humanities.lit.authors.shakespeare

> > > Art Neuendorffer wrote:
>
> > > > I've been on a family reunion & ski week at Lake Tahoe, California.
>
> > .Greg Reynolds wrote:
>
> > > Well the names have all changed since you hung around,
> > > But those dreams have remained and they're turned around.
> > > Audrey and William got divorced.
=2E
> Art Neuendorffer wrote:
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------=

> > Do you mean: Audrey & *Touchstone* ?
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------=

Greg Reynolds wrote:
>
> No, they're doing fine.
> Did you hear something?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Well, Audrey told me she and your father are getting divorced.
[Greg immediately and ritually goes to the oven, turns
on the gas, opens the door and sticks his head in it.]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
THIS STAR OF ENGLAND Chap. 34
"William Shakes-speare" Man of the Renaissance
by Dorothy and Charlton Ogburn
http://www.sourcetext.com/sourcebook/Star/21-40/ch34.html
=2E
<1582, the other superimposed upon it in 1589, or thereabouts, then a
final blending in 1598, when further additions were made. They were
rather carelessly put together, it would seem, since the name Oliver
is used for two quite dissimilar characters, and likewise the name
Jaques. Sometime during the 1590's the highly symbolic Touchstone-
Audrey-William identity-scenes were introduced: they have nothing
whatever to do with the plot of either the 1582 topical Alen=C3=A7on story
or with the 1589-91 or -92 combination, which introduces the Fair
Youth of the Sonnets and refers to Sir Philip Sidney, who had died in
1586, as "Dead poet"; but they have much to do with the real author
versus the substitute.
=2E
We shall confine ourselves here chiefly to the early version of the
play, with regretful awareness that there are probably more parallels
with French contemporary history than we have apprehended. There may
be contemporaneous writers with whom we are as yet unacquainted who,
like Jonson, have made interesting revelations by means of parodies or
allegories. We shall quote enough of Jonson's heavy-handed, mean-
spirited satires upon the courtly dramatist, of whom he was so
bitterly jealous, to round out the picture.
=2E
Lord Oxford made frequent use for dramatic purposes of contemporary
French history. He knew many of the poets of the day and the
diplomats, as well as the members of the House of Valois, Catherine,
her sons Henry III and Alen=C3=A7on, and her daughter Marguerite, who
married Henry of Navarre. Lilian Winstanley has written scholarly
works upon the subject of "Shakespeare's" intimate acquaintance with
French events and problems, celebrated in French poetry of the day,
and Percy Allen has made some brilliant contributions to the subject,
including among other quotations the tribute D'Aubign=C3=A9 paid presumably
to Lord Oxford himself:
=2E
=2E Je vois un prince anglo is, courageux par exc=C3=A8s,
=2E A qui l'amour quitt=C3=A9 fait un rude proc=C3=A8s.
=2E
It would seem from this that the famous Huguenot poet knew about the
love-affair between Oxford and the Queen and her shocking treatment of
him.
=2E
To begin with, whether we like it or not, Orlando was obviously
intended by his creator for Alen=C3=A7on=E2=80=94at least partially. Oliver,=
his
cruel brother, is Henry III of France, who certainly hated Alen=C3=A7on.
Their father, Henry II of the House of Valois, stands for Sir Rowland
de Bois, hero of the French epic poem, Chanson de Roland. (Valois
suggests de Bois.) Their legends are similar, in that the former,
wounded in a tourney by Captain Montgomery of his Scottish Guard,
insisted upon having another round after the decision, and was killed;
whereas the equally indomitable Roland, refusing the pleas of his
friend, Oliver, to wind his horn and summon help in a battle against
hopeless odds, also died bravely. But there is a double significance,
for Roland is, of course, merely another name for Orlando, who is
described in one of the "songs in which Charlemain delighted"=E2=80=94this
one, as it happens, sung by the Norman Taillefer at the Battle of
Hastings=E2=80=94as much the same type of man that Oxford, whose Norman
ancestor took part in the Conquest, reveals himself here and there in
the plays to be. The English translation reads:
=2E
=2E On stubborn foes he vengeance wreak'd,
=2E And laid about him like a Tartar;
=2E But if for mercy once they squeak'd,
=2E He was the first to grant them quarter.
=2E The battle won, of Roland's soul
=2E Each milder virtue took possession:
=2E To vanquish'd foes he, o'er a bowl,
=2E His heart surrendered at discretion. 1
=2E
Henry III had decided, as his brother, Charles IX, had done during his
reign, that "France was not large enough for both him and Alen=C3=A7on."
There was ceaseless animosity between them. Oliver is like Henry III
in his willingness to go any lengths to be rid of his younger brother.
=2E
The political impasse in which Elizabeth found herself at this time
was crucial. She was still trying to play off Spain against France by
promising to marry Alen=C3=A7on, while promoting his campaign in Flanders.
(An account of her wiles and gambits may be found in Hume's The
Courtships of Queen Elizabeth.) Suffice it to say here that by 1582
she was badly worried=E2=80=94not only by international problems but by the
continued religious antagonisms at home=E2=80=94and it is likely that Oxford=

wrote the love-story of Rosalind and Orlando to support the Queen in
her pretense of sincerity toward her lover. This is As You Like It,
not I, he seems to say.
=2E
When the King of France informed his brother that he would give him no
help in the Netherlands and the Queen Mother, Catherine de' Medici,
urged him to return home before he was made "the laughing-stock of the
world," Elizabeth had taken strong means to maintain the status quo.
On November 21, 1581, she had instructed Castlenau, in the presence of
Leicester and Walsingham, "You may write this to the King: that the
Duke of Alen=C3=A7on shall be my husband"; then, turning, she had kissed
Alen=C3=A7on on the mouth, giving him a ring from her hand as a pledge. He
therewith gave her one from his (quite in the manner of Portia and
Bassanio sealing their troth). Whereupon, calling "the ladies and
gentlemen from the presence-chamber to the gallery," she had
emphatically repeated her announcement.
=2E
As we have previously remarked, all that was now necessary was the
consent of Parliament. This was her loophole, and thus she secured
delay, throwing the onus on the French King, since her ministers could
not agree to the terms he made. She played cat and mouse with the
Duke, now cajoling him, now throwing him into despair with her
trifling. Her greatest wish was to keep him persuaded of her good
faith, while speedily getting him out of the country and on his way to
the Netherlands. But the strain was becoming unendurable. Elizabeth
told Burghley on Christmas night "that she would not marry the lad to
be empress of the world and that he must get rid of him somehow." 2.
=2E
Wary by now, Alen=C3=A7on postponed leaving, and it was Elizabeth's turn to
grow desperate. Then suddenly, on January 11, 1582, Secretary Pinart's
son arrived in England bringing acceptance of all the English terms on
the part of the King, the Queen Mother, and the Huguenots. This was a
staggering contretemps for Elizabeth. But the crafty Burghley found a
way to escape the trap, while persuading Sussex that the marriage
would really come off at last, now that all barriers were removed,
thus through him conveying the cheering conviction to Alen=C3=A7on. He wept
with joy at his brother's goodness and the turn of his fortunes.
=2E
Elizabeth, more eager than ever to be rid of him, now that her
suspicions of the French King's intentions had been intensified,
pressed for his departure. And finally, at the beginning of February,
he set forth for Flushing, where the Prince of Orange and other high
dignitaries stood ready to welcome him as a deputy of the Queen of
England. Elizabeth made him a personal present of =EF=BF=BD25,000 (she had
promised him 30,000) when he left=E2=80=94no small sum, since she was badly
off for money at this time=E2=80=94and told him that "a wound on his little
finger would pierce her heart." (Perhaps she would have swooned as
Rosalind did at the sight of the napkin stained with Orlando's blood
[IV.3.157]. Or perhaps she would not!) In the end, she made so urgent
a point of his need to obtain help from his brother that her true
purpose was revealed, which had been from the first to incite France
and Spain against each other, so that she might remain clear.
=2E
However, she kept up the pretence of infatuation even at home,
remarking to her suite one day soon after Alen=C3=A7on had left, "I would
give a million to have my frog swimming in the Thames instead of the
stagnant waters of the Netherlands."
=2E
It was flattering to the Queen, now forty-nine years old, to be
portrayed as the lovely Rosalind=E2=80=94"Fair Rosalind," the Tudor Rose=E2=
=80=94but
of course the courtiers always flattered her. 4 It was certainly a
compliment to the swart, toadlike Alen=C3=A7on to appear as the amiable
Orlando. Her Turk was giving the Queen what she liked. Something
within him had snapped. D'Aubign=C3=A9 had been right. To this
exceptionally courageous Englishman "l'amour quitt=C3=A9" had been a harsh
experience. From now on he would regard Elizabeth in a more filial
light than heretofore, and he would not expect her to be honest, even
with him.
=2E
Restored to his wife now, Lord Oxford was still living away from the
court, it may well have been at his seat in Warwickshire, when
Elizabeth made her spectacular gesture of kissing Alen=C3=A7on on the lips
and proclaiming publicly that he would be her husband; but he would
not have been long in hearing the news. The passage he introduced into
this play surely alludes to Elizabeth's (Diana's) politic kiss, since
it is not germane to the story of the forest lovers (III.4.7-18):
=2E
=2E Rosalind. His very hair is of the dissembling colour.
=2E Celia. Something browner than Judas's; marry, his kisses are
Judas's own children.
=2E
=2E Rosalind. . . . his kissing is as full of sanctity as the touch of
holy bread.
=2E Celia. He hath bought a pair of cast lips at Diana; a nun of
winter's sisterhood kisses not more religiously; the very ice at
chastity is in them.
=2E
In other words, for all the righteous attitude Elizabeth has assumed,
the kiss she and Alen=C3=A7on have exchanged was a Judas kiss of policy.
The Queen's kiss, resolute and stiff, made with the "cast lips of
Diana" was "bought" by necessity and was bestowed in a spirit of
dedication. The legend of her chastity embellished the account, making
recognition inescapable.
=2E
Ben Jonson, in Cynthia's Revels, which is sprinkled with references to
As You Like It, has Mercury say:
=2E
=2E Marry, all that I fear is Cynthia's presence, which with the cold
at her chastity casteth such an antiperistasis about the place that no
heat of thine will tarry with the patient.
=2E
There are many allusions which connect Orlando with Alen=C3=A7on besides
both the young men's patent gullibility. In the conversation (I.1)
with Charles the Wrestler, Oliver tells Charles that his brother is
"the stubbornest young fellow of France, full of ambition." He adds:
=2E
=2E I had as lief thou didst break his neck as his finger. (142.)
=2E
Alen=C3=A7on was, indeed, stubborn and ambitious, as well as being quite as
villainous as Oliver pretends to Charles that Orlando is. And these
instructions to Charles suggest Elizabeth's remark to Alen=C3=A7on that "a
wound on his little finger would pierce her heart."
=2E
After admitting that his soul hates nothing more than Orlando, Oliver
continues (I.1.161-5):
=2E
=2E Yet he's gentle, never schooled and yet learned, full of noble
device, of all sorts enchantingly beloved, and indeed so much in the
heart of the world, and especially of my own people, who best know
him, that I am altogether misprised.
=2E
This has a very familiar ring, and abruptly we realize that Oxford is
in fact playing his usual game of combining himself with the
historical prototype of the hero of the piece. 5 The deftness with
which he here makes apt points about two such diametrically opposed
characters as himself and Alen=C3=A7on is admirable. First, regarding the
application to Elizabeth's suitor: he was of "gentle"'or noble birth,
"never schooled"=E2=80=94in truth, he was almost illiterate, though he had h=
ad
a great deal of experience and might be said to be learned in
practical ways. As for his popularity, it is recorded that when he
"crossed into Spanish Flanders in 1581 . . . half the young nobility
of France were with him," although when things turned against him,
they deserted, "slipping back across the border into France."
=2E
As for Oxford's being "never schooled but learned," he meant this in a
literal sense: he had spent very little time as a student in the
universities, having been tutored, for the most part, outside, but
going first to Cambridge and later to Oxford to receive his degrees.
The "noble device" of which he was possessed was the plays and poems
he could turn out; and he had=E2=80=94we are given Mendoza's word for it=E2=
=80=94"a
great following in the country." .
=2E
The discovery that Oxford shares with Alen=C3=A7on the character of
Orlando, clears up the rather ambiguous opening speech which Orlando
makes. It states both men's complaints. Oxford is speaking to
Elizabeth of himself in the lines,
=2E
=2E . . . call you that keeping for a gentleman of my birth, that
differs not from the stalling of an ox? His horses are bred better;
for besides that they are fair with their feeding, they are taught
their manage. . . . (8-11.)
=2E
He means he is not allowed to consort with his equals at court but is
kept in exile in the country; even Elizabeth's horses have been
trained for the lives they were to lead, while he himself has been
maintained at court and is now thrown upon the world unprepared.
(Compare Sonnet 111, lines 3 and 4.)
=2E
Adam is to Alen=C3=A7on, Simier; to Oxford, Churchyard.
=2E
=2E This is it, Adam, that grieves me; and the spirit of my father,
which I think is within me, begins to mutiny against this servitude. I
will no longer endure it, though yet I know no wise remedy how to
avoid it (20-24.)
=2E
It is amazing the way he combines two such diverse characters and
implies so much. If there were any doubt that he has Elizabeth's
treatment of him in mind, it should be dispelled when Oliver tells
Orlando (I.1.35-6):
=2E
=2E Marry, sir, be better employed, and be naught awhile.
=2E
Orlando tells his brother, who is persecuting him:
=2E
=2E . . . The courtesy of nations allows you my better. . . but the
same tradition takes not away my blood. . . . (45-8),
=2E
adding again,
=2E
=2E The spirit of my father grows strong in me, and I will no longer
endure it; therefore allow me such exercises as may become a
gentleman, or give me the poor allottery my father left me by
testament. . . . (68-9.)
=2E
There is a definite allusion here not only to the Earl's ancestral
(Norman) spirit but to his rightful inheritance, Havering of the
Bowre, which Elizabeth had been inexcusably withholding, to say
nothing of the Forest of Essex, and probably to the estates in the
hands of the Court of Wards as well.
=2E
Oxford is also at times the "old duke" whose "banishment" Charles
speaks of (I. 1.98), remarking,
=2E
=2E . . . three or four loving lords have put themselves into
voluntary exile with him. . . . They say he is already in the forest
of Arden, and a many merry men with him. . . . They say many young
gentlemen flock to him every day and fleet the time carelessly, as
they did in the golden world. (99-117.)
=2E
This was the forest of Ardennes and also the forest of Arden, which
latter formed part of Lord Oxford's estate in Warwickshire on the
Avon. (It is of passing interest that, in Book XLII of Orlando
Furioso, Rinaldo encounters the terrible serpent, jealousy, in the
Forest of Arden.)
=2E
The wrestling-match, with which Oliver arranges for Charles to put an
end to Orlando, symbolizes the recent contest in which Charles Arundel
had so viciously attacked Oxford. Like Charles the Wrestler he could
have said,
=2E
=2E I wrestle for my credit. . . it is a thing of his own search and
altogether against my will. (124-33.)
=2E
The Howards and perhaps others stand for Oliver here.
=2E
The historical prototype of the Wrestler would seem to be Alexander
Farnese, Duke of Parma, and Orlando's victory in the match is
Alen=C3=A7on's victory at Cambrai.
=2E
Bidding Orlando good luck in the contest, Rosalind says:
=2E
=2E Now, Hercules, be thy speed, young man! (I.2.208.)
=2E
Not only was Alen=C3=A7on's name Hercule-Fran=C3=A7ois de Valois, but he was=

also called Monsieur, both in France and England. And this explains
the rather awkward form of address in the two girls' speeches to him
(244-7):
=2E
=2E Rosalind (giving him a chain from her neck). Gentleman, wear this
for me... .
=2E Celia. . . . Fare you well, fair gentleman.
=2E
Rosalind telling Orlando,
=2E
=2E The little strength that I have, I would it were with you (I.
2.192),
=2E
is Elizabeth speaking to Alen=C3=A7on on his departure; and the chain she
gives him is "la belle jarti=C3=A8re."
=2E
When the Queen had paid her celebrated visit to the Pelican, Drake's
ship, in 1581, she was accompanied by Marchaumont, to whom she was
exceedingly partial. As she was crossing the gangway, one of her
purple and gold garters came off and was dragged by her skirts. The
alert Frenchman retrieved it, laughingly refusing to give it up until
she assured him that it was the only means she had of fastening her
stocking and promised to return it to him as soon as they reached
Westminster. She made no ceremony about putting it on then and there
in his presence. The next day M. de Mery was dispatched to Alen=C3=A7on,
bearing a love-letter from Elizabeth, together with "la belle
jarti=C3=A8re" as a souvenir from Marchaumont. Upon winning the victory at
Cambrai, Alen=C3=A7on wrote the Queen that "la belle jarti=C3=A8re" was the
cause of all his good fortune and vowed he would never surrender it so
long as he lived.
=2E
The dramatist, unable to be too realistic, made the chain do for the
garter. Celia refers to the "chain you once wore" (III.2.182), and
Rosalind changes color; then Celia speaks of Orlando's "little beard,"
which certainly describes the sparse growth shown in the Duke's
portrait. Oxford's, too, was quite small, for that matter.
=2E
Before leaving the subject of Drake's ship, the Pelican, which was
afterwards renamed the Golden Hind, in honor of Sir Christopher
Hatton's crest, Hatton having been one of the largest investors in
Drake's famous voyage, it is well to mention the use of the word
"monster" (I.2.22), which was fashionable in the early 1580's. The
great explorers of the day usually brought back with them strange-
looking men or animals from some savage land they had visited, and
people found amusement in going to see these creatures, which they
called "monsters"; the adjective "monstrous" became common also at
this time.
=2E
Rosalind and Celia are engaged in a highly symbolic dialogue (1.2)=E2=80=94i=
n
which Celia's observation regarding Fortune,
=2E
=2E . . . those that she makes fair she scarce makes honest (37),
=2E
is a cut Oxford was able to direct at more women than Elizabeth=E2=80=94when=

Touchstone enters; and presently he and Celia have a trenchant passage
(86-90):
=2E
=2E Touchstone. The more pity, that fools may not speak wisely what
wise men do foolishly.
=2E Celia. By my troth, thou sayest true; for since the little wit
that fools have was silenced, the little foolery that wise men have
makes a great show.
=2E
Because Elizabeth's "allowed fool" spoke wisely what she and others
were doing foolishly, the "little wit" that he had "was silenced."
Oxford tells her she may now console herself with her wise men's
foolery, faute de mieux.
=2E
Touchstone begins (106),
=2E
=2E Nay, if I keep my rank,=E2=80=94
=2E
But Rosalind cuts him off with a pun; and we are left with the
information that this Clown, who "hath been a courtier" (V.4.42), was
a nobleman as well. All this ties in with Sonnets 110 and 111:
=2E
=2E Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there
=2E And made myself a motley to the view;
=2E
and
=2E
=2E Thence comes it that my name receives a brand,
=2E And almost thence my nature is subdu'd
=2E To what it works in, like the dyer's hand.
=2E
Monsieur Le Beau is, apparently, a composite of de Bex and
Marchaumont, Count de Beaumont, the one Alen=C3=A7on's secretary, who wrote
voluminous, gossipy letters, and the other his chief agent, a great
favorite with the Queen.
=2E
=2E Celia. Here comes Monsieur Le Beau.
=2E Rosalind. With his mouth full of news.
=2E . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
=2E Celia. Bonjour, Monsieur Le Beau; what's the news? (I.2.90-97.)
=2E
Presently Le Beau says:
=2E
=2E There comes an old man and his three sons=E2=80=94
=2E Celia. I could match this beginning with an old tale. (117-19.)
=2E
This is a pointed allusion to the Middle English tale of Gamelyn, upon
which part of the As You Like It story is based, and which begins with
almost these same words."
=2E
Le Beau continues:
=2E
=2E Three proper young men, of excellent growth and presence=E2=80=94
=2E
and Rosalind puns with a legal phrase:
=2E
=2E With bills on their necks. 'Be it known unto all men by these
presents.' (I.2.120-3.)
=2E
=2E Lord Chief Justice Campbell wrote, in 1859:
=2E
=2E In Elizabeth's reign deeds were in the Latin tongue; and all
deeds poll, and many other law papers, began with the words, NOVERINT
universi per presentes=E2=80=94"Be it known to all men by these presents,
etc." . . . In Act II, Sc. 1, there are illustrations which would
present themselves rather to the mind of one initiated in legal
proceedings, than of one who had been brought up as an apprentice to a
glover, or an assistant to a butcher or a woolstapler:=E2=80=94for instance,=

when it is said of the poor wounded deer, weeping in the stream=E2=80=94
=2E
=2E . . . thou mak'st a testament
=2E As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more
=2E To that which hath too much. (II.1.47-9.)
=2E
He adds that "in Act III, Sc. 1, a deep technical knowledge is
displayed" in Duke Frederick's words:
=2E
=2E Make an extent upon his house and lands (17),
=2E
pointing out that this refers to "an extendi facias applying to house
and lands, as a fieri facias would apply to goods and chattels, or a
capias ad satisfaciendum to the person." Lord Campbell further
observes that the dramatist also "gives us the true legal meaning of
the word 'attorney,' viz., representative or deputy. . ." in the
following passage (IV.1.87-93): .
=2E
=2E Rosalind. Well, in her person I say I will not have you.
=2E Orlando. Then in mine own person I die.
=2E Rosalind. No, faith, die by attorney. The poor world is almost six
thousand years old, and in all this time there was not any man died in
his own person, videlicat, in a love cause. 6
=2E
Duke Frederick seems to stand for a combination of Leicester and
Hatton, both of whom strongly opposed Alen=C3=A7on and, as has been seen,
undoubtedly conspired to prolong Oxford's banishment. It seems that
Oxford may have suspected Burghley too of preferring to keep him away
from the court, in the belief that he might be more faithful to Anne.
If so, we have an explanation of his appealing to Hatton; and thus he
also is included in the character of Duke Frederick. Certainly he is
Celia's father=E2=80=94
=2E
=2E But yet indeed the smaller is his daughter (I.2.271)=E2=80=94
=2E
and "the smaller" of two women characters invariably represents "the
sweet little Countess of Oxford." Duke Frederick's anger with Rosalind
is of course the opposition of Leicester et al. to Elizabeth's
attitude toward Alen=C3=A7on.
=2E
Rosalind's comment apropos of Orlando,
=2E
=2E The duke my father loved his father dearly (I.3.29),
=2E
has reference to the amity existing between Henry VIII and Alen=C3=A7on's
grandfather, Francis I, who met him on the Field of the Cloth of Gold.
And when, in banishing Rosalind, Frederick says (I.3.57),
=2E
=2E Thou art thy father's daughter, there's enough,
=2E
the double reference is to Leicester's current hatred of everything
French and the fact that Elizabeth's mother, Anne Boleyn, was brought
up in the French court.
=2E
Some reports have it that Elizabeth was above the average in height,
others say not. Rosalind remarks that she is "more than common
tall" (114.) Part of her speech here belongs, however, to a later
period when the Fair Youth played the part of "the fair youth,"
Rosalind, disguised as Ganymede.
=2E
Act II is primed with allusions to Lord Oxford. In Duke Senior's
opening speech he says:
=2E
=2E Are not these woods
=2E More free from peril than the envious court?
=2E . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .=
. .
=2E "This is no flattery: these are counsellors
=2E That feelingly persuade me what I am."
=2E Sweet are the uses of adversity. . . .
=2E
The Earl himself was finding this true.
=2E
We have previously quoted from The Begger's Ape, a contemporary poem
in which Oxford, allegorized as "the Oxe," praises the advantages of
life in the forest away from the envious court. An additional excerpt
(in line with Sonnets 25, 124, and 125) corroborates the
identification:
=2E
=2E "Alas, (quoth th' Oxe) how vulgar is affection
=2E "In vainely seeking after fond promotion,
=2E "As well th' ignoble as the Noble blood
=2E "Deeme vading pompe the happie mans chiefe good.
=2E "Yet view the Court and marke the misery
=2E "Of those that swim in Court felicitie,
=2E "Whose wretched steps in Princes Courts attends
=2E "His slavish will on others wills depends."
=2E
The Duke and "the melancholy Jaques," who are both the dramatist
himself, take the same attitude about the "poor dappled fools," the
denizens of the forest who are victimized. Jaques speaks precisely as
Timon did (55-7), and the whole passage between Duke Senior and the
First Lord is highly significant, especially the following:
=2E
=2E Duke Senior. But what said Jaques?
=2E Did he not moralize the spectacle?
=2E First Lord. O yes, into a thousand similes.
=2E First, for his weeping into the needless stream,
=2E . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .=
. .
=2E . . . . . . then, being there alone,
=2E Left and abandon'd of his velvet friends;
=2E " 'Tis right," quoth he; "thus misery doth part
=2E The flux of company": anon, a careless herd,
=2E Full of the pasture, jumps along by him
=2E And never stays to greet him: "Ay," quoth Jaques,
=2E "Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens;
=2E 'Tis just the fashion; wherefore do you look
=2E Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there?"
=2E . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .=
. .
=2E Duke Senior. And did you leave him in this contemplation
=2E Second Lord. We did, my lord, weeping and commenting
=2E Upon the sobbing deer.
=2E Duke Senior. Show me the place.
=2E I love to cope him in these sullen fits,
=2E For then he's full of matter. (II.1.43-68.)
=2E
Jaques is the melancholy or reflective side of the poet, "moralizing"
the scene in the forest just as he does every "spectacle" of the times
in the plays, and identifying himself with the characters. He is
Elizabeth's "deer"=E2=80=94or dear=E2=80=94"weeping" at the sight of the oth=
er
"sobbing deer," who is also abandoned by his "velvet friends."
Momentarily the Duke seems to stand for the Queen herself, who liked
so much to hear Oxford's "moralizing" of all subjects that she gave
him more license than she ever gave anyone else, not even excepting
Leicester.
=2E
The ensuing scene is also richly allusive. Historically Adam
represents Simier, who loaned Alen=C3=A7on all the money he possessed, as
Adam loaned all his to his young master. But his words are
Churchyard's (who was old, having been born in 1520) to Oxford:
=2E
=2E Know you not, master, to some kind of men
=2E Their graces serve them but as enemies?
=2E No more do yours: your virtues, gentle master,
=2E Are sanctified and holy traitors to you.
=2E O, what a world is this, when what is comely
=2E Envenoms him that bears it! (II.3.10-15.)
=2E
Here we have an important statement. Oxford knows his genius is God-
given, an exceptional attribute; but it is an enemy to him and creates
trouble. This shows that persons in high places resented his plays, as
we know that Burghley did, to say nothing of Leicester and Hatton, and
were inimical to him, because of them. Churchyard could well have
spoken thus to the Earl.
=2E
Adam's account of Oliver's hatred of his brother and of his intention
to make away with him by burning
=2E
=2E the lodging where you use to lie,
=2E And you within it (II.3.23-4),
=2E
recalls the murder of Darnley; for the house in which he was
recuperating from illness was blown up by gunpowder and his and his
servant's bodies hurled into the yard. Many of Oxford's plays allude
to the various aspects of Mary Stuart's tragic life, now moving along
toward its terrible d=C3=A9nouement.
=2E
Adam's statement that he was "now almost fourscore" (11.3.71) would
have been true of Churchyard in 1598, when he was seventy-eight.
Whether he was in service to the Sixteenth Earl at the age of
seventeen we do not know.
=2E
Scene 4 of this Act is as fully primed with allusion as the preceding
one, this time giving us the jester side of Oxford, in Touchstone, and
the poet=E2=80=94or shepherd=E2=80=94in Corin. The Corin-Silvius-Phebe part =
belongs to
the '90's, by which time it can be said of the shepherd, Corin:
=2E
=2E Though in thy youth thou wast as true a lover
=2E As ever sigh'd upon a midnight pillow:
=2E But if thy love were ever like to mine=E2=80=94
=2E And sure 1 think did never man love so=E2=80=94
=2E How many actions most ridiculous
=2E Hast thou been drawn to by thy fantasy? (II.4.25-30.)
=2E
Touchstone says that "this shepherd's passion" (which also means "this
poet's verse") "grows something stale with me." (58-60.) By 1589-90,
Touchstone-Corin-Oxford had become disillusioned with shepherds'
passions in both senses of the term. When Touchstone and Corin leave,
"if not with bag and baggage, yet with scrip and scrippage" (i.e., the
plays and poems), Celia says:
=2E
=2E Didst thou hear these verses?
=2E Rosalind. O, yes, I heard them all, and more too; for some of them
had more feet than the verses would bear.
=2E Celia. That's no matter: the feet might bear the verses.
=2E Rosalind. Ay, but the feet were lame, and could not bear
themselves without the verse, and therefore stood lamely in the verse.
(III.2.163-72.)
=2E
This is good rich Elizabethan punning on the "lame feet" which have to
bear Vere (both Veres, or "verses," Touchstone and Carin) since the
duel with Knyvet, though it is ostensibly the poet's metre which
Rosalind criticizes.
=2E
We are now introduced to the irresistible Jaques. Probably nowhere
except in Hamlet are we given a more vivid and sustained portrait of
the Earl of Oxford in his early thirties than in the remainder of Act
II.
-----------------------------------
Art Neuendorffer