natus,' but is more vigorous and more energetic; the two rich noblemen Torrenti and Gentili, who employ their wealth very differently, are extremely well contrasted, and even Torrenti, although a libertine and a spendthrift, nevertheless has a touch of the poetical in the energetic reckless grandeur with which he indulges in vice; his brother, the unfortunate maritime hero, would no less prove a genuinely poetical character, if it were more fully developed. However, as regards composition, the piece is decidedly inferior to Fortunatus.' It is in fact only a collection of poetical characters brought into all kinds of interesting situations and relations with one another; but these various kinds of threads run along together without coming externally into contact; of a fundamental idea connecting them internally-a design in the texturethere is no trace. At all events I cannot perceive what the story of Torrenti and Gentili has to do with the love affairs of Angelo and Fiametta, Tibaldo, Alphonsina, etc., nay, even the latter stand in no kind of connection with one another. The same may be said of Dekker's 'Honest Whore,' printed in 1604,* a piece which, according to Henslowe's 'Diary' (p. 232), he wrote in the same year in which it was printed in conjunction with Middleton.† Here again we meet with a quantity of heterogeneous subjects, the separate scenes and characters are in general rather successful, but there is no trace of an internal unity, and even the external concatenation is but very loose and superficial. And yet the piece is of a somewhat different stamp, in so far as it already approaches the modern spirit, which proceeded from Ben Jonson and his school. Dekker appears subsequently to have devoted himself more and more to this tendency; even the second part of The Honest Whore' (1608) shows only but very slight differences from the manner in which the followers of Ben Jonson comprehended dramatic art and life. * Reprinted in Dodsley, l.c, iii. 221 ff. Middleton, in my opinion, probably had but a very small hand in it; the piece at least bears the stamp of Dekker's style. However, A. Dyce has given both portions of the piece in his edition of Middleton's works (iii. 1 ff.) In Dodsley, iii. 329 f. Dekker, from the very commencement, seems to have wavered between Greene's and Marlowe's style. The tragedy 'Lust's Dominion or the Lascivious Queen,' which he wrote in conjunction with Day and Haughton in the year 1600,* was long considered to be a work of Marlowe's, and in fact shows great affinity to him both in spirit and in style. But Marlowe, as remarked, in many respects already indicates the new aspirations and exertions made in the spirit of modern times. Those of Shakspeare's contemporaries who are more closely allied to him, must therefore have been more readily affected and carried away by the more recent tendency; their number may have included, among others, Day and Haughton. * Compare Chalmers in Dodsley, ii. 311. Collier, Hist., iii. 96. Henslowe's' Diary,' 165. It first appeared in print in 1657, and is reprinted in the abovementioned edition of Marlowe's works, part iii. CHAPTER II. TRANSITIONS TO THE BEN-JONSON SCHOOL. G. Chapman. Th. Middleton and Rowley. J. Marston and J. Webster. AMONG the earlier and more distinguished poets George Chapman must be especially mentioned as Marlowe's successor, by the side of Chettle. He was somewhat older than Shakspeare (born in 1557, d. 1634), had studied at Oxford, which however he left in 1576 or 1578 without having taken a degree, and was noted for his moderation and strict morality. In Freeman's epigrams (1614) high praise is given to his originality, his unaffected style and the gentle stroke of his 'inambitious pen,' in which he is said to have closely resembled the grace of the comic Muse of the ancients. Meres, as early as 1598, enumerates him among the best English 'tragic poets;' Henslowe mentions one of his pieces in 1595, and accordingly he must have begun to write almost contemporaneously with Shakspeare, Heywood and Dekker.* And indeed it was probably tragedy that especially suited his talent and his earnest and strict disposition. This is evident from his two best pieces: The Conspiracy of the Duke of Byron,' and The Tragedie of the Duke of Byron,' of which one, at least, existed as early as 1602 and was printed in 1609. However both of these, and still more so his 'Bussy d'Ambois,' manifest a strong inclination to Marlowe's conception of the tragic; except that in the first named piece it more closely resembles the medieval romantic spirit of the old English drama, the second piece, however, already appears affected by the more recent spirit of Ben Jonson and his School. In those earlier works of his also, there is indeed *See G. Chapman: The Iliad of Homer, edited by the Rev. R. Hooper. London, 1865, vol. i. p. iii. f. + When Mézières (Contemporains et successeurs de Shakspeare, p. likewise a predominance of that striving after what is grand, mighty and extraordinary, but still it is checked by the laws of beauty and harmony, and therefore only testifies to the great and powerful mind of the poet. In 'Bussy d'Ambois,' on the other hand, which was printed in 1607,* this striving is already exaggerated beyond all measure and bounds; power degenerates into ferocity and atrocity, severity into cruelty, evil into devilry, and the tragic into the horrible. Moreover, the action is surrounded by a quantity of superfluous additions, which in themselves are extremely simple, nay, even poor; for the piece turns merely upon the amours between d'Ambois and the Countess of Montsurry, which are as rapidly commenced as discovered by the husband of the Countess, and destroyed by the death of the guilty parties. As regards the composition, Chapman, in fact, does not rise above Marlowe's standpoint. In like manner the language, especially again in Bussy d'Ambois,' has much empty pomposity and rhetorical pathos, only rarely interrupted by tones of genuine feeling and passion; and as regards characterisation, there is no dearth of those strange combinations, and sudden unmotived turns, or rather transformations of the characters, which Marlowe is fond of employing as levers to the action. (For instance, the confessor of the countess 213 f. 384) places him completely on Ben Jonson's side, and thinks that Chapman, like Jonson, followed the models of the ancients, and that he endeavoured to raise the classic drama and the antique tendency, he has allowed himself to be deceived by a certain similarity between Chapman's and Jonson's diction, and the former's delight in long, reflecting discourses. As regards his composition, which is after all the main point, we do not, in his tragedies, meet with any resemblance to Ben Jonson and the classical school, and only at a later period, in his comedies, does this tendency become distinctly apparent. F. Bodenstedt, in his excellent essay, Chapman in seinem Verhältniss zu Shakspeare, Jahrbuch der Deutsch. Shaks.-Gesell. 1865, p. 304, very justly remarks that, all that which is eminent in his dramas must be essentially attributed to his great epic talent; that his descriptions are excellent, and his narratives have a vivid appearance of reality, that he abounds in beautiful maxims and fine remarks, but that he is entirely wanting in all dramatic elasticity as well as in the gift of allowing characters to develop before the eyes of the spectator. * Reprinted in Old Plays, being a Continuation, etc., iii. 235 f. speaks, with the perfect seriousness of conviction, about religion and Christian virtue, but nevertheless ́ plays the part of a pimp, acts as an exorcist, is intimately acquainted with Behemoth, the prince of Darkness, and finally commits the absurdity of playing the ghost throughout the whole of the fifth act, without accomplishing anything. And Monsieur, brother of the King of France, suddenly changes from being a friend and admirer of d'Ambois' chivalrous and heroic greatness, into his most bitter opponent and a devilish wretch.)* Chapman, in his comedies (at all events in those written after 1605) enters more decidedly into the Jonsonian conception of dramatic poetry. In the prologue to his 'All Fools' (1605),† he indeed complains: "Yet merely comical and harmless jests (Though ne'er so witty) be esteemed but toys, and in the piece itself he makes his age the reproach that it finds pleasure only in mockery and slander. Chapman sets himself up against this, but involuntarily falls into the same error. His All Fools' is intended to represent the whole world in the form of a great madhouse; but his madmen are more like immoral, coarse fellows who look upon honesty as stupidity, falsehood and deception as * Alphonsus, Emperor of Germany, doubtless one of Chapman's later works-which was probably not published before 1622 (first printed in 1654), and recently re-edited by K. Elze: G. Chapman's Tragedy of Alphonsus, Emperor of Germany, edited with an Introduction and Notes, etc., Leipzig, 1867-is indeed interesting on account of the remarkable knowledge of the German language, German habits. customs, and state institutions, but otherwise an extremely weak production, not an historical drama, but one of those bloody, horrible tragedies of revenge, which Kyd's Jeronimo and Marlowe's Jew of Malta seem to have called forth by the dozen. It is written in the spirit and style of the new School, whose main object was to rivet the attention of the spectators by a complicated, well or ill devised intrigue. It is sufficiently characterised by the first scene alone, where Alphonsus causes his learned secretary to explain to him the principles of the Machiavellistic policy (which is taken almost word for word from the Principe); these he notes down like a schoolboy, but directly afterwards not only tears the paper to pieces but poisons his instructor, so that no living person should know of his plans and objects; and yet he had not even divulged them to his secretary. In Dodsley, l.c., iv. 109 ff. |