Pagina-afbeeldingen
PDF
ePub

6

original fabric, if they be additions, that no eye can detect a piecing of the web. But we cannot, without conducting this inquiry in a spirit of mere advocacy, assume that they are not additions; and therefore we reserve the question of versification, in proof that Shakspere was the entire author of Henry VI.,' till we come to examine the poetical structure of the two Parts of The Contention,' in which, without the additional passages, the freedom of versification stands out in most decided contrast to every production that existed before 1592.

6

[ocr errors]

6

We hold, then, that The First Part of Henry VI.,' in all the essentials of its dramatic construction, is, with reference to the object which its author had in view of depicting a series of historical events with poetical truth, immeasurably superior to any other chronicle history which existed between 1585 and 1590. It has been called, as we see, a "drum-and-trumpet thing." The age in which it was produced was one in which the most accomplished of its courtiers said, "I never heard the old song of Percy and Douglas that I found not my heart moved more than with a trumpet: and yet it is sung but by some blind crowder, with no rougher voice than rude style; which, being so evil apparelled in the dust and cobweb of that uncivil age, what would it work trimmed in the gorgeous eloquence of Pindar! He who made the "drumand-trumpet thing" desired to move men's hearts as Sidney's was moved. He saw around him thousands who crowded to the theatres to witness the heroic deeds of their forefathers, although "evil apparelled in the dust and cobweb of that uncivil age;" and it was he who first seized upon the great theme for his own, and “ trimmed” it in his own "gorgeous eloquence." And what, if the music which he first uttered had a savour of the rough voice and the rude style which had preceded him? What, if his unpractised hand sometimes struck the notes of timidity and unskilfulness? What, if he now and then hurried away even from the principles of his own art, and appeared to start at " the sounds himself had made?" He did what no other man up to that day had done, or did for a long time afterwards-he banished the "senseless and soulless shows" of the old historical drama, and at once raised up a stage, ample and true with life." To understand the value of The First Part of Henry VI.,' we must have a competent knowledge of the chronicle histories which had preceded it.

6

* Sir Philip Sidney's Defence of Poesy.'

66

§ VI.

6

"No more than five dramas, the undoubted works of Greene, have come down to posterity. Writing for bread, and with a pen whose readiness was notorious, he undoubtedly produced, during the series of years when he was a professed author, a much greater number of plays in all probability many of them were never published, and perhaps, of some of them which were really printed, not a single copy has escaped destruction." * Of these five dramatic pieces none were printed till after Greene's death in 1592. • Orlando Furioso' bears no name on its title; Alphonsus King of Aragon' is made by R. G.; The Looking Glass for London' bears the joint names of Lodge and Greene; whilst Friar Bacon,' and 'The Scottish History of James the Fourth,' purport to be written by Robert Greene. It is from these plays, then, that we must form our estimate of Greene's peculiarities as a dramatist; and thence inquire with what justice he can be accounted the author of one or both of the two Parts of The Contention of the Houses of York and Lancaster.'

6

6

The subjects of Greene's five plays would appear from their titles to be sufficiently varied. In Orlando' the groundwork is, of course, to be traced to Ariosto; but the superstructure presents the most extravagant deviations from the plan of the great romancewriter of Italy. The pomposity of the diction is not amiss in the mouths of such stately personages as the Emperor of Africa, the Soldan of Egypt, the Prince of Mexico, the King of the Isles, and the mad Orlando. We give an average specimen of the versification:

But the

"Discourteous women, nature's fairest ill,

The woe of man, that first-created curse,
Base female sex, sprung from black Ate's loins,
Proud, disdainful, cruel, and unjust,

Whose words are shaded with enchanting wiles,
Worse than Medusa mateth all our minds;
And in their hearts sits shameless treachery,
Turning a truthless vile circumference!
O, could my fury paint their furies forth!

For hell's no hell, compared to their hearts,

Too simple devils to conceal their arts;
Born to be plagues unto the thoughts of men,
Brought for eternal pestilence to the world."

Orlando' has its comic scenes as well as its heroic; and we may form some judgment from them of the nature of the wit

* The Rev. A. Dyce. Greene's Dramatic Works, vol. i., p. xli.

which a scholar, such as Robert Greene was, had to offer to audiences who, in a few years after, had become familiar with Launce, and Bottom, and Falstaff. One sample will suffice:

“Tom. Sirrah Ralph, and thou 'lt go with me, I'll let thee see the bravest madman that ever thou sawest.

Ralph. Sirrah Tom, I believe it was he that was at our town a' Sunday: I'll tell thee what he did, sirrah. He came to our house when all our folks were gone to church, and there was nobody at home but I, and I was turning of the spit; and he comes in, and bade me fetch him some drink. Now, I went and fetched him some; and ere I came again, by my troth, he ran away with the roast meat, spit and all, and so we had nothing but porridge to dinner.

Tom. By my troth, that was brave: but, sirrah, he did so course the boys last Sunday; and if ye call him madman, he 'll run after you, and tickle your ribs so with his flap of leather that he hath, as it passeth."

'The Looking Glass for London' may appear to promise a comedy of manners, such as Jonson came a few years afterwards to present with accurate discrimination and poetical force. Greene's portion of it, which we think may be easily distinguished from Lodge's satirical prose, offers the most extraordinary canvas for such a delineation. The whole play is the most surprising combination of Kings of Nineveh, Crete, Cilicia, and Paphlagonia; of usurers, judges, lawyers, clowns, and ruffians; of angels, magi, sailors, lords, and "one clad in devil's attire." Last of all, we have the prophets Jonas and Oseas. The opening of this extraordinary drama sufficiently marks the general character of the versified parts:

"Enters RASNI King of Nineveh, with three Kings of Cilicia, Crete, and Paphlagonia, from the overthrow of Jeroboam King of Jerusalem.

"Rasni. So pace ye on, triumphant warriors;

Make Venus' leman, arm'd in all his pomp,

Bash at the brightness of your hardy looks,

For you the viceroys are, the cavaliers,

That wait on Rasni's royal mightiness.

Boast, petty kings, and glory in your fates,

That stars have made your fortunes climb so high,
To give attend on Rasni's excellence.

Am I not he that rules great Nineveh,

Bounded with Lycas' silver flowing streams?

Whose city large diametri contains,

Even three days' journey's length from wall to wall;

Two hundred gates carv'd out of burnish'd brass,

As glorious as the portal of the sun;

And for to deck heaven's battlements with pride,

Six hundred towers that topless touch the clouds."

6

'Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay' is the old story of The Brazen Head.' There is here, unquestionably, more facility in the versi

fication, much less of what we may best distinguish by the name of fustian, and some approach to simplicity and even playfulness. But whenever Greene gets hold of a king he invariably makes him talk in the right royal style which we have already seen; and our Henry III. does not condescend to discourse in a bit more simple English than the Soldan of Egypt or the King of Nineveh. A line or two will exhibit this peculiarity :

6

"Hen. Great men of Europe, monarchs of the west, Ring'd with the walls of old Oceanus,

Whose lofty surge is like the battlements

That compass'd high-built Babel in with towers,
Welcome, my lords, welcome, brave western kings."

Alphonsus King of Aragon' is surrounded by companions that render it impossible he should descend to the language men use, and which the real dramatic poet never casts aside, even in his most imaginative moods. Alphonsus is not only accompanied by the great Turk, the King of the Moors, the King of Barbary, the King of Arabia, and the King of Babylon, but the scene is varied by the presence of Medea, Venus, and the nine Muses. Yet in this play, extravagant as the whole conception is, we occasionally meet with passages not so laboured, the result, probably, of the author's carelessness as much as of his art. The following is an example:

"Fabius, come hither; what is that thou sayest?
What did God Mahomed prophesy to us?

Why do our viceroys wend unto the wars
Before their king had notice of the same?
What, do they think to play bob-fool with me?
Or are they wax'd so frolic now of late,
Since that they had the leading of our bands,
As that they think that mighty Amurack
Dares do no other than to soothe them up?

Why speak'st thou not? What fond or frantic fit
Did make those careless kings to venture it?"

The Scottish History of James IV., slain at Flodden,' would, from its title, lead us to imagine that Greene, abandoning his phantasies for realities, had applied himself at last to a genuine historical drama. But the words "slain at Flodden" indicate only what Scottish James was meant. The story is altogether a romance, in which James, putting away his queen, and falling in love with a maiden called Ida, is forsaken by his peers; whilst his wife, who undergoes a mysterious assassination with a still more mysterious recovery, is at last restored to her repentant husband. Mr. Dyce says, "From what source our author derived the materials of this strange fiction I have not been able to discover; nor could Mr.

David Laing, of Edinburgh, who is so profoundly versed in the ancient literature of his country, point out to me any Scottish chronicle or tract which might have afforded hints to the poet for its composition." As if purposely to divest this piece of any pretension to the character of an historical drama, we have a sort of chorus of 'Oberon' and 'Antics,' and a 'Stoic,' who talks Scotch. Yet the play is not without indications that, however Greene might be incapable of producing a regular historical drama, he could occasionally adapt his style so as to express plain thoughts in intelligible words. The following speech is one of the most favourable specimens: it does not exhibit much power, but it strikingly contrasts with the ambitious rhodomontade which is his distinguishing characteristic:

66

"O king, canst thou endure to see thy court

Of finest wits and judgments dispossess'd,

Whilst cloaking craft with soothing climbs so high,

As each bewails ambition is so bad?

Thy father left thee, with estate and crown,

A learned council to direct thy court:

These carelessly, O king, thou castest off,

To entertain a train of sycophants.

Thou well mayst see, although thou wilt not see,

That every eye and ear both sees and hears

The certain signs of thine incontinence.

Thou art allied unto the English king

By marriage; a happy friend indeed

If used well, if not, a mighty foe."

The dramatic works of Greene, which were amongst the rarest treasures of the bibliographer, have been rendered accessible to the general reader by the valuable labours of Mr. Dyce. To those who are familiar with these works we will appeal, without hesitation, in saying that the character of Greene's mind, and his habits of composition, rendered him utterly incapable of producing, not the two Parts of 'The Contention,' or one Part, but a single sustained scene of either Part. And yet a belief has been long entertained in England, to which even the wise and judicious still cling, that Greene and Peele either wrote the two Parts of 'The Contention' in conjunction; or that Greene wrote one Part, and Peele the other Part; or that, at any rate, Greene had some share in these dramas. This was a theory propagated by Malone in his Dissertation;' and it rests, not upon the slightest examination of the works of these writers, but solely on the far-famed passage in Greene's posthumous pamphlet, the 'Groat's Worth of Wit,' in which he points out Shakspere as a crow beautified with our feathers." The hypothesis

66

6

« VorigeDoorgaan »