Chapter 6: Comparative analysis

Recommended reading

Bradbrook, M.C. The Growth and Structure of Elizabethan Comedy. History of Elizabethan Drama, vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979) [ISBN 9780521295260].

Braunmuller, A.R. and J.C. Bulman (eds) Comedy From Shakespeare to Sheridan: Change and Continuity in the English and European Dramatic Tradition. (Newark and London: University of Delaware Press, 1986) [ISBN 9780874132762].

Clare, J. and R. Eriksen (eds) Contexts of Renaissance Comedy. (Oslo: Novus, 1997) [ISBN 9788270992751].

Farley-Hills, D. The Comic in Renaissance Comedy. (London: Macmillan, 1981) [ISBN 9780333275146].

Leggatt, A. Introduction to English Renaissance Comedy. (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1999) [ISBN 9780719049651].

Newman, K. Shakespeare’s Rhetoric of Comic Character: Dramatic Convention in Classical and Renaissance Comedy. (New York and London: Routledge, 2008) [ISBN 9780415489089].

Introduction

Section C of the examination asks you to produce a critical analysis of themes in two or more plays, including at least one by Jonson, and one by Shakespeare. What follows is an example of the type of ideas that you may like to consider.

Comic transformation in The Taming of the Shrew, The Merchant of Venice and The Alchemist

Transformation

One of the main themes of early-modern comedy is the idea of transformation. Transformation can take many forms, but, essentially, comedy dramatises some type of change, whether intentional or otherwise, in the characters of the play. Change is in the spirit of social inversion or the transposition of people and places that is central to the comic world of the early-modern period. Transformations can include women dressing as men, Puritans becoming love-sick, or servants cheating their masters. This chapter will attempt to illustrate the themes of comic transformation through a critical comparison of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, and The Merchant of Venice and Ben Jonson’s The Alchemist. It should be used as an example of how you may construct an argument following a single idea through a number of plays.

The Taming of the Shrew

Half-way through The Taming of the Shrew, Petruchio reappears to claim Katherina as his wife. Before he enters, Biondello describes his bizarre appearance:

BIONDELLO

Why, Petruchio is coming in a new hat and

an old jerkin; a pair of old breeches thrice turned; a pair

of boots that have been candle-cases, one buckled,

another laced; an old rusty sword ta’en out of the town

armoury, with a broken hilt, and chapeless; with two

broken points; his horse hipped, with an old mothy

saddle and stirrups of no kindred; besides, possessed

with the glanders and like to mose in the chine, trob-

led with the lampass, infected with the fashions, full of

windgalls, sped with spavins, rayed with the yellows,

past cure of the fives, stark spoiled with the staggers,

begnawn with the bots, weighed in the back and

shoulder-shotten, near-legged before, and with a half-

checked bit and a headstall of sheep’s leather which,

being restrained to keep him from stumbling, hath been

often burst, and now repaired with knots; one girth six

times pieced, and a woman’s crupper of velour, which

hath two letters for her name fairly set down in studs,

and here and there pieced with pack-thread.

(3.2.43–61)

Petruchio, dressed in ill-fitting, improper and torn clothes, and riding on a horse with a dislocated hip and other equine maladies, paints a picture of disorder that is entirely inappropriate for a man supposed to be courting his love. Transformation in dress is an often-used comic strategy for Shakespeare, and here it works to visibly underline the otherwise invisible transformations that permeate the play. Petruchio seems to have so badly judged the situation that his failure must be assured. However, Petruchio’s appropriation of an appearance and behaviour that stands in absolute opposition to that expected of him at this time is typical of the ideas of inversion and transformation that constitute this play. The Taming of the Shrew is principally concerned with Katherina’s change from ‘shrewd ill-favoured wife’ (1.2.59) to someone so agreeably well-suited to marriage that her own father admits that ‘she is changed, as she had never been’ (5.2.115). Therefore Petruchio’s change in outward appearance acts as a counterpoint to the inward change that Katherina will undergo.

This concept of change also begins the play. Petruchio’s strange dress, suiting a man in extreme poverty rather than one in comfortable circumstances, is a literal inversion of the situation of Christopher Sly, the itinerant beggar whose sleep offers the Lord and Hostess with the opportunity to dress him in rich apparel and present him with a play. The framing narrative of Christopher Sly and the conveniently strolling Players is the first occasion of a person becoming what they are not in order to initiate some kind of change. Sly’s instantaneous conversion from beggar to lord of the manor is the initial action that sets the thematic tone, establishing the idea of a theatrical type of ‘playing’ and the shifting and appropriation of different identities. In many respects, The Taming of the Shrew is obsessed with theatricality and its transformative effects. But this idea is not confined to Sly, Petruchio and Katherina alone. The suitors of the sweet-natured Bianca themselves appropriate a role as they attempt to woo her with highly arched and conventionalised poetic language that masks their truly competitive identities and sexual motivations.

Activity

Given the theme of change in the play, attempt to chart all the various changes and transformations that constitute the action of The Taming of the Shrew.

Although some critics have had trouble with the apparently total subservience of Katherina’s final speech, what it clearly shows is the absolute transformation that she has undergone. Even though Katherina insists that a husband should be ‘thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,/Thy head, thy sovereign’ (5.2.146–7), it is clear by this stage that her relationship with Petruchio is strongly established on affectionate grounds and the excited anticipation of their future lives together. Although her final speech to the assembled characters may seem merely a propaganda piece on behalf of husbandly superiority, it simultaneously outlines the place of acting in a relationship, appropriating roles and humours, and reacting to one another as the occasion demands.

The Merchant of Venice

Unlike The Taming of the Shrew, the transformations of The Merchant of Venice are not entirely happy ones, although they are understood to operate in the name of social harmony. The central conflict in this play revolves around Shylock’s insistence on the literal interpretation of his bond and his planned fatal cruelty to Antonio. The Merchant of Venice seems to have established an apparently hopeless situation for the poor Antonio. But whereas The Taming of the Shrew uses comic inversion in order to bring about resolution, The Merchant of Venice establishes a series of antagonistic oppositions that must be resolved before harmony can be restored. These oppositions are drawn along the lines of Shylock’s ethnic and religious difference to the Christian Venetians. Shylock’s Jewishness aligns him with a certain sense of out-dated barbarism in the eyes of the Christians. Shylock believes in Old Testament justice, ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’: that is, a belief in exacting revenge and retribution in proportion to the crime. Venice, however, believes in the New Testament philosophy of ‘turning the other cheek’ and the idea of Christian mercy, as outlined by Portia when she says:

PORTIA

The quality of mercy is not strained.

It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven

Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:

It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.

The mightiest in the mightiest. It becomes

The throned monarch better than his crown.

His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,

The attribute to awe and majesty,

Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;

But mercy is above this sceptered sway.

It is enthroned in the hearts of kings;

It is an attribute to God himself,

And earthly power doth then show likest God’s

When mercy seasons justice.

(4.1.181–194)

For Portia, mercy is considered to be an attribute of divinity, and one that any truly just monarch should have inscribed on his heart. In the court scene, the apparently irreconcilable factions of Antonio and Shylock confront each other directly. What is required is some kind of change in order to bring this deadlock to conclusion. The transformation that this situation produces is brought about by insisting on Shylock’s conversion to Christianity, ironically as part of his punishment. Antonio outlines the details:

ANTONIO

That for this favour

He presently become a Christian;

The other, that he do record a gift

Here in the court of all he dies possessed

Unto his son, Lorenzo, and his daughter.

(4.1.383–387)

Shylock’s sentence, as agreed by the court, insists on his transformation from Jew to Christian. This is not the sole transformation involved in the resolution of the dispute, however, as it also includes the redistribution of his wealth, half to the court, and half in deed to his ‘son’ Lorenzo. Lorenzo, of course, is no son of Shylock’s, although he has eloped with his daughter Jessica and as such is an unwanted son-in-law. The marriage of Lorenzo and Jessica is a further transformation inasmuch as Judaism is a matrilineal religion, meaning that the faith is passed down through the generations by the mother rather than the father. By marrying Jessica, and converting her to Christianity, the Venetians have succeeded in preventing the creation of any more Shylocks in generations to come.

Activity

Given the conclusion of The Merchant of Venice, is it possible to think of Shylock as a sympathetic character?

What we can see in The Merchant of Venice is a principle of Shakespearean comedy that operates in nearly all of the comedies in this subject. Essentially, Shakespearean comedy can be said to dramatise the move from heterogeneity to homogeneity. Put simply, Shakespearean comedy likes to make everything fit together neatly, and will exercise the power of transformation on those elements that do not, until they do. In The Merchant of Venice, this transformation has unpleasant racial undertones, as it insists on the religious homogeneity of Venice. A look at Shylock’s various verbal attacks on the Christian merchants shows how he himself continually remarks on his difference from them. It is this difference that must be eradicated.

Activity

Try and find examples of Shylock’s difference to the Christian Venetians. How do they describe his difference, and how does he understand it himself?

The agent of transformation in The Merchant of Venice is, of course, Portia. Portia not only solves the legal issues, but she also cross-dresses as the male attorney Balthasar, and is responsible for resolving the romantic interests at the end of the play. Portia is associated with all that is considered valuable by Venetian society. Shylock is a mean usurer, an occupation forbidden to Christians, who plies his trade on the Rialto bridge, a location that associates him with intransience and rootlessness. Portia, on the other hand, lives in the fine villa of Belmont, with its associations of landed aristocracy, and, therefore, heritage, stability, hospitality and moral orderliness.

Activity

Portia is associated with Belmont, marriage, cross-dressing and merciful justice. In what sense might she be described as a typically ‘comic’ character?

The Alchemist

In contrast to the Shakespearean demand for absorption into sameness, Ben Jonson’s city comedies often make a virtue of their character’s incompatibility with the orthodox moralities that surround them. Whereas Shakespearean comedy celebrates harmonious conclusions through marriages and reconciliations, Jonson tends to conclude his plays on a note of greater moral ambiguity, serving to merely highlight the greed and stupidity of his characters, rather than attempting to cure it. Indeed, it might be argued that a comedy like The Alchemist ridicules the idea of transformation.

To begin with, The Alchemist is centred around the non-existence of the philosopher’s stone, believed to be in the possession of Doll, Face and Subtle. Traditionally, a philosopher’s stone was a mythical mineral charged with the ability to transmute base metals into gold. As such, the idea of transformation is at the very heart of this play. However, the philosopher’s stone is mythical, and Doll, Face and Subtle are confidence tricksters, so we might modify the previous statement to suggest that the idea of fraudulent transformation is at the centre of this play.

The Alchemist is driven forward by a series of knocks at the door. Each knock ushers in a new client, which in turn necessitates a costume change and the adoption of a new persona by Subtle, Face and Doll. Even the names of the tricksters gesture towards the idea of unfixed identities and the possibility of change. The alchemical fraudsters have realised that in order to con their victims more efficiently, they must appropriate an identity that seems to offer access to whatever it is their clients most desire. Transformation for Subtle, Face and Doll is about becoming desirable.

Activity

What is the role of desire in Jonsonian city comedy? How is it different to the concept of desire that exists in Shakespearean pastoral?

Just as the philosopher’s stone promises to transform, and the tricksters rapidly change their identities, so each of their clients is obsessed with the idea of transformation. Dapper wishes to become a raffish gambler and rakish lover, Sir Epicure Mammon wishes to spread his munificence about the world while indulging his senses to the extreme, whereas Kastril wishes to change the fortunes of his family by marrying his sister to a rich man. The comic premise of transformation here serves to highlight the ignorance and insensitivities of the characters whose desires are essentially selfish and self-serving. Jonson’s comic talent is revealed when we see the result of the interaction of the selfish desire for change with the continually transmuting conmen. Transformation does occur, but it is not the transformation the characters seek so much as the one they deserve.

For example, the Anabaptist clerics, Ananias and Tribulation, seek to establish their version of religious truth as the uniform religion of the world for the benefit of all humanity. A change of this kind, apparently in the name of spirituality, is soon transformed into a much nastier type of temporal concern:

SUBTLE

Or changing

His parcel gilt, to massy gold. You cannot

But raise you friends. Withal, to be of power

To pay an army, in the field, to buy

The King of France, out of his realms; or Spain,

Out of his Indies: What can you not do,

Against lords spiritual, or temporal,

That shall oppone you?

TRIBULATION

Verily, ‘tis true.

We may be temporal lords ourselves, I take it.

(3.2.44–53)

In this example, the Jonsonian irony of transformation concerns the Puritan pastor’s unholy interest in conquering the world and dispatching all his enemies, which is a far cry from his stated wish to convert all to his pacifist faith.

Activity

In what ways might the philosopher’s stone be taken as a metaphor for the foolish characters that Jonson dramatises in The Alchemist?

Transformation, then, can be seen to be a primary function of comedic narrative in the early-modern period. Whether it be the removal of blocking agents that prevent the passage of social harmony, or the transformation of fools into the personification of their own vice, early-modern comedy identifies with the power of change.

Learning outcomes

Having read this sample chapter, alongside your own independent study, you should be able to:

Sample examination questions for Section C

  1. 1. ‘While comedy aims to make us laugh, its true intention is to make us see the injustice in society.’ Discuss this opinion with reference to two or more plays, including at least one by Jonson, and one by Shakespeare.
  2. 2. ‘For all its competitive and individualistic energy, city comedy preaches essentially family values.’ Discuss with reference to two or more plays, including at least one by Jonson and one by Shakespeare.
  3. 3. ‘While comedy is a celebration of fertility and pleasure, it concludes with a message that is fundamentally conservative in tone.’ Discuss with reference to two or more plays, including at least one by Jonson, and one by Shakespeare.
  4. 4. ‘Although comedy allows women to speak, they are essentially commodities in a market run by men.’ Discuss this comment with reference to two or more plays, including at least one by Jonson, and one by Shakespeare.
  5. 5. In what ways can the action, characters or narrative of comedy be said to be ‘transgressive’? Discuss with reference to two or more plays, including at least one by Jonson and one by Shakespeare.

Suggestions for further study

The comparative analysis of themes and issues in Renaissance comedy is a broad and engaging field. There are many angles of approach it is possible to take, each of which will enable you to fashion a full and detailed answer. Perhaps you may like to think about gender issues in Renaissance comedy, the treatment of women and the expectations of men? Or, for example, you might consider the role of clowns and their relationship to the central narrative of the plays. Similarly, issues of mortality, such as black humour and memento mori (remembrances of death) are popular issues in early-modern comedy. What, for example, is the relationship of comedy to death, or the threat or fear of death? You may also consider the political aspect of comedy, debating whether or not it is possible for comic narratives to uphold serious political agendas, or whether satirical anger is necessarily diluted by its humorous context. Consult the list of topics for study set out in the introduction to this subject guide for further ideas.