2. The fact that Bale does not mention any of Udall's comedies in the
1548 edition of his _Catalogus_;
3. The fact that "about 1552" Udall was in high esteem as a "comic
dramatist";
4. The fact that Udall quotes a number of proverbial phrases which he
got from Heywood's proverbs, published first in 1546;
5. The fact that the usury statute of 37 Henry VIII. was repealed
in 1552, "of some moment" as far as the "reference [in the play] to
excessive usury" is concerned.
The first argument is doubtless the strongest, but I venture to argue
that the quotation of 1553 does _not_ prove that the play was _written_
in 1552, but only that Wilson was unable _to use a copy of the play_
before 1553; whether this copy was a manuscript copy, or _a printed_
(and now lost) edition of the play, we cannot decide; _most probably
Wilson's quotation was made from an early edition of Roister, printed
in 1552_.
The fact that Wilson left Eton in 1541 seems to make it probable that
he remembered the "ambiguous" passage from his school days.
The second argument is very slight, for Bale does not give a _complete_
list of Udall's works either in edition 1548 or in edition 1557; nor
does he mention Udall's connection with the coronation pageants of
1533; and a modest school comedy would naturally not at once become
public property.
The _third_ argument is based on a serious anachronism. _We do not know
anything_ of Udall's fame as a "comic dramatist _about 1552_." The
warrant of December 3, 1554, is dated, and cannot be used for "about
1552." Besides, the nature of Udall's "dialogues and interludes" for
the "regell disporte and recreacion," as explained on p. 93, above,
excludes any possibility of connecting these "Dialogues" with the
comedy.
The number of proverbial phrases which Udall uses in common with
Heywood's _Proverbs_ (the early date of which, 1546, is rather a myth)
proves no dependence of Udall on Heywood. Their use proves merely that
Udall, as well as Heywood, talked the London English of his time, and
that both were familiar with phrases common in the early sixteenth
century. Any possible number of such phrases could not prove any
"dependence."
With regard to the allusion in _Roister Doister_ to the Usury Statute,
one may readily see that the reference is _not_ to a date later than
the repeal, in 1552, of 37 Henry VIII., c. 9, but to a _period between
1545 and 1552_. In Act V., Scene vi., lines 21 to 30, Custance blames
Roister humorously, _not_ for taking interest at all, but for taking
_too much_ (fifteen to one!), and for taking it _right away_ instead of
waiting until the year was up. The passage, therefore, does not refer
to the law passed 5 and 6 Edward VI., c. 20 (1552), which repeals 37
Henry VIII., c. 9, and orders that "no person shall lend or forbear
any sum of money for any maner of Usury or Increase to be received or
hoped for above the Sum lent, upon pain to forfeit the Sum lent, and
the Increase, [with] Imprisonment, and Fine at the king's pleasure."
The passage refers to 37 Henry VIII., c. 20 (1545), to a law which
allows ten per cent interest: "The sum of ten pound in the hundred, and
so after that rate and _not above_," and which forbids the lender "to
receive, accept or take in Lucre or Gain for the forbearing or giving
Day of Payment _of one whole year_ of and for his or their money," for
any other "Period" but the year, not "for a longer or shorter time."
Cf. the technical term "gain" in line 30.
If, therefore, Custance's joke can be taken as an indication of the
time when the play was written, it would be an indication of the period
between 1545 and 1552, or, at any rate, _before_ 1552.[315]
I should, however, not be inclined on account of this reference to
usury to date the play between 1545 and 1552. I would rather regard
the allusion as a later insertion, which ought not to weaken the force
of the internal evidence in favour of the old theory, according to
which the play belongs to the Eton period of Udall's life, to the years
between 1534 and 1541.
=Date of the Early Edition.=--The Stationers Company's _Registers_ show
(ed. Arber, 1, 331) four pence as
"Recevyd of Thomas hackett for hys lycense for pryntinge of a play
intituled Rauf Ruyster Duster,"
and the unique copy of the play which has come down to us has been
regarded as the solitary relic of this edition. Title-page and colophon
are lacking.
Hackett, however, printed between October (November?), 1560, and July,
1589; and Arber dates the unique copy: "? 1566."
This copy is now in the possession of Eton College. On the first
fly-leaf are written the words: "The Gift of the Revᵈ Thoˢ Briggs to
Eton Coll. Library, Decʳ 1818." As shown above, the quotation of the
"ambiguous" letter in the 1553 edition of Wilson's _Logique_ speaks,
however, in favour of an edition earlier than that of the unique copy;
and this earlier edition might be dated "1552?".[316]
=Place of Roister Doister in English Literature.=--_Roister Doister_
is the only specimen of Udall's dramatic art preserved by Fate, but it
is sufficient to justify us in assigning to the author his place as
father of English Comedy.
The causes that brought a "Latinist," a schoolmaster, a theological
writer to such a position are interesting to consider. Primarily, of
course, it is his genius, his "_Froh-natur_," his way of looking at
the world, and his art of representing this picture of the world, to
which we owe _Roister Doister_, but besides this we may be certain that
Udall's classical training, the condition of the Latin School-comedy
of his time, and, finally, his clear insight into the character of the
national play helped him to the place that he holds.
If Udall had been merely a pedantic schoolmaster, one of whose duties
it was to superintend an annual Christmas play, he would have been
satisfied with an adaptation of--let us say--the _Miles Gloriosus_, or
he would merely have translated the _Miles_ as the _Andria_ had been
translated before; perhaps he would even have been satisfied with a
performance of the play in the Latin. On the other hand, had he never
been obliged to drill boys in Terence, his plays would have remained
"interludes" of the old type, and at best, he would now receive
honourable mention by the side of Heywood. It was his very position as
teacher of the classics, his humanism (apart from the annual necessity
of advising the "enterluders" at Christmas time) which must have
pointed out to him the way in which the "enterlude" might be outgrown,
the way that would lead to a new category of plays: the "comedy."
Udall (if the prologue to _Roister Doister_ is his own, as we have no
reason to doubt)[317] seems to have been somewhat doubtful at first
about the designation of his play; he calls it at the beginning "thys
enterlude"; but he realized the new departure which he had taken,
and calls it later "Our Comedie or Enterlude." By the use of this
word,--the first time applied correctly to an _English_ comedy,--Udall
indicates his aspirations, his sources and classical models: those
plays which were the comedies _par excellence_, the comedies of
Terence, and--especially since the discovery of the twelve "new" plays
in 1429--those of Plautus. Udall shows himself a genuine disciple of
the Renaissance; he "imitates" in that true way in which "imitation"
has always ultimately proved "originality": he shows that he had
absorbed the spirit of the Roman comedy, that he fully understood the
easy movement, the sparkling and refined dialogue, the succinct but
full delineation of character, and the clear development of a plot. But
besides all this he possessed enough patriotic feeling not to overlook
the merits of the modest national "interlude" of England. He did not
too anxiously avoid carrying out here and there even a farcical motive;
but with the higher ideal before him, he succeeded in fusing the
classical and the national elements into a new category, becoming thus
the father of English comedy.
Udall's position appears clearly if one compares his work with _Gammer
Gurtons Nedle_ on the one hand, and--regarding them as a type--with
Heywood's farces on the other.
The good taste and higher art of _Roister Doister_ are at once evident:
the play is free from the undeniable vulgarity of _Gammer Gurton_, and
in delineation of character is distinctly superior. The plot, simple as
it is, is never as meagre as in the clever dialogues of Heywood; and as
much as Udall surpasses Heywood in construction of the plot, I think
he surpasses him in delineation of character. For even if, as Ward
says,[318] in Heywood's witty plays, the "personified abstractions" of
the moralities have been entirely superseded by "personal types," these
personal types have not yet matured into individual persons, into men
of flesh and blood, as they have in Udall's play.
I take, of course, for granted Udall's absolute superiority over that
category of interludes which--bastards of the "Moralities"--seem to
have had no other purpose than to introduce dogmatical moralizations,
seasoned perhaps with a tavern scene or with some other farcical
coarseness, and at best ending with an "unmotived" conversion of the
sinner or sinners.
=Plot and Characters.=--Udall's plot is so simple that its development
becomes clear at a glance; it consists of the unsuccessful wooing of
Ralph Roister Doister for the hand of Dame Christian Custance, evolved
amid various entanglements, and ultimately unsuccessful, not so much
because Custance is at the time of Roister's first advances already
engaged to another man, as because Roister's folly is so enormous that
no success can be possible.
Now the figure of an avowed fool in love would give excellent scenes
for a farce, but would not yield the complications of character
and situation necessary for a comedy; and in order to bring about
this essential complexity, there is introduced a second motive for
action in this fool's own character,--that of vainglory. There is
also introduced a personage who shall season the play by his wit and
produce the necessary entanglements. This is Mathew Merygreeke, who
grows gradually under the poet's hands, until he occupies the most
prominent place in the play, at least as far as our interest in the
different characters is concerned. Despite all that has been said to
the contrary, Merygreeke is Udall's own creation,--a figure in itself
deserving of high praise. Undoubtedly this character was at first
conceived as a mere modern parasite, of a much higher type, however,
than the Sempronio, for instance (in _Calisto and Meliboea_), but as
the play advanced the figure outgrew its original limits, and although
in the first scenes Merygreeke is scarcely out of the eggshell of
the parasite, he proves very soon to be a new character: a character
belonging to the class of Pandarus, a "Friend" playing the part of
kindly Fate, a Vice certainly mischievous and cruel enough, but
directing everything to a good end; as full of humour and fun as of
character, and, at the bottom of his heart, of good-nature.
Merygreeke comes indeed to Roister at first "for his stomach's sake"
and wants a new coat, but he has on the whole only a few traits of the
parasite,[319] and these might be left out without injuring the play
in the least. As soon as he sees Roister in love, his humour gains
the upper hand; he realizes at once what a capital source of fun this
"love" on the part of a vain fool might become, and he determines to
bring about such complications as will yield the greatest quantity
of amusement. His purpose may, indeed, at first have been merely
egotistical, to have the fun himself; but he is forgiven because
all the other persons of the play--as well as the audience--are
liberally invited to the feast. Merygreeke may appear at times as a
false friend and thus as an immoral character, but his flattery is so
exaggerated, his lies are so improbable, so enormous, so amusing to all
sane people,--Roister so fully deserves (indeed provokes) the cruel
treatment,--that any possible wrath of a moralizing censor is entirely
disarmed. Supreme folly stands outside the common moral order of
things. Even if Merygreeke had not disclosed his motives, we could see
from the respect which is shown him by Custance and Trusty, that he is
far from being a treacherous parasite. And after all he does not betray
his friend. He rather helps him to what he really desires. And what
Roister most desires in this world is, after all, not the possession of
the fair widow, but the satisfaction of his vanity. How quickly does he
forget his love in the delusion fostered by Merygreeke, that Goodluck
and Custance desire to live in peace with him because they fear him.
The lie is in harmony with poetic justice.
Merygreeke has been characterized[320] as "the Artotrogos of Plautus,
the standing figure of the parasite of the Greek new comedy and its
Latin reproductions." But, though Merygreeke was doubtless originally
planned as the parasite of the play, and though here and there to the
very end of the play we find allusions which corroborate this, I note,
first, that the classical parasite[321] lacks the element of modern
humour, of witty but, after all, good-natured enjoyment of the mischief
which he stirs up; secondly, that Merygreeke is free from endless
and--to us--tedious allusions to the "stomach"; and, thirdly, from the
vulgar, and almost uninteresting, selfishness, revealed in such words
as these of Gnatho:
Principio ego vos credere ambos hoc mi vehementer volo
_Me huius quicquid faciam id facere maxume causa mea_.
I may be mistaken, but I cannot find that the classical parasite has
any _fine_ touch of the humour that is inseparable from "humanity,"
from good nature. The classical parasite is, on account of this
deficiency, distinctly inferior to this modern creation.
As completely as in Merygreeke's case, Udall disarms the moralist in
the case of Roister himself, whose lying[322] and bragging, whose
cowardice, matched only by his vanity, cannot possibly be regarded as
setting a bad example, because they have reached dimensions which are
grotesque and plainly ridiculous. They result only in the propagation
of his folly, and that is allowed to reap its--poor--external fruit:
Roister is "invited" to the banquet (and Roister has constitutionally
a good "stomach"), and he is made to believe that he is a much
"dreaded lion." Fate has fortunately not pressed the mirror into his
hands. He is saved the sight of the ass's ears visible to every one
else.[323] And as kind as Fate is his "friend" Merygreeke, who never
reveals to him his absolute wretchedness, and who has to the last
the satisfaction of knowing Roister a "glad man." Here was a great
danger for a less skilful writer than Udall--a danger of marring our
enjoyment of Merygreeke's part by inserting traits of a finer or
grosser brutality, a danger of spoiling the whole feast by some drop of
malice. The element of conscious humiliation is absent; the pathetic is
consequently avoided.
The other figures of the play are kept in the background; even
Custance, and Gawin Goodluck, who comes in at the end of the play
to give the _coup de grace_ to Roister's foolish hopes. As a lover
Goodluck is hardly a success. He is so fish-blooded that, in a scene
which savours of a judicial procedure, the evidence of Trusty becomes
necessary before he can be satisfied of the fidelity of his betrothed.
Goodluck is obviously no Romeo. In the widow ready to marry again Udall
presents a good study of character. Custance is a well-to-do London
city-wife of the days of Henry VIII. and Edward VI., ruling like a
queen over servants who themselves are happily introduced and capitally
delineated. We imagine her neither lean, nor pale, but rather like the
wife of Bath--like her, resolute and substantial, but more faithful.
She is, to a certain extent, even shrewd; she enjoys fun,--after
she has been made to see it,--and she is not without a touch of
sentimentality.
Indeed, to Custance Udall has assigned the only serious scene in the
play, Act V., Scene iii. This monologue appears pathetic, and sounds
like a prayer of innocence, extremely well justified in a woman who
finds herself surrounded by difficulties and involved in a complication
which seems to question her honour. The last words of the complaint
indicate, however, that Goodluck would better not doubt _too_ much,
because Custance's patience might reach a limit, and her natural
independence might sharply bring him to his senses.[324] She appears in
that very scene as the match of Goodluck, who will be very happy with
her if he gets her.
Udall shows his complete superiority over his predecessors in these
delineations of character even more than in the creation of the plot.
Though in the development of the latter everything fits together and is
arranged in good order and proportion, it is, after all, the _dramatis
personæ_ that interest us most. Udall's persons are men and women of
flesh and blood, interesting and amusing living beings, not the wax
figures of "Sapience" or "Folly," "Virtuous Living" or "Counterfet
Countenance." Udall's persons are vastly superior to these wooden
"dialoguers," whom one feels to be acting merely for a school-bred
morality, and they leave the coarse-grained but witty figures even of
Heywood's farces far behind.
If anything, his _persons_ show that Udall had studied his Plautus and
Terence as a clear and sharp observer,[325] and that he had learned
from them where the originals for a comedy were to be found--in life,
in the actual world surrounding the poet.
=The Present Text= is based upon Arber's reprint of July 1, 1869,
which has been carefully collated by Professor Gayley with the unique
copy in the library of Eton College. The courtesy of the librarian,
F. Warre Cornish, M.A., and the other authorities of Eton College, is
hereby heartily acknowledged. In the present text all variations from
the original are inclosed in brackets. But, in uniformity with the
regulation adopted for this series, _j_ and _v_ have been substituted
for _i_ and _u_ when used as consonants, and _u_ has been printed for
_v_ when used as a vowel. References in the footnotes to previous
editions are thus indicated: A., Arber's reprint; C., W. D. Cooper's
edition for the Shakespeare Society, 1847; H., Hazlitt's Dodsley
(edition in Vol. III.), Lond. 1874; M., Professor J. M. Manly's edition
in "Specimens of the Pre-Shaksperean Drama," Vol. II., Boston, 1897.
References to the Eton copy are indicated by E.