A special use of, a use, indeed, that gives a special value to your
publication, is the communication through its means of facts and
conclusions for the information or assistance of editors or intending
editors. I do not suppose that any gentleman occupying this position
would be guilty of so much disrespect to the many eminent names which
have already appeared in your columns, as would be implied in not giving
all the attention it deserved to any communication you might see fit to
publish; and with this feeling, and under this shelter, I return to the
subject of Marlowe, and his position as a dramatic writer relative to
Shakspeare. I perceive that a re-issue of Mr. Knight's _Shakspeare_ has
commenced, and from the terms of the announcement, independently of
other considerations, I conclude that the editor will take advantage of
this opportunity of referring to doubtful or disputed points that may
have made any advance towards a solution since his previous editions. I
have read also an advertisement of an edition of Shakspeare, to be
superintended by Mr. Halliwell[1], which is to contain the plays of
"doubtful authenticity, or in the composition of which Shakspeare is
supposed only to have taken a part." Neither of these gentlemen can well
avoid expressing an opinion on the subject I have adverted to, and to
them more especially I would address my observations.
I think I have observed that the claims of Marlowe have been maintained
with something very like party spirit. I have seen latterly several
indications of this, unmistakeable, though expressed, perhaps, but by a
single word. Now it is true both Mr. Collier and Mr. Dyce are committed
to a positive opinion on this subject; and it would be unreasonable to
expect either of those gentlemen to change their views, except with the
fullest proof and after the maturest consideration. But who, besides
these, is interested in maintaining the precedence of Marlowe? These
remarks have been called forth by an article in the _Athenæum_,
containing the following passages:--
"All Marlowe's works were produced prior, we may safely assert,
to the appearance of Shakspeare _as a writer for the stage_, or
as an author, in print.
"It is now universally admitted among competent critics, that
Shakspeare commenced his career as a dramatic author, by
remodelling certain pieces written {370} either separately or
conjointly by Greene, Marlowe, Lodge, and Peele."
An anonymous writer commits himself to nothing, and I should not have
noticed the above but that they illustrate my position. In the passage
first cited, if the writer mean "as a writer for the stage _in print_,"
it proves nothing; but if the words "in print" are not intended to be so
connected, the assertion cannot be proved, and _many_ "competent
critics" will tell him it is most improbable. The assertion of the
second quotation is simply untrue; Mr. Knight has not admitted what is
stated therein, and if I recollect right, an Edinburgh Reviewer has
concurred with him in judgment. Neither of these, I presume, will be
called incompetent. I cannot suppose that either assertion would have
been made but for the spirit to which I have alluded; for no cause was
ever the better for allegations that could not be maintained.
In some former papers which you did me the honour to publish, I gave it
incidentally as my opinion that Marlowe was the author of the _Taming of
a Shrew_. I have since learned, through Mr. Halliwell, that Mr. Dyce is
confident, from the style, that he was not. Had I the opportunity, I
might ask Mr. Dyce "which style?" That of the passages I cited as being
identical with passages in Marlowe's acknowledged plays will not, I
presume, be disputed; and of that of such scenes as the one between
Sander and the tailor, I am as confident as Mr. Dyce; it is the style
rather of Shakspeare than Marlowe. In other respects, I learn that the
kind of evidence that is considered by Mr. Dyce good to sustain the
claim of Marlowe to the authorship of the _Contention_ and the _True
Tragedy_, is not admissible in support of his claim to the _Taming of a
Shrew_. I shall take another opportunity of showing that the very
passages cited by Mr. Dyce from the two first-named of these plays will
support my view of the case, at least as well as his; doing no more now
than simply recording an _opinion_ that Marlowe was a follower and
imitator of Shakspeare. I do not know that I am at present in a position
to maintain this opinion by argument; but I can, at all events, show on
what exceedingly slight grounds the contrary opinion has been founded.
I have already called attention to the fact, that the impression of
Marlowe's being an earlier writer than Shakspeare, was founded solely
upon the circumstance that his plays were printed at an earlier date.
That nothing could be more fallacious than this conclusion, the fact
that many of Shakspeare's earliest plays were not printed at all until
after his death is sufficient to evince. The motive for withholding
Shakspeare's plays from the press is as easily understood as that for
publishing Marlowe's. Thus stood the question when Mr. Collier
approached the subject. Meanwhile it should be borne in mind, that not a
syllable of evidence has been advanced to show that Shakspeare could not
have written the _First part of the Contention_ and the _True Tragedy_,
if not the later forms of _Henry VI._, _Hamlet_ and _Pericles_ in their
earliest forms, if not _Timon of Athens_, which I think is also an early
play revised, _Love's Labour's Lost_, _The Two Gentlemen of Verona_,
&c., all of which I should place at least seven years distance from
plays which I think were acted about 1594 or 1595. I now proceed to give
the kernel of Mr. Collier's argument, omitting nothing that is really
important to the question:--
"'Give me the man' (says Nash) 'whose extemporal vein, in any
humour, will excel our greatest _art masters_' deliberate
thoughts.'
"Green, in 1588, says he had been 'had in derision' by 'two
gentlemen poets' because I could not make my verses get on the
stage in tragical buskins, every word filling the mouth like the
faburden of Bow-bell, daring God out of heaven with that atheist
tamburlane, or blaspheming with the mad priest of the sun.
Farther on he laughs at the 'prophetical spirits' of those 'who
set the end of scholarism in an _English blank-verse_.'
"Marlowe took his degree of _Master of Arts_ in the very year
when Nash was unable to do so, &c.
"I thus arrive at the conclusion, that Christopher Marlowe was
our first poet who used blank-verse in dramatic compositions
performed in public theatres."--_Hist. of Dramatic Poetry_, vol.
iii. pp. 110, 111, 112.
This is literally all; and, I ask, can any "conclusion" be much more
inconclusive? Yet Mr. Collier has been so far misled by the deference
paid to him on the strength of his unquestionably great services, and
appears to have been so fully persuaded of the correctness of his
deduction, that he has since referred to as a _proved fact_ what is
really nothing more than an exceedingly _loose conjecture_.
Of the two editors whose names I have mentioned, Mr. Knight's hitherto
expressed opinions in reference to the early stage of Shakspeare's
career in a great measure coincide with mine; and I have no reason to
suppose that it is otherwise than an open question to Mr. Halliwell. For
satisfactory proof in support of my position, time only, I firmly
believe, is required; but the first stage in every case is to remove the
false conclusion that has been drawn, to weaken its impression, and to
reduce it to its true value; and that I have endeavoured to do in the
present paper. In conclusion, I take the opportunity of saying, as the
circumstance in some degree bears upon the present question, that the
evidence in support of the priority of Shakspeare's _Taming of the
Shrew_ to the so-called older play which I withheld, together with what
I have collected since my last paper on the subject, is I think stronger
even than that which I communicated.