Chapter 5

Andrew's nonsense in _Twelfth Night_, II. iii. 23. Many of the Sonnets contain reminiscences of the French sonneteers of the sixteenth century, and it is thought that in some cases Shakespeare shows direct acquaintance with Ronsard. He was thus acquainted with the three greatest French writers of his century, and French may well have been the medium through which he reached authors in other languages.

[Page Heading: French and Italian]

The class of Italian literature with which Shakespeare shows most acquaintance is that of the _novelle_, though there is no proof that he could read the language. The _Decameron_ of Boccaccio contains the love-story of _Cymbeline_, though there may have been an intermediary; the plot of _All's Well_ came from the same collection, but had been translated by Painter in his _Palace of Pleasure_; and the story of the caskets in _The Merchant of Venice_ is found in a form closer to Shakespeare's in the English translation of the _Gesta Romanorum_ than in the _Decameron_. Thus we cannot conclude that the poet knew this work as a whole. Similarly with Bandello and Cinthio. The plot of _Much Ado_ is found in the former, and is translated by Belleforest into French, but at least one detail seems to come from Ariosto, and here again an intermediary is commonly conjectured. The novel from Cinthio's _Hecatommithi_ which formed the basis of _Othello_ existed in a French translation; and his form of the plot of _Measure for Measure_ came to Shakespeare through the English dramatic version of George Whetstone. The version of the bond story in _The Merchant of Venice_ closest to the play is in _Il Pecorone_ of Sir Giovanni Fiorentino, but the tale is widespread. Incidents in _The Merry Wives_ have sources or parallels in the same work, in Straparola's _Piacevoli Notti_, and in Bandello, but in both cases English versions were available. A mass of Italian and French prototypes lies behind the plot of _Twelfth Night_, but most of the details are to be found in the English _Apolonius and Silla_ of Barnabe Riche, and there is reason to conjecture a lost English play on the subject. _The Taming of the Shrew_, based on an extant older play, draws also on Gascoigne's version of Ariosto's _I Suppositi_; and the echoes of Petrarch in the Sonnets may well have come through French and English imitators. The introduction of stock types from the Italian drama, such as the pedant and the braggart-soldier, can be accounted for by the previous knowledge of these in England, and does not imply a first-hand reading of Italian literature. The negative position is still stronger in the case of Spanish, where the use of episodes from George of Montemayor's _Diana_ in _The Two Gentlemen_, _Twelfth Night_, and _A Midsummer-Night's Dream_, can be supposed to be due to the author's having access to Yonge's translation in manuscript, especially since there is no other trace of Spanish influence.

[Page Heading: Early English]

The conclusion with regard to Italian and Spanish, then, seems to be that Shakespeare in his search for plots was aware of the riches of the _novelle_, but that he found what he wanted as a rule in English or French versions; and that we have no evidence of his knowledge of anything but fiction from these literatures.

Turning now to English, we find Shakespeare's knowledge of books in his own tongue beginning after the Conquest. The romances of the Middle Ages were in the Elizabethan time rapidly undergoing the process of degradation that was soon to end in the chap-books, but the material was still widely known. The particular versions read by the dramatist can rarely be determined on account of the slight nature of most of the references, but we find allusions to the Arthurian romances, to _Guy of Warwick_, _Bevis of Hampton_, _The Squire of Low Degree_, Roland and Oliver, and to _Huon of Bordeaux_, from which last came the name of Oberon as king of the fairies. Among popular ballads, those of Robin Hood are frequently alluded to; the story of _King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid_ appears in no fewer than five plays; Hamlet knew a ballad on Jephtha's daughter, and Sir Toby one on the chaste Susanna. A large number of popular songs appear in fragments; and rimes and spells, current jests and anecdotes, combine with the fairy-lore of _A Midsummer-Night's Dream_, _Romeo and Juliet_, and _The Merry Wives_ to assure us that Shakespeare was thoroughly versed in the literature and traditions of the people.

His acquaintance with more formal letters begins with Chaucer, whose _Knight's Tale_ contributed some details to _A Midsummer-Night's Dream_, and the main plot of _The Two Noble Kinsmen_, in which Shakespeare is now usually supposed to have had a hand. This story had, however, been already dramatized by Richard Edwardes. More certainly direct is his knowledge of Chaucer's _Troilus_, which, with Caxton's _Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye_, is the main source of _Troilus and Cressida_. The references to the leprosy of Cressida are due to Henryson's _Testament of Creseide_, a Scots sequel to Chaucer's poem, printed in the sixteenth century editions of the older poet's works. In the _Legend of Good Women_ he may have found the story of Pyramus, and a version of the tragedy of Lucrece, to supplement his main sources in Livy and Ovid. Chaucer's contemporary Gower contributed to his stock the story of Florent (_Taming of the Shrew_, I. ii. 69) from the _Confessio Amantis_, and from the same collection a version of the tale of _Apollonius of Tyre_, dramatized by Shakespeare and another in _Pericles_.

[Page Heading: Contemporary Literature]

With the non-dramatic literature produced by Shakespeare's contemporaries, we naturally find most evidence of his acquaintance in the case of those books which provided material for his plays. Thus the otherwise obscure Arthur Brooke, whose poem _Romeus and Juliet_ is the chief source of the tragedy, is much more prominent in such an enumeration as the present than he probably was in Shakespeare's view of the literature of the day. Painter, whose version of the same story in his _Palace of Pleasure_ cannot be shown to have been used much, if at all, by the dramatist, seems nevertheless to have been known to him; and we hardly need evidence that Shakespeare must have kept a watchful eye on similar collections of stories, such as Whetstone's, Riche's, and Pettie's. Of the greater writers of imaginative literature there is none missing from the list of those he knew, though, as has been implied, the evidence is not always proportionate to the greatness; and some prominent figures in other fields, such as Hooker and Bacon, do not appear. Spenser, who is supposed to have alluded to Shakespeare in _Colin Clout's come home again_ and, less probably, in _The Teares of the Muses_, is in turn alluded to in _A Midsummer-Night's Dream_, V. i. 52; and his version of the story of Lear in _The Faerie Queene_, II. x, is believed to have given Shakespeare his form of the name Cordelia. Evidence is more abundant in the case of Sir Philip Sidney. The under-plot of _King Lear_ is based on the story of the blind king of Paphlagonia in the _Arcadia_, and Sidney's sonnets, along with those of Daniel, Drayton, Constable, Watson, and Barnes, formed the main channel through which the French and Italian influences reached Shakespeare's. However we may estimate the original element in his sonnets, and in our opinion it is very great, there is no question of the author's having had a thorough familiarity with contemporary sonnetteers.

Similarly we can be certain that he had read many of the elaborate narrative poems then in vogue, a class to which he contributed _Venus and Adonis_, _Lucrece_, and _A Lover's Complaint_. Daniel's _Rosamond_ and Marlowe's _Hero and Leander_ especially have left many traces, and Daniel's _Barons' Wars_ is intimately related to _Richard II_ and _Henry IV_. The longer prose fictions of the time he also watched, and Lyly's _Euphues_ contributed the germ of a number of passages, as Lodge's _Rosalynde_ and Greene's _Pandosto_ supplied the plots of _As You Like It_ and _The Winter's Tale_ respectively.

Reference has already been made to his knowledge of folk beliefs about fairies. To this should be added other supernatural beliefs, especially as to ghosts, devils, and witches, evidence of his familiarity with which will occur to every one. Matters of this sort were much discussed in his time, the frequency of ghosts in Senecan plays having made them conspicuous in Elizabethan imitations, and religious controversy having stimulated interest in demonology. Several important books appeared on the subject, and one of these at least Shakespeare read, Harsnett's _Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures_, for from it Edgar, as Poor Tom in _King Lear_, derived many of the names and phrases which occur in his pretended ravings.

The most useful book in all his reading, if we judge by the amount of his work that is based on it, was the second edition of the _Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland_, compiled by Raphael Holinshed. With it he used the work by Hall on _The Union of Lancaster and York_, the _Chronicles_ of Grafton and of Fabyan, and the _Annals_ of John Stowe. On these were based the greater number of the historical plays, _Macbeth_, and the political part of _Cymbeline_. In the case of _Henry VIII_ there should be added the _Acts and Monuments_, better known as the _Book of Martyrs_, of John Foxe.

[Page Heading: Contemporary Drama]

To deal adequately with Shakespeare's reading in the plays of his time would be to write a history of the Elizabethan drama. Older dramatists, like Preston, Gascoigne, and Whetstone, he knew, for he quotes _Cambyses_, and from the two last he derives material for the plots of _The Taming of the Shrew_ and _Measure for Measure_. Anonymous writers supplied the older plays on which he based _King John, King Lear_, and _Hamlet_, parts of _Henry V_ and _VI_, and of _Richard III_, and probably others. Allusions prove a familiarity with all of Marlowe's dramas; _Hamlet_ is indebted to the tradition of which Kyd was one of the founders; Lyly taught him much in the handling of light comic dialogue; and he quotes lines from Peele. Greene's contribution is less specifically marked; but Shakespeare's profession of acting, as well as that of play-writing, of necessity made him acquainted with the whole dramatic production of the time. Thus, as has been stated in a previous chapter, he acted in several of Jonson's plays, and a good case has been made out for his modelling his last comedies on the new successes of Beaumont and Fletcher.

No Englishman of that day was insensible to what was going on in exploration and conquest of the Western World; and in _The Tempest_, _Othello_, and other plays we have clear ground for stating that Shakespeare shared this interest, and read books like Eden's _History of Travayle in the West and East Indies_, Raleigh's _Discoverie of Guiana_, and such pamphlets as were used in the vast compilation of Richard Hakluyt. The scientific knowledge implied in the plays reflects current beliefs, and must have been derived from such works as Pliny, _Batman uppon Bartholome his Booke De Proprietatibus Rerum_, and from conversation.

Finally, Shakespeare knew his Bible. Several volumes have been written to exhibit the extent of this knowledge, and it has been shown by Anders that he knew both the Genevan and the Great Bible, as well as the Prayer Book.

Taken all together, the amount of literature indicated by this summary account of the evidences in the plays and poems abundantly proves the statement that Shakespeare, if not a scholar, was a man of wide and varied reading. When it is further considered that only a fraction of what any author reads leaves a mark that can be identified on what he writes, we shall readily allow that in the matter of study Shakespeare showed an activity and receptivity of mind that harmonizes with the impression received from his creative work.

[Page Heading: His Reading Typical]

It agrees with our impressions of him derived from other sources also, that his reading reflects not so much idiosyncrasies of taste as the prevalent literary interests of the day. Thus in Latin literature the most conspicuous author among general readers, as distinguished from scholars, was Ovid, whose romantic narratives appealed to a time which reveled in tales gathered from all quarters; and this same prominence of Ovid has been shown to exist among the classical authors known to the dramatist. Similarly his use of chronicles like that of Holinshed merely reflects a widespread interest in national history; and Shakespeare shared the popular interest in the translations of _novelle_ and the like that poured in from the Continent. The age of Elizabeth was an age of great expansion in reading--especially in the literature of entertainment. For the first time since the introduction of printing the people were free to indulge in books as a recreation, and the enormous growth of publishing in this era indicates the response to the new demand. In all this Shakespeare took part, and the evidences appear in his works so far as the nature of their themes permitted it. But the drama gave no opportunity for anything but passing allusions to scientific, philosophical, and religious matters, so that direct evidence is lacking as to how far Shakespeare was acquainted with what was being written in these fields. On the other hand, the profundity of his insight into human motive and behavior, the evidences of prolonged and severe meditation on human life and the ways of the world, and the richness of the philosophical generalizations that lie just below the surface of his greater plays, make it difficult to believe that in these fields also he did not join in the intellectual activity of his day.