Category: Plays/Films/Dramas

Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher

_Ros._ You must be purged too, your sins are rank; You are attaint with fault and perjury: Therefore, if you my favour mean to get, A twelvemonth shall you spend, and never rest, But seek the weary beds of people sick.”

Chapters

56. Chapter 56

“Ha! Goneril!—with a white beard!—They flattered me like a dog; and told me, I had white hairs in my beard, ere the black ones were there. To say _Ay_ and _No_ to every thing I...

62. Chapter 62

_Ib._ sc. 1 and 2. Shakespeare seems to mean all Hamlet’s character to be brought together before his final disappearance from the scene;—his meditative excess in the grave-digg...

52. Chapter 52

“Hung be the heavens with black, yield day to night! Comets, importing change of times and states, Brandish your crystal tresses in the sky; And with them scourge the bad revolt...

57. Chapter 57

How delightfully natural is the transition, to the retrospective narrative! And observe, upon the Ghost’s reappearance, how much Horatio’s courage is increased by having transla...

69. Chapter 69

Admirable is the preparation, so truly and peculiarly Shakespearian, in the introduction of Roderigo, as the dupe on whom Iago shall first exercise his art, and in so doing disp...

73. Chapter 73

Thus it is for no-poets to comment on the greatest of poets! To make Othello say that he, who had killed his wife, was like Herod who killed Mariamne!—O, how many beauties, in t...

34. Chapter 34

I cannot see the necessity of this alteration. The editors and commentators are, all of them, ready enough to cry out against Shakespeare’s laxities and licenses of style, forge...

20. Chapter 20

“Mr. Pope (after Dryden) informs us that the story of _Troilus and Cressida_ was originally the work of one Lollius, a Lombard: but Dryden goes yet further; he declares it to ha...

43. Chapter 43

Yes! on a death-bed there is a feeling which may make all things appear but as puns and equivocations. And a passion there is that carries off its own excess by plays on words a...

39. Chapter 39

“How oft when men are at the point of death Have they been merry! which their keepers call A lightning before death. O, how may I Call this a lightning?—--O, my love, my wife!” &c.

53. Chapter 53

There is something of disgust at the ruthless hypocrisy of her sisters, and some little faulty admixture of pride and sullenness in Cordelia’s “Nothing;” and her tone is well co...

41. Chapter 41

I prefer the old text: the word “devil” implies “fiery.” You need only read the line, laying a full and strong emphasis on “devil,” to perceive the uselessness and tastelessness...

59. Chapter 59

This speech is of absolutely universal interest,—and yet to which of all Shakespeare’s characters could it have been appropriately given but to Hamlet? For Jaques it would have...

42. Chapter 42

I remember in the Sophoclean drama no more striking example of the τὸ πρέπον καὶ σεμνὸν than this speech; and the rhymes in the last six lines well express the preconcertedness...

115. Chapter 115

sort of talisman, or strange something, that might be lost without the least fault on the part of the owner. In short, their chaste ladies value their chastity as a material thi...

58. Chapter 58

In all things dependent on, or rather made up of, fine address, the manner is no more or otherwise rememberable than the light notions, steps, and gestures of youth and health....

65. Chapter 65

_Ib._ sc. 2. This scene, dreadful as it is, is still a relief, because a variety, because domestic, and therefore soothing, as associated with the only real pleasures of life. T...

61. Chapter 61

two thoughts that had never subsisted in disjunction, the love for Hamlet, and her filial love, with the guileless floating on the surface of her pure imagination of the caution...

44. Chapter 44

_Ib._ sc. 4. See here the skill and judgment of our poet in giving reality and individual life, by the introduction of accidents in his historic plays, and thereby making them d...

28. Chapter 28

This seemingly strange assertion of Brutus is unhappily verified in the present day. What is an immense army, in which the lust of plunder has quenched all the duties of the cit...

95. Chapter 95

This is an instance of that modifying of quantity by emphasis, without which our elder poets cannot be scanned. “Power,” here, instead of being one long syllable—pow’r—must be s...

54. Chapter 54

and yet no reference to the guilt, but only to the accident, which she uses as an occasion for sneering at her father. Regan is not, in fact, a greater monster than Goneril, but...

79. Chapter 79

What does “trunk” mean here, and in the first scene of the first act? Is it a large ear-trumpet?—or rather a tube, such as passes from parlour to kitchen, instead of a bell?

70. Chapter 70

_Cas._ Most fortunately: he hath achieved a maid That paragons description, and wild fame; One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens, And, in the essential vesture of creatio...

5. Chapter 5

There is a beauty here. The word “boy” naturally provokes and awakens in Orlando the sense of his manly powers; and with the retort of “elder brother,” he grasps him with firm h...

120. Chapter 120

Merione’s speech. Had the scene of this tragi-comedy been laid in Hindostan instead of Corinth, and the gods here addressed been the Vishnu and Co. of the Indian Pantheon, this...

25. Chapter 25

The speeches of Flavius and Marullus are in blank verse. Wherever regular metre can be rendered truly imitative of character, passion, or personal rank, Shakespeare seldom, if e...

26. Chapter 26

“It must be by his death; and, for my part, I know no personal cause to spurn at him, But for the general. He would be crown’d: How that might change his nature, there’s the que...

16. Chapter 16

There can be little doubt of Mr. Tyrwhitt’s emendations of “courtiers” and “king,” as to the sense;—only it is not impossible that Shakespeare’s dramatic language may allow of t...

109. Chapter 109

It is well worthy of notice, and yet has not been, I believe, noticed hitherto, what a marked difference there exists in the dramatic writers of the Elizabetho-Jacobæan age—(Mer...

113. Chapter 113

It is a real trial of charity to read this scene with tolerable temper towards Fletcher. So very slavish—so reptile—are the feelings and sentiments represented as duties. And ye...

96. Chapter 96

What strange self-trumpeters and tongue-bullies all the brave soldiers of Beaumont and Fletcher are! Yet I am inclined to think it was the fashion of the age from the Soldier’s...

15. Chapter 15

I cannot but think this rather a heroic resolve, than an infamous wish. It appears to me to be the grandest symptom of an immortal spirit, when even that bedimmed and overwhelme...

17. Chapter 17

How is it that the commentators take no notice of the un-Shakespearian defect in the metre of the second line, and what in Shakespeare is the same, in the harmony with the sense...

36. Chapter 36

Take notice in this enchanting scene of the contrast of Romeo’s love with his former fancy; and weigh the skill shown in justifying him from his inconstancy by making us feel th...

14. Chapter 14

I cannot understand this. Perhaps there is a corruption both of words and speakers. Shallow no sooner corrects one mistake of Sir Hugh’s, namely, “louse” for “luce,” a pike, but...

100. Chapter 100

Licentious as the comic metre of B. and F. is,—a far more lawless, and yet far less happy, imitation of the rhythm of animated talk in real life than Massinger’s—still it is mad...

68. Chapter 68

Fine as this is, and delicately characteristic of one who had lived and been reared in the best society, and had been precipitated from it by dice and drabbing; yet still it str...

31. Chapter 31

Warburton’s comment—“If the man be honest, for that reason he will be so in this, and not endeavour at the injustice of gaining my daughter without my consent”—is, like almost a...

99. Chapter 99

“Did I for this consume my _quarters_ in meditations, vows, and woo’d her in heroical epistles? Did I expound the _Owl_, and undertake, with labour and expense, the recollection...

124. Chapter 124

In this (as, indeed, in all other respects, but most in this) it is that Shakespeare is so incomparably superior to Fletcher and his friend,—in judgment! What can be conceived m...

4. Chapter 4

Very Anacreon in perfectness, proportion, grace, and spontaneity! So far it is Greek;—but then add, O! what wealth, what wild ranging, and yet what compression and condensation...

2. Chapter 2

There is no authority for any alteration;—but I never can help feeling how great an improvement it would be, if the two former of Hermia’s exclamations were omitted;—the third a...

12. Chapter 12

It would be, I own, an audacious and unjustifiable change of the text; but yet, as a mere conjecture, I venture to suggest “bastards,” for “’bated.” As it stands, in spite of Wa...

3. Chapter 3

The paucity of spondees in single words in English, and indeed in the modern languages in general, makes perhaps the greatest distinction, metrically considered, between them an...

37. Chapter 37

“_Mer._ No, ’tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door; but ’tis enough: ’twill serve: ask for me to-morrow, and you shall find me a grave man,” &c.

77. Chapter 77

This scene is unspeakably irrational. To believe, and yet to scoff at, a present miracle is little less than impossible. Sejanus should have been made to suspect priestcraft and...

94. Chapter 94

Jonson has elsewhere proceeded thus far; but the part most difficult and delicate, yet, perhaps, not the least capable of being both morally and poetically treated, is the union...

63. Chapter 63

_Ib._ sc. 2. Now that the deed is done or doing—now that the first reality commences, Lady Macbeth shrinks. The most simple sound strikes terror, the most natural consequences a...

123. Chapter 123

It would be very easy to restore all this passage to metre, by supplying a sentence of four syllables, which the reasoning almost demands, and by correcting the grammar. Read th...

8. Chapter 8

And yet Viola was to have been presented to Orsino as a eunuch!—Act i. sc. 2. Viola’s speech. Either she forgot this, or else she had altered her plan.

64. Chapter 64

place with Schiller’s mistaken scene between Butler, Devereux, and Macdonald in _Wallenstein_.—(Part II. act iv. sc. 2.) The comic was wholly out of season. Shakespeare never in...

27. Chapter 27

“Pardon me, Julius—here wast thou bay’d, brave hart: Here didst thou fall; and here thy hunters stand Sign’d in thy spoil, and crimson’d in thy lethe. _O world! thou wast the fo...

84. Chapter 84

What a strange notion Ben must have formed of a determined, remorseless, all-daring, foolhardiness, to have represented it in such a mouthing Tamburlane, and bombastic tonguebul...

90. Chapter 90

Now, however, I doubt the legitimacy of my transposition of the “of” from the beginning of this latter line to the end of the one preceding;—for though it facilitates the metre...

29. Chapter 29

Warburton’s conjecture of “stool” is ingenious, and would be a probable reading, if the scene opening had discovered Antony with Cleopatra on his lap. But, represented as he is...

66. Chapter 66

Observe the easy style of chitchat between Camillo and Archidamus as contrasted with the elevated diction on the introduction of the kings and Hermione in the second scene: and...

85. Chapter 85

Does not this confirm, what the passage itself cannot but suggest, the propriety of substituting “booty” for “beauty” in Falstaff’s speech, _Henry IV._ part i. act i. sc. 2. “Le...

50. Chapter 50

Does “grace” mean the king’s own peculiar domains and legal revenue, and “highness” his feudal rights in the military service of his nobles?—I have sometimes thought it possible...

22. Chapter 22

... “Mine emulation Hath not that honour in’t, it had; for where I thought to crush him in an equal force, True sword to sword; I’ll potch at him some way Or wrath, or craft may...

45. Chapter 45

A most obscure passage: but I think Theobald’s interpretation right, namely, that “thirsty entrance” means the dry penetrability, or bibulous drought, of the soil. The obscurity...

106. Chapter 106

The editors, and their contemporaries in general, were ignorant of any but the regular iambic verse. A study of the Aristophanic and Plautine metres would have enabled them to r...

98. Chapter 98

It would be amusing to learn from some existing friend of Mr. Seward what he meant, or rather dreamed, in this note. It is certainly a difficult passage, of which there are two...

1. Chapter 1

_Ros._ You must be purged too, your sins are rank; You are attaint with fault and perjury: Therefore, if you my favour mean to get, A twelvemonth shall you spend, and never rest...

75. Chapter 75

The anachronic mixture in this Arruntius of the Roman republican, to whom Tiberius must have appeared as much a tyrant as Sejanus, with his James-and-Charles-the-First zeal for...

92. Chapter 92

Instead of reading with Whalley “ply” for “play,” I would suggest “horse” for “house.” The meaning would then be obvious and pertinent. The punlet, or pun-maggot, or pun intenti...

55. Chapter 55

external nature in a storm, all moral nature convulsed,—the real madness of Lear, the feigned madness of Edgar, the babbling of the Fool, the desperate fidelity of Kent—surely s...

74. Chapter 74

It would form an interesting essay, or rather series of essays, in a periodical work, were all the attempts to ridicule new phrases brought together, the proportion observed of...

38. Chapter 38

“O, look! methinks I see my cousin’s ghost Seeking out Romeo, that did spit his body Upon a rapier’s point:—Stay, Tybalt, stay!— Romeo, I come! this do I drink to thee.”

76. Chapter 76

“Adultery! it is the lightest ill I will commit. A race of wicked acts Shall flow out of my anger, and o’erspread The world’s wide face, which no posterity Shall e’er approve, n...

21. Chapter 21

Should it be “accosting?” “Accost her, knight, accost!” in the _Twelfth Night_. Yet there sounds a something so Shakespearian in the phrase—“give a coasting welcome” (“coasting”...

32. Chapter 32

Either, methinks, “plays” should be “play’d,” or “and” should be changed to “while.” I can certainly understand it as a parenthesis, an interadditive of scorn; but it does not s...

49. Chapter 49

I know no argument by which to persuade any one to be of my opinion, or rather of my feeling; but yet I cannot help feeling that “Happy low-lie-down!” is either a proverbial exp...

51. Chapter 51

Ludicrous as these introductory scraps of French appear, so instantly followed by good, nervous mother-English, yet they are judicious, and produce the impression which Shakespe...

110. Chapter 110

Mr. Seward discards the words “for lying,” because “most of the things spoke of Estifania are true, with only a little exaggeration, and because they destroy all appearance of m...

19. Chapter 19

That Shakespeare never “turned his genius to stage-writing,” as Theobald most _Theobaldice_ phrases it, before he became an actor, is an assertion of about as much authority as...

81. Chapter 81

A fondness for judging one work by comparison with others, perhaps altogether of a different class, argues a vulgar taste. Yet it is chiefly on this principle that the _Catiline...

116. Chapter 116

This character of Aubrey, and the whole spirit of this and several other plays of the same authors, are interesting as traits of the morals which it was fashionable to teach in...

35. Chapter 35

_Cap._ He shall be endur’d. What, goodman boy!—I say, he shall:—Go to;— Am I the master here, or you?—Go to. You’ll not endure him!—God shall mend my soul— You’ll make a mutiny...

82. Chapter 82

This is either an unintelligible, or, in every sense, a most unnatural, passage,—improbable, if not impossible, at the moment of signing and swearing such a conspiracy, to the m...

10. Chapter 10

Surely Warburton could never have wooed by kisses and won, or he would not have flounder-flatted so just and humorous, nor less pleasing than humorous, an image into so profound...

111. Chapter 111

The poet intended no allusion to the word “Erota” itself; but says that her very name, “the proud Erota,” became a character and adage;—as we say, a Quixote or a Brutus: so to s...

126. Chapter 126

where the verse recommences. This transition from the prose to the verse enhances, and indeed forms the comic effect. Lazarillo concludes his soliloquy with a hymn to the goddes...

101. Chapter 101

Jealous of Virgil’s honour, he is afraid lest, by referring to the _Georgics_ alone, he might be understood as undervaluing the preceding work. “Not that I do not admire the _Bu...

112. Chapter 112

33. Chapter 33

“How fairly this lord strives to appear foul!—takes virtuous copies to be wicked; _like those that under hot, ardent zeal would set whole realms on fire. Of such a nature is his...

122. Chapter 122

“Nay, some will swear they love their mistress so, They would hazard lives and fortunes to preserve One of her hairs brighter than Berenice’s, Or young Apollo’s; and yet, after...

78. Chapter 78

It should be “quit” no doubt, but not meaning “discharged from working,” &c.—but quit, that is, acquitted. The pewterer was at his holiday diversion as well as the other apprent...

117. Chapter 117

Pity, that the editor did not explain wherein the sense, “seemingly enforced by the next line,” consists. May the true word be “a sable”—that is, a black fox, hunted for its pre...

102. Chapter 102

I can make sense of this passage as little as Mr. Seward;—the passage from Philaster is nothing to the purpose. Instead of “a story,” I have sometimes thought of proposing “Astr...

88. Chapter 88

46. Chapter 46

Perhaps it is a misprint, or a provincial pronunciation, for “leach,” that is, blood-suckers. Had it been gnats, instead of fleas, there might have been some sense, though small...

13. Chapter 13

Shall we say here, that Shakespeare has unnecessarily made his loveliest character utter a lie?—Or shall we dare think that, where to deceive was necessary, he thought a pretend...

47. Chapter 47

is one of those fine hair-strokes of exquisite judgment peculiar to Shakespeare;—thus detaching the Lady’s speech, and giving it the individuality and entireness of a little poe...

105. Chapter 105

The present text, and that proposed by Seward, are equally vile. I have endeavoured to make the lines sense, though the whole is, I suspect, incurable except by bold conjectural...

67. Chapter 67

I think the original word is Shakespeare’s. 1. My ear feels it to be Shakespearian; 2. The involved grammar is Shakespearian—“show thee, being a fool naturally, to have improved...

119. Chapter 119

Alinda’s interview with her father is lively, and happily hit off; but this scene with Roderigo is truly excellent. Altogether, indeed, this play holds the first place in B. and...

40. Chapter 40

O true Warburton! and the _sancta simplicitas_ of honest dull Theobald’s faith in him! Nothing can be more lively or characteristic than “Philip? Sparrow!” Had Warburton read ol...

23. Chapter 23

30. Chapter 30

I have the greatest difficulty in believing that Shakespeare wrote the first “mermaids.” He never, I think, would have so weakened by useless anticipation the fine image immedia...

72. Chapter 72

“_Æmil._ Why, the wrong is but a wrong i’ the world; and having the world for your labour, ’tis a wrong in your own world, and you might quickly make it right.”

103. Chapter 103

Nonsense! “Whiteness of name” is in apposition to “the serious part of life,” and means a deservedly pure reputation. The following line—“You _must_ be mine!” means—“Though I do...

121. Chapter 121

Pshaw! “Sit” is either a misprint for “set,” or the old and still provincial word for “set,” as the participle passive of “seat” or “set.” I have heard an old Somersetshire gard...

118. Chapter 118

This Mr. Seward is a blockhead of the provoking species. In his itch for correction, he forgot the words—“lies my safe way!” The bear is the extreme pole, and thither he would t...

24. Chapter 24

I have always thought this, in itself so beautiful speech, the least explicable from the mood and full intention of the speaker of any in the whole works of Shakespeare. I cheri...

108. Chapter 108

86. Chapter 86

7. Chapter 7

Warburton’s alteration of _is_ into _in_ is needless. “Fancy” may very well be interpreted “exclusive affection,” or “passionate preference.” Thus, bird-fanciers; gentlemen of t...

48. Chapter 48

80. Chapter 80

Probably, the meaning is—that intending to give false evidence, he carried a Greek _Xenophon_ to pass it off for a Greek Testament, and so avoid perjury—as the Irish do, by cont...

97. Chapter 97

It is worth noticing that of the three greatest tragedians, Massinger was a democrat, Beaumont and Fletcher the most servile _jure divino_ royalists, and Shakespeare a philosoph...

125. Chapter 125

I conjecture “imports,”—that is, duties or offices of importance. The flow of the versification in this speech seems to demand the trochaic ending - u; while the text blends jin...

6. Chapter 6

I question whether there exists a parallel instance of a phrase, that like this of “horns” is universal in all languages, and yet for which no one has discovered even a plausibl...

107. Chapter 107

This worse than superfluous “like” is very like an interpolation of some matter of fact critic—all _pus, prose atque venenum_. The “your” in the next line, instead of “their,” i...

87. Chapter 87

9. Chapter 9

Theobald’s etymology of “cheveril” is, of course, quite right;—but he is mistaken in supposing that there were no such things as gloves of chicken-skin. They were at one time a...

60. Chapter 60

71. Chapter 71

93. Chapter 93

confessed, was in the right in considering the Fly, Tipto, Bat Burst, &c., of this play mere dotages. Such a scene as this was enough to damn a new play; and Nick Stuff is worse...

11. Chapter 11

18. Chapter 18

114. Chapter 114

The whole of this speech seems corrupt; and if accurately printed,—that is, if the same in all the prior editions,—irremediable but by bold conjecture. “_Till_ my tackle,” shoul...

89. Chapter 89

104. Chapter 104

83. Chapter 83

91. Chapter 91