Shakespeare Study Programs; The Comedies by Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke
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Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke >> Shakespeare Study Programs; The Comedies
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QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Are Miranda and Ferdinand undeveloped characters whose relation to
each other is more important to the play than they themselves are?
3. THE MINOR CHARACTERS
Which is the most important of the lesser characters and why? Is
Gonzalo blamable at all under the circumstances for following the
command to turn Prospero and Miranda adrift? Why is Gonzalo of better
cheer than his companions? What do you think of his philosophy in
itself and as an index to his character? Is his knowledge superior to
that of his companions? Does he suspect the evil intent of Antonio and
Sebastian? Show how his frankness and loyalty came out in Act III, and
how his uprightness is rewarded in Act V. Do you think it significant
that he closes the play? Francisco considered as the least important
personage in the play: should his speech describing Ferdinand's
swimming be given to Gonzalo? The sailors considered as examples of
Shakespeare's skill in outline portraits. Are Stephano and Trinculo
more highly developed types than Caliban? Would the play be better if
they were left out?
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Is Gonzalo more like Polonius in 'Hamlet' or Rent in 'Lear'?
VII
A STUDY OF ARTISTIC DESIGN
THE SYMBOLISM OF 'THE TEMPEST'
Did Shakespeare typify himself as Prospero? Prospero (says Montegut)
alludes to his own age, and intimates that the time has come for
retirement to private life. What indications can you find that
Prospero images Shakespeare? If he is so interpreted, what parts may
Ariel and Caliban be supposed to play? Is the history of the Enchanted
Island and the transformation wrought a parallel with the history of
the Stage and the transformation Shakespeare wrought? According to
Montegut, Caliban stands for Marlowe, Ariel for the English Genius
which Shakespeare frees from its barbaric prison. Dowden ('Mind and
Art of Shakespeare') fancies Prospero as the great artist lacking at
first in practical faculty, cast out therefore from practical worldly
success; but bearing with him Art in her infancy, the child Miranda,
finds at last an enchanted country where his arts can work their
magic, subduing the grosser appetites and passions (Caliban), and
commanding the offices of the imaginative genius of poetry (Ariel). He
supposes Ferdinand to be Shakespeare's heir as a playwright
(Fletcher). Lowell ('Among my Books') considers that the characters do
not illustrate a class of persons, but belong to universal
nature,--Imagination embodied in Prospero; Fancy in Ariel; brute
understanding in Caliban, who, with his wits liquor-warmed, plots
against his natural lord, the higher reason; Miranda, abstract
Womanhood; Ferdinand, Youth, compelled to drudge till sacrifice of
will and self win him the ideal in Miranda. Browning makes an
incidentally interesting contribution to this subject by symbolizing
in Caliban rudimentary theologizing man, in his poem 'Caliban.' (See
_Poet Lore_, Vol. V, p. 562, November, 1893.)
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Is 'The Tempest' an allegory? Is it in any sense an autobiographical
play? Does its symbolism have much in common with that of modern
symbolistic plays, such as Maeterlinck's 'Joyzelle,' for example? In
what respects may it be said, do you think, as Maeterlinck himself has
informed us, that 'Joyzelle' grew from 'The Tempest?'
THE WINTER'S TALE
CONSIDERED IN CONNECTION WITH GREENE'S 'PANDOSTO' AND THE 'ALKESTIS'
OF EURIPIDES
I
SHAKESPEARE'S INDEBTEDNESS TO GREENE
The story of 'Pandosto' falls into two distinct divisions; first, the
story of Pandosto and Bellaria; second, the story of Dorastus and
Fawnia. Compare each of these two stories with the two stories
interwoven in the play, noting all the analogous passages and the use
Shakespeare has made of them. (For Greene's 'Pandosto' or 'History of
Dorastus and Fawnia' see 'Shakespeare's Library,' or pp. 118-125 and
Notes in First Folio Edition.)
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Do Shakespeare's borrowed and additional archaisms and his confusion
of names and places show carelessness? Is his continuation of the
story merely a playwright's device to join the two parts of the plot
and make a good stage piece end happily? (As to Coast of Bohemia see
_Poet Lore_, April, 1894), also in "First Folio Edition," pp. 176-177.
II
THE RESEMBLANCES TO THE 'ALKESTIS' OF EURIPIDES
In Greene and in Shakespeare the King wishes the Queen's death because
he is uncomfortable so long as she lives, and he prefers his comfort
to aught else, taking it as his conjugal right and royal prerogative.
(See ii. 3, 1 and 204.) The Queen, understanding this, says, "My life
stands in the level of your dreams, which I'll lay down." To her she
says, "can life be no commodity" when love, "the crown and comfort of
her life," is gone. So Alkestis (see any translation of Euripides, in
Bohn edition, literal prose translation, vol. i. p. 223) says she "was
not willing to live bereft" of Admetos, therefore she did not spare
herself to die for him, "though possessing the gifts of bloomy youth
wherein" she "delighted." This point of correspondence may have
occurred to Shakespeare and suggested his continuation of Greene's
novel. Admetos' image of his wife, that he would have made by the
cunning hands of artists, is possibly a prototype of the statue of the
Queen in 'The Winter's Tale,' the piece "newly performed by that rare
Italian master, Julio Romano." Compare also, Herakles' trial of
Admetos with Paulina's trial of Leontes (v. i); and Herakles'
restoration of the unknown Alkestis to her husband with Paulina's
bringing the statue of the Queen to life.
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Is Shakespeare's use of a striking incident from the 'Alkestis' too
close not to have been suggested by it? Does it show his intention to
portray in Hermione a new Alkestis?
III
SHAKESPEARE'S ORIGINALITY IN WORKING OVER HIS MATERIAL
Note Shakespeare's departures from Greene and their significance. Do
they serve two ends,--make the play more effective for stage
representation, make the characters stronger? Does he make Leontes
more attractive than Greene does in the first part of the play? Does
he make him worse or better than Pandosto in the second part? What is
the sole trace left in Shakespeare of the father's guilty passion for
his daughter? Garinter, in Greene, dies without any cause. See
Shakespeare's explanation of this, also his use of the news of
Mamillius' death to strike shame to the king's heart. Greene makes the
king relent as soon as he hears the oracle. Contrast Shakespeare's
conduct of the scene at this point.
Notice the difference in his treatment of the character of the
cup-bearer. Does he make it his chief care to enhance the character of
the Queen? Note the new characters introduced,--Paulina, Antigonus,
Autolycus, the clown (in place of the wife in Greene). Conjecture any
reason for his different names. The introduction of Autolycus makes
the play more amusing on the stage, but is his part as well planned as
Capnio's for leading up to the _denouement_? Greene lets his mariners
off alive after they set Fawnia afloat. Shakespeare wrecks his, and
makes a bear eat Antigonus, to what end? What does Shakespeare gain by
prolonging the life of Hermione?
QUERY FOR DISCUSSION
Does Shakespeare's remodelling of Greene's story show chiefly a higher
ideal than Greene's of womanhood and of love?
IV
THE ALKESTIS STORIES IN LITERATURE
The sacrifice of the Queen to ease her husband, and the final
restoration, being the two main points of contact with Euripides'
version of the story, compare with these the stories of Alkestis told
by William Morris in 'The Earthly Paradise,'--'June'; 'The Love of
Alcestis,' by Emma Lazarus, in 'Admetos,'--'Poems,' vol. i.; by Robert
Browning in 'Balustion's Adventure;' by Longfellow in 'The Golden
Legend.' See also articles in _Poet-lore_,--'The Alkestis of Euripides
and of Browning,' July, 1890; 'Old and New Ideals of Womanhood'; 'The
Iphigenia' and 'Alkestis Stories,' May, 1891; 'Longfellow's Golden
Legend and its Analogues,' February, 1892. In comparing, note first
general resemblances, then slighter points of resemblance and of
difference.
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Is development in literature of the ideal of womanhood away from
self-sacrifice and toward self-development?
Is woman's task for the future a reconciliation of them?
V
THE OUTCAST CHILD IN CULTURE-LORE AND FOLK-LORE
A few of the outcast children in culture-lore are Krishna, Zeus,
Paris, Oedipus, King Arthur, Claribel's child in the 'Faerie Queene'
(canto xii.), etc. For the stories in folk-lore, see the English
_Folk-lore Journal_. For the solar theory of the origin of this story,
see Cox, 'Mythology of the Aryan Nations.'
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Collier says that Shakespeare changed Greene's pretty description of
turning Fawnia adrift in a boat because he had used much the same
incident in "The Tempest." Does Shakespeare's new treatment of
Greene's "pretty incident" add dramatic force and moral purpose to the
play?
VI
CHARACTER STUDIES
1. PAULINA; LEONTES; HERMIONE
Note Paulina's likeness to Emilia in "Othello." Jealousy in
Shakespeare: Resemblances in Leontes to Posthumus ("Cymbeline") and to
Othello. "The jealousy of Leontes," says Dowden, "is not a detailed
dramatic study like the love and jealousy of Othello. It is a gross
madness, which mounts to the brain and turns his whole nature into
unreasoning passion." Is Hermione more highly developed than others of
Shakespeare's suspected wives,--Desdemona, Imogen? Likeness or
superiority to Alkestis, Compare with Queen Katharine in 'Henry VIII.'
Is she hard, having made her husband do penance for sixteen years?
"Deep and even quick feeling never renders Hermione incapable of an
admirable justice," writes Dowden, "nor deprives her of a true sense
of pity for him who so gravely wrongs both her and himself."
2. THE YOUNG LOVERS
Notice the high and pure character of their love as shown in the facts
that Florizel did not find it fitting to buy pedler's "knacks" for
Perdita,--a trait not in Greene. Her independent and uncringing nature
as shown in another little touch of Shakespeare (see IV. iv. 492-497).
Compare these two lovers with Ferdinand and Miranda in "The Tempest."
3. THE ORIGINALITY OF SHAKESPEARE'S AUTOLYCUS
For suggestions see _Poet-lore_, April, 1891. ('Notes and News.')
Compare the Hermes of the Homeric Hymn with the Autolycus and Sisyphos
of mythology, also the folk-lore tales of the master-thief (Cox). To
discuss the probable originality with Shakespeare of a conception
which is one of the universal inheritances of the Aryan race is
futile; the type existed, and Shakespeare's part was to make an
individual of the type.
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Is Leontes' jealousy too gross and unfounded to be likely?
Is Hermione, not hard, but slow to be satisfied, because her love is
noble?
Is Mamillus not too precocious to be natural?
VII
A STUDY OF THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE PLOT
Has Shakespeare welded the two parts of the story together in such a
way as to unify the plot? Does Autolycus contribute anything to the
development of the plot? How does it compare with "Julius Caesar" or
"Macbeth," for example, in the construction of the plot? Is the
movement more rapid in the last half of the play or in the first? Note
the expedient introduced by Shakespeare to bridge over the lapse of
time between the first part and the last part; compare with other
examples of the same sort in Shakespeare.
QUERY FOR DISCUSSION
Does the dramatic interest of 'The Winter's Tale' suffer because the
plot is of less importance than the incidents and characters.
VIII
SHAKESPEARE'S WORKMANSHIP IN "THE WINTER'S TALE"
The versification is that of Shakespeare's latest group of plays.
Dowden says, "No five-measure lines are rhymed and run on lines, and
double endings are numerous." Give examples of the construction of the
lines from "Love's Labour's Lost" as an earlier play, "Merchant of
Venice" as a riper play. It has been said that the difficulties of
style in the play are accounted for by the endeavor of the author to
reflect the changing moods of Leontes. Compare with Prospero's diction
and construction in "The Tempest." Give examples of these.
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Does the lawlessness of poetic workmanship in "The Winter's Tale,"
together with the looseness of the dramatic construction, show a
deterioration from the ripe power of Shakespeare's middle period, or
that practised artistic mastery which is free from art by means of
perfect art?
IX
PERDITA'S GARDEN
The flower-imagery of "The Winter's Tale" compared with other
flower-scenes in Shakespeare,--in "A Midsommer Nights Dreame" and
"Hamlet." The classic and folk-lore allusions. The pastoral element in
"As you Like It" and "Winter's Tale."
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
The rustic scenes have little bearing on the play; are they necessary
to Shakespeare's art in order to throw a clear light on the character
of his protagonists?
X
THE ETHICS OF "THE WINTER'S TALE"
"The Winter's Tale" gives examples of meritorious actions losing their
virtue with the progress of ideas; for example, the civic virtue,
allegiance to the king, is what Leontes depends upon in his talk with
Camillo, with Antigonus, and the other lords. Note Camillo's reason
for not poisoning Polixenes to order,--that it is risky to kill a king
even at command of a king. That such a reason would be considered
small moral support to-day appears, for example, in the indignation or
amusement expressed in the newspapers on the German Emperor's address
to his army on the soldier's duty of obedience. In Shakespeare's day a
king had taken matters in his own hands in the trial of his wife, much
as Leontes did (see "Henry VIII".). The moral significance of
Hermione's patience under accusation appears in the long reparation
she requires. Paulina is made to speak for her during her seclusion.
What are the "secret purposes" which Shakespeare makes her subserve?
Observe that, if the fulfilment of the oracle and the restoration of
the child were all Paulina anticipates, there would be no use in her
remonstrances against a second marriage and in her goading the king to
remorse.
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION
Does Shakespeare's ideal of love and constancy, as revealed in 'The
Winter's Tale,' imply that second marriages are offences against the
first. Has the objection Paulina makes to his re-marriage such a cause
or is it a necessity of the plot?
Does the way of telling "The Winter's Tale" indicate the passing away
of aristocratic and the formation of democratic ideals, and the
dawning change in the _status_ both of woman and the commoner?
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