quies, your Ques, and your Quods, you must be preeches: Goe your waies and play, go.
(IV.i.68-70)
Evans' 'Quies', 'Ques' and 'Quods' should be pronounced 'keys', 'case' and 'cods', giving rise to the bawdy quibbles, 'case' for the female sexual organ (which is why Mistress Quickly had exclaimed in horror, ''Vengeance of Gineys case; fie on her; neuer name her (childe) if she be a whore' (IV.i.53-54)); to open the 'case', the 'key' or male organ; and 'cods' for testicles. 3.81 To be 'preeches' is to be beaten, 3.82 and so what Evans unwittingly says is that if William forgets, or does not mind, sexual matters - if he misbehaves sexually - he will be punished. The violent threat to William mirrors the violence being done to Falstaff for sexual offences in the main action, and as an amusing conclusion, the boy
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is told to 'play, go', both of which could imply sexual activity. 3.83
While in his first punishment there is no violence done to Falstaff on the stage, this is not the case with the second, in which Falstaff is soundly beaten by Ford. The increase in stage violence is in keeping with the fact that the second punishment is harsher than the first, both in the physical pain or discomfort it inflicts, and in the degree of humiliation suffered by Falstaff. His confinement in the buck-basket is degrading, but not damaging to his aura of sexuality, which being dressed as an old woman is. The beating he receives while in this disguise is administered by his rival in love, Ford, and so it, too, contributes to his sexual degradation. With this triumph behind him, Ford is completely cured of his jealousy once the wives reveal how they have used Falstaff:
... Now doth thy honor stand
(In him that was of late an Hereticke)
As firme as faith.
(IV.iv.8-9)
All that remains is to cure Falstaff by means of his final punishment; and in the process the wrangle over Anne Page is also resolved.
While Falstaff's throwing into the Thames and beating are events which we can conceive as actually happening, what happens at Herne's oak is quite outside the bounds of possibility. Falstaff's disguise, the fairies, the pinching and testing with tapers simply could not happen in the real world, and what the audience observes in this masque-like presentation takes on the significance of a ritual. Furthermore, although the audience is aware that the fairies, unlike those of A Midsummer Night's Dream, are not real, a sense of the supernatural is nevertheless encouraged by Mrs Page's vivid description of the folk beliefs concerning Herne's oak, which, handed down by 'The superstitious idle-headed-Eld' (IV.iv.36), effectively suggest the world of ghosts and spirits. In the final scene Falstaff is to be disguised as Herne the hunter, who
Doth all the winter time, at still midnight
Walke round about an Oake, with great rag'd-hornes,
And there he blasts the tree, and takes the cattle,
And make the milch-kine yeeld blood, and shakes a chaine
In a most hideous and dreadfull manner.
(IV.iv.30-34)
The identification of Falstaff with Herne has particular meaning for the wives: his 'great rag'd hornes' are like those of Actaeon, sexually
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threatening; but more than this, he is a force of disorder, causing unnatural and dire happenings. Part of their plan is to 'dis-horne the spirit' (IV.iv.63), which Roberts sees as a symbolic castration; 3.84 however, I think castration is too strong an analogy for the process: I do not see Falstaff as being sexually incapacitated during the ritual - he is merely sexually purified, so that he will no longer present the sexual threat signified by the horn, and his proclivity to disorder is curbed. The purifying ceremony is specifically designed to achieve these ends, and takes place just after midnight,
... the verie witching time of night,
When Churchyards yawne, and Hell it selfe breaths out
Contagion to this world.
(Hamlet III.iii.379-381)
With the masque-like setting and the various suggestions of the supernatural, the audience is led to believe that what merely human agents could not achieve with Thames water and beating, the final ritual will.
The physical pain which Falstaff experiences during the ceremony cannot equal that of his beating by Ford: the Quarto stage directions require burning with tapers and pinching. While the former could be painful if carried to extremes, I do not think the ritual is intended to present the audience with an unpleasant picture of violent physical torture; after all, the burning is merely a test, with the real punishment being the less physically painful pinching which is accompanied by a 'scornfull rime' (V.v.92). The forest setting, the time of night, the outlandish disguises, the spoken verse, the fairy song and dancing - all encourage an interpretation of the scene in terms of its images, and Falstaff himself indicates the portent of the trial-fire:
I thinke the diuell wil not haue me damn'd,
Least the oyle that's in me should set hell on fire;
He would neuer else crosse me thus.
(V.v.35-37)
Falstaff's 'oyle' that would 'set hell on fire' is not only his bodily fat, but also an image of his sexual sins, just as his greasiness was earlier. The trial fire, Mistress Quickly points out, will 'turne him to no paine' (V.v.87) if he is chaste; he will burn only if his 'is the flesh of a corrupted hart' (V.v.88). Falstaff's prognostication, that 'the diuell wil not haue me damn'd', points to the fact that the ritual
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is to be his salvation. Pinching by fairies as a means of chastisement can be found in Lyly's Endymion, where Corsites is the victim:
3 Fairy.
Let him not lacke
Sharpe nailes to pinch him blue and red,
Till sleepe has rock'd his addle head.
4 Fairy.
For the trespasse hee hath done,
Spots ore all his flesh shall runne.
(Endymion IV.iii.1739-1743) 3.85
Much closer to Shakespeare is Fletcher's The Faithful Shepherdess, where trial fire is used as a test for sexual corruption:
In this flame his finger thrust,
Which will burn him if he lust;
But if not, away will turn,
As loth unspotted flesh to burn,
(The Faithful Shepherdess V.ii) 3.86
and pinching is a means of purging lust:
And the Fairies all will run,
Wildly dancing by the Moon,
And will pinch him to the bone,
Till his lustful thoughts be gone.
(The Faithful Shepherdess III,.i)
In the same way the trial fire is used in The Merry Wives of Windsor to identify Falstaff as a lustful agent of disorder, and this is followed by the ritual fairy pinching to signify his purgation.
However, the ritual also restores order to the families of Windsor: Ford has had his jealousy purged, but there is still the matter of the conflict between Page and his wife over who should marry Anne, and Anne's own idea on the matter. Much use is made in this scene of the conflict between appearance and reality, and it is characters on the stage who are gulled by means of a deceptive appearance. Falstaff is the central victim, fooled into believing the wives have met him to satisfy his sexual lust, and then led on to believe he is discovered and punished by fairies. The resolution of the Anne Page plot also relies on this conflict, with Caius and Slender being deceived by appearance, made conspicuous by the fact that they choose their brides by the colours of their dresses. This in itself provokes laughter, but to crown it all, Anne's parents are also misled by appearance, each believing that the fairy their favoured suitor has stolen away is in reality Anne, whereas
in fact Fenton gets Anne. When the Pages realise that they cannot have their wishes, they are quite happy to accept Fenton; but Caius and Slender, who are unworthy of Anne, remain outside the general reconciliation at the end of the play.
Stewart maintains that 'All true drama penetrates through representative fiction to the condition of myth', 3.87 and sees the Falstaff of the chronicle plays as the sacrifice made to purify and regenerate a barren land. 3.88 The analogy can be extended to Falstaff in The Merry Wives of Windsor, and I have already mentioned the limited validity of seeing him as a scapegoat for the sins of the community. Colman says of Falstaff's speech on arriving in the forest, 'His initial appeal to Jove has set the tone and established a link between the man and the god'. 3.89 Falstaff can thus be seen as a Christ-like figure, made to suffer as a means of redeeming the others: his suffering results in the purging of Ford's jealousy as well as the marrying of Anne to the man she loves, with her parents being brought to accept him. The difference between Christ and Falstaff, indeed, what makes Falstaff comic, is that he suffers unwittingly, in ignorance of the good he is doing the Windsor community. That redemption and regeneration are important issues in the masque is indicated by the forest setting and Herne's oak itself: in two earlier plays Shakespeare uses forests as places in which chaotic situations are restored to rights; and the present play affords another example. The forest in The Two Gentlemen of Verona allows the romantic excess of Valentine's offer of Silvia to Proteus to restore harmony, while the magic performed in the Athenian forest of A Midsummer Night's Dream restores harmony at all levels in the play, even if qualified by the awareness of Puck's unreformed love of disorder. 3.90 Windsor forest has a similar function, enhanced by the presence of Herne's oak, a feminine image of fecundity and regeneration. 3.91 Another such image in the ritual is found in the Quarto stage direction requiring Evans to appear 'like a Satyre' (Q V.v.37), a mythical forest spirit of fertility. 3.92 That Evans, the peaceful man of God, should be disguised as a satyr may seem incongruous if the satyr is seen purely as depicting rampant sexuality; but the character of the parson and the nature of the scene with its beautiful fairy blessing of fertility,
And Nightly-medow-Fairies, looke you sing
Like to the Garters-Compasse, in a Ring,
Th' expressure that it beares: Greene let it be,
More fertile-fresh then all the field to see,
(F2 V.v.66-69)
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preclude any violent or excessively sexual interpretation - Evans should be seen as a benign agent of fertility, directing the fairies during the ritual of purification and regeneration. That the rite is successful is confirmed by Ford's reference to himself which closes the play, 'For he, to night, shall lye with Mistris Ford' (V.v.242), implying that sexual order and harmony have been restored.
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- - - NOTES: CHAPTER THREE - - -
3.51 Jeanne Addison Roberts, Shakespeare's English Comedy: 'The Merry Wives of Windsor' in Context (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1979), p.73. return
3.52 This has been the case to some extent for Bianca (pp.27 and 38-39), but more obviously for Silvia (pp.57 and 63) and Hermia (pp.93-95). return
3.53 Dover Wilson, Comedies, p.78. return
3.56 Comparisons of the characters in the chronicle plays with those in The Merry Wives of Windsor may be of historical interest, but they shed little light on Shakespeare's use of disruption in the comedies. Falstaff, in particular, can stand on his own in the comedy. return
3.57 Oliver, p.10 n.; Hoole, p.32. return
3.58 This is, of course, pure speculation; but, in view of the ballads containing sexual innuendo which survive, it is not unreasonable to suppose that one with a line about kissing the keeper's daughter might have gone further than kissing. Although the subject matter is quite unrelated to deer stealing, the progression from kissing to sexual intercourse is found in the late fifteenth century carol, 'The Friar of Order Gray', in which the following lines illustrate the development I refer to:
This fryer was lusty proper and yong
Inducas
he offerd the Nunne to lerne her syng
in temptacionibus
...
Sol / la / this nunne he kyst full oft
...
This nunne he groped wt flattery
...
The Nunne was tauзght to sung sepe
...
Thus the fryer lyke a prety man
inducas
Ofte rokkyd the Nunnys Quoniam
in temptacionibus
Finis / short and swete
(This carol is found on the Bradshaw bifolium in the Cambridge University Library, Add. MS 7350 (Box 2), and is reproduced in photographic facsimile by P.J. Croft, 'The "Friar of Order Gray" and the Nun', Review of English Studies 32 (1981), 1. I have used the facsimile as well as Croft's transcription of it (pp.15-16) in certain places.) I have already remarked on the fact that the deer was an image of lust elsewhere in Shakespeare (pp.10 and 15), and so my suggestion that the ballad quoted
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by Shallow and Falstaff was ribald is not needed to make the connection, but would humorously enhance it. return [return to note 1.28]
3.59 O.E.D., XIX, 501: 'venery1 ... 1. The practice or sport of hunting beasts of game; the chase ... c 1320 ... venery2 ... 1. The practice or pursuit of sexual pleasure; indulgence of sexual desire ... 1497'; the association would have been further enhanced, in this context, by Shakespeare's earlier poem, Venus and Adonis, only there the animal chased was a boar. Roberts, p.128, suggests that apart from the double meaning of 'venery', other verbal connections between the fields of hunting and loving are 'dear' - 'deer' and 'heart' - 'hart', as well as the common Elizabethan sexual pun on 'die'. return
3.61 Oliver, p.14 n. If the 1602 Quarto is a memorial reconstruction, an idea Oliver accepts (pp.xiii-xxxvii), then it is probable that the person reporting the text had some recollection of misbehaviour on Falstaff's part, indicated by the stage direction. Page's 'hot Venison pasty' could be misconstrued as referring to his wife, implying she was a prostitute: see Slender's 'hot meate' (I.i.263) which I mention on p.116. return
3.63 Ibid., p.10 n.; although the Folio does not distinguish the spelling, the meaning is clear, as 'council' = 'Councell' in line 109 and 'councel' = 'councell' (with the lower case initial letter) in line 110. return
3.64 Ibid., p.11 n., where Oliver cites the proverbial simile 'as thin as Banbury cheese'. return
3.66 Ibid., p.18 n. See also references in Partridge under 'stew' (p.195), 'hot' (p.130) and 'meat' (p.153). return
3.67 They could have a phallic significance for him, since they are largely associated with his proposed duel, which is sexually motivated. return
3.68 O.E.D., VIII, 168: 'jackanapes ... 1. Name for a tame ape or monkey ... 1522 ... 2. ... b. ... a man ... displaying the qualities, of an ape ... 1534'. return
3.70 Of course the Dromios in The Comedy of Errors were innocent, and this considerably increased the humour of their beatings; their masters, however, were unaware of their innocence. return
3.71 Hoole, pp.33-35: 'Roses' are the female sexual organ; 'sat in Pabilon' implies sexual intercourse with a prostitute; 'vagram Posies' are prostitutes. return
3.72 The edition cited is the Folio of 1616. return
3.73 See Oliver, p.43 n.; Bullough II, 17-18; and Roberts pp.75-76 and 114-115. The horns are mentioned both in Ovid, Metamorphoses III.194, and Golding's translation, III.230 (Bullough II, 53; quotations from Golding are Bullough's edition), both possible sources for the Actaeon associations in the play. The sexually threatening aspect of Actaeon is more elusive. In both Golding and Ovid the nymphs scream with fear at the sight of Actaeon in their grove, but perhaps the most conclusive evidence is in the idea that Diana' punishment of Actaeon was worthy of her virginity:
Rumor in ambiguo est: aliis violentior aequo
visa dea est, alii laudant dignamque severa
virginitate vocant ....
(Metamorphoses III.253-255)
The horn as the phallus was a common Elizabethan joke, but it is found in all seriousness, associated with Actaeon, in Titus Andronicus, where Tamora is surprised
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in the company of her illicit lover, Aaron the Moor:
Tamo.
Sawcie controuler of our priuate steps:
Had I the power, that some say Dian had,
Thy Temples should be planted presently.
With Hornes, as was Acteons, and the Hounds
Should driue vpon his new transformed limbes,
Vnmannerly Intruder as thou art.
Laui.
Vnder your patience gentle Empresse,
'Tis thought you haue a goodly gift in Horning.
(Titus Andronicus II.iii.60-67)
(Line numbers are taken from William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus, ed. J.C. Maxwell, 3rd ed. (London: Methuen, 1963). Commenting on this passage, Maxwell refers to 'the never-failing joke about the cuckold's horns' (p.40 n.).) Tamora's speech concerns her desire to see Bassanius killed (as he is, shortly) because he has surprised her with Aaron; Lavinia takes advantage of the reference to Actaeon to criticise Tamora, whose 'goodly gift in Horning' refers not only to the cuckold's horns she causes her husband, Saturninus, to wear, but also directly to the male sexual organ of the man with whom she consorts. return
3.76 Ibid., pp.114-115. return
3.77 O.E.D., VI, 795: 'greasy ... a. ... 7. Filthy, obscene, low ... 1588'. return
3.78 Ibid., II, 611: 'buck ... v.2 1530 ... To copulate with; said of male rabbits and some other animals. 1530'. return
3.79 The association of heat with lust is unequivocal in the fairy song, where
Lust is but a bloudy fire
kindled with vnchaste desire,
Fed in heart whose flames aspire,
As thoughts do blow them higher and higher.
(V.v.96-99)
There is also Leontes' first expression of his jealous suspicion, 'Too hot, too hot' (Winter's Tale I.ii.108). (Line numbers are taken from William Shakespeare, The Winter's Tale, ed J.H.P. Pafford (London: Methuen, 1973).) return
3.80 The edition cited is that of Adams. See also my quotation from Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay (p.46 n.1.37), in which the lesson is bawdy and ends in violence. In The Two Maids of More-clacke Armin made use of grammar to similar effect, making the parts of speech signify Tabitha's path to marriage:
Tabith.
... I am the wife of Filbon, whose rough Welch, hath got a constering English, parse it boy, Nounes, Pronounes, Verbs, Aduerbs, and God giue thee ioy.
Tutch.
With vocative ô, your father heares it.
Tabith.
And ablatiue caret, takes his daughter.
Henry.
Then in pluraliter, ah has a sonne.
Filb.
So singular and plurall all is done.
(Two Maids G4v)
All of these 'lessons', as well as the Latin and music lessons in The Taming of the Shrew (III.i.1-79), have humorous word-play in common, usually heightened by underlying conflicts and in two cases terminating in violence or threats of violence.
- 161 -
With the exception of the example in The Taming of the Shrew, the relevance of these episodes to their plays is slight. return
3.81 Oliver, p.105 n.; hard 'c' for Latin 'qu' was acceptable pronunciation. Pope's emendation of 'Que' and 'Ques' to 'quae' and 'quaes' (accepted by Oliver, loc.cit.), although correcting Evans' Latin, is not required: the Folio spelling approximates Evans' pronunciation. return
3.82 O.E.D., II, 526: 'breaching ... vbl. sb. ... 2. A flogging ... 1520'. return
3.83 Ibid., XI, 1015: 'play ... v. ... II. ... 10. ... c. To sport amorously; euphem. to have sexual intercourse ... a 1000'; VI, 617-621 'go ... v. ... I. ... 7. Of a female: To pass (a specified period) in gestation ... c 1200 ... III. ... 31. ... b. Of female animals (occas. of male): to go to ... = to copulate with. 1577'; this last is the sense used by Charmian: 'let him mary a woman that cannot go' (Antony and Cleopatra I.ii.60-61). (Line numbers are taken from William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra, ed. M.R. Ridley, 1954; rpt, 9th ed. (London: Methuen, 1972).) See also entries in Partridge, 'play' (p.167) and 'go' (pp.121-122). return
3.85 This song does not appear in the 1591 quarto of the play, but was inserted by Blount in his edition of 1632, and so its authorship is doubtful (Peter J. Seng, The Vocal Songs in the Plays of Shakespeare: A Critical History (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1967), pp.168-169). The edition of the song cited here is found in F.W. Fairholt, ed., The Dramatic Works of John Lyly, the Euphuist: With Notes and Some Account of His Life and Writings, II vols, Library of Old Authors (London: John Russell Smith, 1858). Fairy pinching is also used by Subtle in Jonson's The Alchemist to terrify Dapper into confessing what items of value he is carrying:
Titi, titi, titi, titi.
They must pinch him, or he will neuer confesse, they say.
(Alchemist III.v) return
3.86 The edition cited is John Martyn, Henry Herringman, and Richard Marriot, eds, Fifty Comedies and Tragedies Written by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, Gentlemen: All in One Volume: Published by the Authors Original Copies, the Songs to Each Play Being Added (London: J. Macock, 1679), with act and scene divisions being taken from the edition by Rhys. return
3.87 John Innes Mackintosh Stewart, Character and Motive in Shakespeare: Some Recent Appraisals Examined (London: Longmans, 1950), p.139. return
3.88 Ibid., pp.137-139. return
3.90 Roberts, pp.121-123, discusses the significance of Shakespeare's forests and finds them threatening, associated with sexual confusion, lust, and chaos; they are places of trial, but the characters tried overcome their problems successfully. Roberts emphasises the negative aspects of the forest, but our views are essentially in agreements on what the forests achieve. return
3.91 Jung notes this image: 'As the seat of transformation and renewal, the tree has a feminine and maternal significance': Carl Gustave Jung, The Collected Works of C.G. Jung, ed. Herbert Read, Michael Fordham and Gerhard Adler, trans. R.F.C. Hull et al., XX vols (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1957-1979), XIII, 317. [return to note 4.73] return
3.92 Guirand, pp.160-161; satyrs were often confused or associated with Pan, Priapus and Aristaeus, all fertility and phallic divinities, Aristaeus being the father of Actaeon. return
Proceed to The Merchant of Venice