The Critics Versus Shakspere Part 4

German criticism has taken up the subject with minute care, and, we may a.s.sert with confidence, has settled beyond doubt that Shakspere never wrote a single line of "The two n.o.ble Kinsmen." And it may be added with equal certainty that if the citations from that play are correctly credited to Fletcher, he never wrote a line of "Henry VIII." Professor Thorndike is not consistent with himself. On one page he calls his theory conjectural, on another, a "reasonable conclusion." The play itself ought to convince any fair mind that Shakspere had no share in it, for it contains an obvious imitation of Ophelia's madness in "Hamlet," which in some points "is a direct plagiarism." But it was important for Professor Thorndike to show what he calls a "probability"

that Shakspere and Fletcher collaborated, in order to establish his theory that Fletcher "influenced" Shakspere. With the vanis.h.i.+ng of the "probability" the "influence" vanishes.

The second step in the argument is a review of the chronology of the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher, among which only _seven_ are immediately important. "The Woman Hater," licensed 20th May, 1607, published in quarto 1607, as lately acted, again in 1648, and a.s.signed to Beaumont and Fletcher. Its first representation is put by Mr. Fleay on April 5th, 1607. Professor Thorndike conjectures that this play was produced in 1606. "Philaster," the most important in connection with our subject, was first published in 1620. Mr. Fleay dates its composition in 1611; Professor Thorndike, in 1608. The "Four Plays in One" he likewise a.s.signs conjecturally to the same year. The fact is, it was first printed in the folio of 1647, and no authority fixes the date of its production. "Thiery and Theodoret" was first published in 1621, without giving the name of any author. The quarto of 1648 credits Fletcher as the sole author; that of 1649, Beaumont and Fletcher as the joint authors. Fleay places the date about 1617; Oliphant maintains that it was written about 1607 or 1608, and afterwards revised in 1617 by Fletcher and Ma.s.singer; Professor Thorndike ventures the guess that it was written in 1607.

"The Maid's Tragedy" he places doubtfully in 1609. It was first published in 1619 without naming its authors. The only evidence as to its date is that it was licensed October 31st, 1611.

"Cupid's Revenge" was acted at Court in 1612, and first published in 1615. Professor Thorndike thinks it was an effort to repeat the success of "Philaster," and therefore a.s.signs it to 1609 or 1610.

"A King and No King" he puts without hesitation in the year 1611, and this is supported by authority. Professor Thorndike remarks that this is the only play (of Beaumont and Fletcher), "acted before 1612, the year of whose production is fixed."

The only reason for referring to "The Woman Hater" is to fix the date of Beaumont and Fletcher's appearance. There is absolutely no proof that they were known to literature before that play was licensed by Sir George Buc on the 20th May, 1607. Yet Professor Thorndike, in spite of this, a.s.signs "The Woman's Prize," first printed in 1647, and first acted, so far as the record shows, November 28th, 1633, to the year 1604.

It is to be noted that of the six other plays referred to by Professor Thorndike, and claimed to have been in existence before the end of 1611, the dates of all except "A King and No King" are only conjecturally given.

Compared with these, the chronology of "Cymbeline," "Tempest" and "Winter's Tale" is reviewed. "Cymbeline," according to Dr. Simon Forman's Diary, was acted between April 20th, 1610, and May 15th, 1611; it must therefore have been written before the last named date. Mr.

Fleay fixes the date in 1609, Malone in 1605, and both Chalmers and Drake substantially agree with Malone. Ulrici a.s.signs the date of composition to 1609 or 1610.

"The Tempest," according to Professor Thorndike, cannot be dated earlier than October 13th, 1610, nor later than 1613, and was probably written and acted late in 1610 or early in 1611. Ulrici agrees with this.

"The Winter's Tale," as appears by Forman's Diary, was acted May 15, 1611. Ulrici says: "It is now a matter of certainty that it must have been brought upon the stage between August, 1610, and May, 1611." It has been suggested with some plausibility that this play was an early production by Shakspere which he remodelled. A play called "A Winternyght's Pastime" is entered at Stationer's Hall as early as 1594.

Professor Thorndike fixes the date between January 1st and May 15th, 1611 and a.s.sumes that the drama is imitated from Jonson's "Masque of Oberon." He suggests that as in the "Masque" the chariot of Oberon is drawn by two white bears, "perhaps here, as in the dance, costume and actor reappeared in the play, in the bear who chases Antigonus."

Anything to show that Shakspere imitated anybody.

The argument is based upon this chronology and the alleged similarity between the enumerated dramas: the issue is made upon the respective dates of Beaumont and Fletcher's "Philaster" and Shakspere's "Cymbeline." There is no claim that Shakspere imitated Beaumont and Fletcher or was influenced by them, except in his three "romances," and of these, "Cymbeline" is placed first. Professor Thorndike undertakes to prove that "Philaster" was written before October 8th, 1610, and this is his reasoning:

"In the 'Scourge of Folly' by John Davies of Hertford, entered in the Stationer's Register October 8th, 1610, occurs an epigram referring to this play." Let us examine this statement first. On the next page he says: "The '_Scourge of Folly_' furnishes no further clue in regard to the date of the epigram." On page 59 of the same essay, referring to another play, "Don Quixote," the statement is made that it was "entered S. R. 1611 and printed 1612." The entry was therefore in the nature of a "license to print." It is clear that in this instance the actual printing or publication was after the entry. The same rule must apply to other plays of the same period. The date of entry affords no proof whatever of the date of publication or of presentation. Therefore the date of the entry of "The Scourge of Folly," October 8th, 1610, as Professor Thorndike states, "affords no clue in regard to the date" of Davies's "epigram." The "epigram" may have been written long after the entry in the Stationer's Register, and probably was, because it is not to be a.s.sumed that the "epigram" appeared in the entry of the play, and Davies cannot be a.s.sumed to have had any knowledge of the existence of "Philaster" until it appeared upon the stage, a date entirely uncertain.

Further, Professor Thorndike says: "There is no reason why 'Philaster'

may not have been produced before Burbage took up the Blackfriar's lease in 1608. There is in fact no early limit that can be set for the date; the final limit is of course fixed by Davies' epigram." Of what value is the final limit "fixed by the epigram" when there is no proof of the date of that? What ground is there, beyond mere arbitrary a.s.sumption, for a.s.signing "Philaster" to 1608? That play was not printed till 1620.

Mr. Fleay, Professor Thorndike's constant authority, says it was written in 1611, after "Cymbeline" was upon the stage. There is absolutely no proof, therefore, that "Philaster" was written before October 8th, 1610, no proof when it was entered, licensed or first acted; and so it is clear, as Professor Thorndike says, that "the date, 1608, adopted by Dyce, Leonhardt, and Macaulay, is no more than a conjecture." On the other hand, as we have shown, the external evidence is conclusive that "Cymbeline" was upon the bills before May 15th, 1611, and therefore the argument that "Philaster" preceded "Cymbeline" finds no better support than the opinion of Dyce, Leonhardt, and Macaulay. It is mere conjecture.

Professor Thorndike expressly admits that of the six plays which are claimed as "romances," "A King and No King" "is the only one acted before 1612 the year of whose production is fixed," but he states without qualification that "Winter's Tale" and the "Tempest" were not acted until after "Philaster." As we have seen, "Winter's Tale" was acted May 15th, 1611, and Professor Thorndike himself says that "'The Tempest' was probably written and acted late in 1610 or early in 1611"; "Cupid's Revenge" "was acted the Sunday following New Year's 1612; 'A King and No King' in December, 1611." These are the only two of the six of which the date of acting is given. Nowhere does Professor Thorndike pretend to give any date whatever when "Philaster" was acted; the only question discussed is as to the year of authors.h.i.+p, and that is left uncertain. The statement that "Winter's Tale" and "The Tempest" were "not acted until after 'Philaster'" is utterly without warrant or authority. If Shakspere is to be adjudged the "imitator" of Beaumont and Fletcher, the judgment must rest upon facts or inference from facts, and not upon the unsupported opinion of Professor Wendell's pupil.

Professor Thorndike in fact admits that "we cannot be certain about the date of 'Cymbeline,'" but yet a.s.sumes that "Philaster" preceded it, both in date of production and public appearance, and proceeds to draw a long parallel between the "romances" of Beaumont and Fletcher and those of Shakspere, for the purpose of showing that the "romance" or the heroic "romance" was a new style of drama, "created" by Beaumont and Fletcher and probably adapted and improved by Shakspere.

Whether there is any difference in definition between the "romance" and the "heroic romance" seems immaterial, since Professor Thorndike uses one term as synonymous with the other. He gives "the most noticeable characteristics of the romances": "A mixture of tragic and idyllic events, a series of highly improbable events, heroic and sentimental characters, foreign scenes, happy denouements." This definition is elaborated in connection with the "romances" of Beaumont and Fletcher:

1st. They took the plots from any source.

2nd. The plots are ingenious and improbable.

3rd. The plots lack realism.

4th. The plots deal with heroic persons and actions.

5th. The characters are not historical.

6th. The plays are located far off, for example, in Milan, Athens, Messina, Lisbon.

7th. The action has little to do with the real life of any historic period, but with "romance."

8th. The story is of sentimental love, as contrasted with gross, sensual pa.s.sion.

9th. There is variety of emotional effect.

10th. There is always a happy denouement.

All these elements of the definition are applied to "Cymbeline," "The Tempest" and "Winter's Tale," and it is maintained that none of Shakspere's previous dramas present the same features. This is a convenient method of showing that Beaumont and Fletcher "created the romantic drama" and that Shakspere was "influenced" in writing "Cymbeline" by "Philaster," but it is not criticism; it is rather an attempt to "create" a definition and apply it to "Philaster," and then to deny its application to "Midsummer Night's Dream," "Much Ado About Nothing," "The Merchant of Venice," "Twelfth Night" or "Measure for Measure."

Why does Professor Wendell call the "Two Gentlemen of Verona" a "romantic comedy," if Beaumont and Fletcher "created" the type which Professor Thorndike p.r.o.nounces "romance"? He deliberately cla.s.sifies "Much Ado" and "Twelfth Night" as "romantic comedies." Is not "Philaster" a "romantic comedy"? Then, as "Much Ado" was probably written in 1599, "Twelfth Night" in 1598, when Beaumont was twelve or thirteen and Fletcher twenty-two or twenty-three, it seems quite "probable" that they were "influenced" in writing their "romances" by Shakspere. If there is any fundamental difference between "romantic comedy" and "romance," what is it? This is a difficult question, which Professor Thorndike has attempted but failed to answer. He admits that "Philaster" has some generic resemblance to "Measure for Measure," but says that "No one would think of finding close resemblance between it and anyone of the 'romances.'" If the resemblance is generic, does it matter whether it is "close"? If "Measure for Measure" falls within the laborious definition of a "romance," or of a "tragi-comedy," as both that play and "Philaster" are called, why shouldn't we think of "Measure for Measure," produced in 1604, four years before the wildest conjecture puts the date of "Philaster," as the model upon which Beaumont and Fletcher built?

"Measure for Measure" answers every detail of the definition: the plot is taken from "Promos and Ca.s.sandra"; it is ingenious and improbable, lacks realism, deals with heroic persons and actions, a sovereign duke and his rascal brother; the characters are not historical; the location is far off; the action has little to do with the real life of any historical period; the story involves sentimental love, as distinctly contrasted with sensual pa.s.sion; there is variety of emotional effect; the denouement is happy. If therefore the definition of "romance" is correct, "Measure for Measure" is as much of that type as "Philaster"; Beaumont and Fletcher did not "create" it, and there is no reason for supposing that Shakspere imitated them in "Cymbeline," "Tempest," or "Winter's Tale."

But certain traits of construction are named as peculiar to the six "romances" of Beaumont and Fletcher and those of Shakspere, and it is sought to show that Beaumont and Fletcher set the fas.h.i.+on in these also.

1st. They did not observe the unities.

2nd. They disregarded the chronicle method.

3rd. They left out battles and armies.

4th. They presented a series of contrasted and interesting situations leading up to a startling climax.

5th. The by-plots a.s.sist the main action.

6th. There is the use of tragi-comedy.

Does any attentive reader of Shakspere's comedies, whether called romantic or tragi-comic, or by whatever other name, need to be told that many of them contain all these traits? General review is impossible, but take "The Merchant of Venice" as an ill.u.s.tration:

The unities are not observed. We think it is generally thought that Shakspere was in the habit of disregarding them. The chronicle method is ignored. We are not aware that Shakspere ever followed it except in writing historical plays. Battles and armies are left out. This comedy, like others by the same cunning hand, presents a series of contrasted and interesting situations leading up to a startling climax. Need we call to mind the rash contract of the merchant, and its almost tragic result, the game of the caskets, the trial and defeat of the clamorous Shylock? The by-plot a.s.sists the main action, else why does Jessica keep house for Portia while she goes to play "A Daniel come to judgment"?

There is the use of tragi-comedy in the ruin of the merchant, in the whetting of the Jew's knife for the heart of his a.s.sured victim. If these "traits" characterize the "romances" of Beaumont and Fletcher, they are possibly more likely to have been the "imitators," because "Shylock" was created in 1596 or 1597, some years before "Philaster" was exhibited as a stage decoration.

It is urged further that in the "romances" of Beaumont and Fletcher "the characters are not individuals, but types," and that those types are repeated until they became conventionalized. There is always a very bad and a very good woman, a very generous and n.o.ble man and one so bad as to seem a monster. There is the type of the "love-lorn maiden," of "the lily-livered" hero, of the faithful friend, of the poltroon. It is supposed by many that such types repeated in play after play do not mark the highest original power, but rather poverty of invention, weak and shadowy conception, indistinctness of coloring. Professor Thorndike, however, cannot too much commend this style, because it gives such wide scope for intense pa.s.sion, startling situation, and successful stage effect, and proceeds to seek for similar types in Shakspere's "romances"

as further proof that he "imitated" "Philaster." In his view, the characters show "surprising loss of individuality." Imogen's character "fails to supply really individual traits"; "Perdita and Miranda have even less marks of individuality than Imogen." They are like Beaumont and Fletcher's heroines who appear in the same stage costumes, wearing the same masks, differing only in stage postures and dialogue. More than this: Professor Thorndike would reduce the "creations" of Viola and Rosalynd to the conventional type of the "love-lorn" maiden, to mere adaptations for the stage, because they dressed in boy's clothes; of Perdita, to an "imitation" of Lady Amelia in "Palamon and Arcyte"

because she gathered flowers prettily and was commended by the Queen. He makes the surprising statement that the three heroines in "Cymbeline,"

the "Tempest" and "Winter's Tale" have on the stage "few qualities to distinguish them from almost any of Beaumont and Fletcher's." It is difficult to discuss such generalizations with the temperance of criticism. They can be true only if Professor Thorndike's theory is correct,--that the delineation of character is solely for stage effect.

There is another theory announced and recorded by Shakspere himself, and ill.u.s.trated in every drama he wrote,--that the sole end and aim of the stage itself and of the characters it represents, is "to hold the mirror up to nature," and therefore his characters are not "types"; they are men and women who were born, not manufactured; each is a separate, individual human being; each different from every other. We know them, for they have entered our houses, sat at our tables, talked with us, laughed and wept with us, made us shudder at crime and exult in the triumph of virtue.

Therefore, there is but one "Lear": his madness was never imitated outside of Bedlam; but one Lady Macbeth, and we have seen her walking in her awful dream. Beaumont and Fletcher in six romances delineate "love-lorn maidens," "conventionalized types," who differ little from each other, except that three of them "masquerade in boy's clothing" and three do not. They have "little individuality," "are utterly romantic,"

"utterly removed from life"; all are presented to produce novel situations leading up to a startling climax.

Imogen is not like Miranda or Perdita; neither is a "type" of the "love-lorn" maiden; all are living, acting individuals, differing from each other like those we know, resembling each other only as one beautiful and pure woman resembles another. Professor Thorndike, who is the advocate of Beaumont and Fletcher, may keep his personal opinion that Imogen lacks "individual traits," but we respectfully decline to take his opinion as a critic that she is like Arethusa in "Philaster."

For us and for all men and women, Shakspere has _created_ the character of Imogen, as of Perdita and Miranda, and her "individual traits" are clear enough, to those who have had the happiness of her acquaintance, to show that neither in feature or dress, neither in manners or morals, did she "imitate" any of the heroines of Beaumont and Fletcher. But even as a critic we must differ from Professor Thorndike; he accuses Miranda of unpardonable indelicacy, and says she "proposed" to Ferdinand! He gives her language from "Tempest," and remarks with satisfaction that it sounds "very much like one of Beaumont and Fletcher's heroines," meaning of course Arethusa, and so draws the obvious conclusion that Shakspere in this remarkable instance clearly "imitated" the "creators" of the "heroic romantic drama." The difficulty with this statement first of all is, that it is not true: Miranda does not "propose" to Ferdinand; before her sweet confession of love, Ferdinand had given all lovers the best form of proposal ever spoken, in this language:

"I, Beyond all limit of what else i' the world, Do love, prize, honor you."

Arethusa does "propose" to Philaster, and therefore her "proposal" does not "sound very much like" the proposal in "Tempest," or, if it does, it tends strongly to show that Beaumont and Fletcher attempted an "imitation" from "The Tempest." Professor Thorndike the critic has here been misled by his zeal as the partisan: isn't it just possible that the like zeal has misled him in the conclusion that "Cymbeline" was an imitation of "Philaster"?

The second cla.s.s of "types," as shown by the dramas of Beaumont and Fletcher, is the "evil woman"--Evadne in the "Maid's Tragedy," Bacha in "Cupid's Revenge," Megra in "Philaster," Brunhalt in "Thierry and Theodoret" and Arane in "A King and No King." Professor Thorndike says that "four of them brazenly confess adultery, and four attempt murder,"