Thomas MIDDLETON, The Collected Works. General

Transcription

1 Sophie CHIARI Moreana Vol. 47, Thomas MIDDLETON, The Collected Works. General Editors: Gary Taylor and John Lavagnino. Associated General Editors: Macd. P. Jackson, John Jowett, Valerie Wayne, and Adrian Weiss. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007, p ISNB: and Thomas Middleton and Early Textual Culture. A Companion to the Collected Works, General Editors: Gary Taylor and John Lavagnino. Associate General Editors: Macd. P. Jackson, John Jowett, Valerie Wayne, and Adrian Weiss, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007, p ISNB: REVIEWED BY Sophie Chiari LERMA-Université de Provence Gary Taylor is well known as the General Editor with Stanley Wells of the Oxford edition of Shakespeare s Complete Works (1986) 1, and as the author of Reinventing Shakespeare (1989) 2, among many other publications. As to John Lavagnino, an expert in digital humanities, he had already shown his expertise in the field of electronic textual editing. Their collaboration on the Oxford edition of Thomas Middleton s Collective Work is something of a tour de force, which aims at providing authoritative texts and up-to-date introductions and annotations, and at rehabilitating an author 1 William Shakespeare, The Complete Works, Edited by Stanley Wells and Gary Taylor, Oxford: Oxford U. P., (1988), Gary Taylor, Reinventing Shakespeare: A Cultural History from the Restoration to the Present, Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1991.

2 278 Moreana Vol. 47, Sophie CHIARI generally neglected in university curricula. The Internet site of Oxford University Press describes it as a self-consciously federal edition, which applies contemporary theories about the nature of literature and the history of the book to editorial practice. One cannot disagree, although one can wonder what a federal edition might be 3. Our other Shakespeare, as Gary Taylor calls Thomas Middleton, needs to be reconsidered by today s critics, and the present edition aims at showing that he excelled in many different genres, contrary to the more limited William Shakespeare. A debate is open. No wonder that a heated argument recently appeared in the Times Literary Supplement, led by Brian Vickers who notably disagrees with Taylor s editorial methods, arguing that Macbeth (p in The Collected Works), contrary to what Taylor asserts, is solely from 4 Shakespeare s hand. Exit Thomas Middleton. This Jacobean playwright is mostly remembered today as a collaborative genius. We are used to associating his name with that of William Rowley, and we tend to forget the illustrious others. Indeed, Thomas Middleton collaborated with William Shakespeare (one thinks of The Life of Timon of Athens, whose short introduction by Sharon O Dair might have been more detailed), Thomas Dekker (in the famous The Roaring Girl, inspired by the real story of Mary Frith, a notorious pickpocket), John Ford (The Spanish Gipsy, also written in collaboration with Thomas Dekker and Rowley), or John Webster (Anything for a Quiet Life), to name but a few. He displayed his talent in histories, comedies, tragedies and tragic-comedies altogether. The 3 See the Internet site: LiteratureEnglish/Drama/BritishIrish/?view=usa&ci= Brian Vickers, Disintegrated. Did Thomas Middleton really adapt Macbeth? in TLS n 5591, May 28, 2010, Commentary, p

3 Sophie CHIARI Moreana Vol. 47, Index of titles by genre adds civic pageantry, masques, and pamphlets and poems to the list. Eclectic might be the best word to describe the man and his works. This all-encompassing volume, starting with a truly impressive list of contributors (seventy-five scholars from a dozen countries contributed to the Oxford Middleton), and ending with due acknowledgements, includes a thought-provoking critical apparatus as well as numerous illustrations (maybe because Middleton s plays were more often illustrated than those of any Renaissance playwright, p. 20). It covers 25 years of writing, or poetry ( ), and should be ideally read in parallel with Thomas Middleton and Early Modern Textual Culture, the Companion of the Collected Works. Indeed, as each work is introduced in a separate way, readers are constantly and usefully referred to the corresponding articles in the Companion. This edition includes modernized works written by Middleton alone, by Middleton and his collaborators and, more surprisingly perhaps, works which were to be adapted by Middleton and descriptions of texts which, unfortunately, have not survived. At the end of the volume (p. 1907), Thomas Cogswell s illuminating account of Middleton s lost political prose ( ) reveals that Middleton had produced two manuscripts, Annales and Farrago, which, because they were not intended for publication, must have allowed their author a relative freedom to discuss the political and religious issues of his time. What probably constitutes the added value of the edition, however, is the importance given to a previously neglected body of occasional work, such as poems (see in particular the Occasional Poems, , whose original source is reproduced p ), civic entertainments (The Triumphs of Honour and Industry edited by David

4 280 Moreana Vol. 47, Sophie CHIARI M. Bergeron, is a good case in point), triumphs, masques, moral tales (The Nightingale and the Ant and Father Hubburd s Tales, for instance, edited by Adrian Weiss) or satirical pamphlets such as Microcynicon: Six Snarling Satires (edited by Wendy Wall), introducing the readers to a degenerate universe and burned immediately after its publication, in As a whole, The Collected Works has been carefully devised by its editors, and is reader-friendly in spite of its length. In a first practical section entitled How to use this book, Gary Taylor provides his readers with valuable Ariadne s threads about the editorial choices which have been made and problems related to punctuation, spelling, stage directions or typography. Taylor then offers an intriguing discussion of Middleton s Lives and Afterlives. A striking comparison with Hogarth, dating back to 1840, helps us realize how much Middleton, while seeking to achieve popularity, was at the same time making people feel uncomfortable, just like Hogarth. Middleton disturbed his audience. He was born in 1580, the only son of William Middleton and Anne Snowe. He entered the grammar school where he studied classics, was taught Latin, learned copia and imitation. Readers will not be surprised, thus, to find a little known translation in The Collected Works, namely Andreas Loeaechius, translated and adapted by Middleton, under the title Sir Robert Sherley: his Royall Entertainement in Cracovia, a 1609 pamphlet edited and annotated by Jerzy Limon and Daniel J. Vitkus. In 1598, Middleton, as a rather poor student, matriculated at Queen s College, Oxford, and soon experienced financial difficulties. We learn that by the summer of 1600, Middleton had sold, for an Oxford education, the entire landed inheritance his mother had fought so many years to preserve (p. 35), but a few months later, he

5 Sophie CHIARI Moreana Vol. 47, lost Oxford. He soon became a stagewright, a profession despised by most people. By the end of 1603, his mother was dead. He married Mistress Marbeck, known as Mary, and went to live in the countryside, in Newington. He began writing comedies such as The Phoenix, royal entertainments, and pamphlets, which were selling quite well. Taylor goes on describing the very active life of a man who was involved in the publication of some of his texts, and who had an extraordinarily active sexual imagination (p. 47). This last quote, though, might have needed further comment, for it seems to apply to Marlowe, Shakespeare, Nashe, and many others of his predecessors. The engraved portrait of Middleton published by Humphrey Moseley in 1655 (p. 48) shows us a fashionable darkfaced man, much unlike Shakespeare. Gary Taylor is keen to underline the differences between the bard and his successor, much to the benefit of the latter. Still, from time to time, light similarities are stressed, as in the introduction of Women, Beware Women, where John Jowett takes King Lear (a play in which the plots reinforce each other ) as his final reference. An important sub-part is then devoted to Middleton s reputation. Working freelance, he did not think much of his posterity, and he has long been considered to be the author of A Game at Chess, while his other works were eclipsed. His achievement began to be acknowledged in the mid-eighteenth century, thanks to Alexander Dyce, who published his works. Now, what if Middleton s plays had been less bawdy? According to Taylor, Middleton s crude eroticism is one of the reasons why his theatrical afterlife has never been comparable to that of Shakespeare. That is eminently debatable, of course. A more plausible explanation for Shakespeare s achievement of canonical supremacy might be that the First Folio appeared within a decade of his death whereas

6 282 Moreana Vol. 47, Sophie CHIARI Middleton s plays were not collected until over a century after his reputation as a playwright had waned. Thanks to Paul. S. Seaver, the edition also offers a snapshot of Middleton s London in an article which seems particularly relevant when one realizes that, if there was something achieved by Middleton and not by Shakespeare, it was the writing of city comedies. Seaver s well-documented article recapitulates all available factual data on the city, without really linking them to Middleton s life, which proves rather frustrating for the reader. Scott McMillin then proposes a description of Middleton s theatres, alluding to the children s companies, public and private theatres, and insisting on St Paul s neighborhood, stocked with lawyers, and probably one of Middleton s favorite places. McMillin also deals with practical problems linked to the staging of Middleton s plays, emphasizing the importance of the actor s costume. After a 90-page-long introduction, readers discover a series of heterogeneous texts, focused on money, sexuality, power and madness. The first of these is a play edited by Lawrence Danson and Ivo Kamps, The Phoenix, which sets the tone of the anthology. Adultery, Incest, rampant theft, treason, bribery, social leveling, and attempted murder (p. 93): here are indeed some of the recurring subjects favored by Middleton. One will also appreciate the specific efforts made for A Game at Chess, a play, Gary Taylor explains, that made literary history, dramatizes a pivotal period of English, and indeed European, history: the major political and foreign policy crises of (p. 1773). This complicated play, in which meaning is unstable and plural (even the word chess does not only refer to the game, but also to layers or tiers or rows ), is presented here in its early as well as in its later form. This will

7 Sophie CHIARI Moreana Vol. 47, undoubtedly give food for thought and produce more comparative studies on a play first staged in There are so many things to be written on Middleton and his world(s) that of course, there is always something missing in spite of the impressive scholarship of the volume. One would have liked to be allowed to read some of the very sources used by Middleton in his works (part of Bartholomew Young s translation of Stefano Guazzo s Civil Conversation, for instance, alluded to in the introduction of No Wit / Help Like a Woman s; Or, the Almanac, p. 781). That is of course an unrealistic desire, since another volume would not suffice to cover all of Middleton s possible textual sources. One thinks here of the eight volumes of the Narrative and Dramatic sources of Shakespeare, edited by Geoffrey Bullough ( ). All in all therefore, this edition, a collaborative work in itself which logically privileges text over theory, proves to be an indispensable tool for all Renaissance scholars. That may be viewed as a posthumous victory for Middleton who, in spite of his successes, was always overshadowed by the Bard. As an anecdote, his last major dramatic work, the official pageant to celebrate the coronation of Charles I, was never performed. The new king cancelled it one year before Middleton s death. It seems therefore that Gary Taylor and John Lavagnino have done him justice. The whole edition is engaging, and while (or because) it raises some controversial issues related to Middleton s relationship to the Shakespeare canon, none can deny that it makes a substantial contribution to the study of early modern textual culture. As previously noted, this edition s comprehensive scholarly Companion (whose front cover is beautifully illustrated with a detail from The Singing Boys, by Frans Hals) is closely connected to the Works although each volume can be used independently from the other. If

8 284 Moreana Vol. 47, Sophie CHIARI the first volume focuses on texts, the second emphasizes the context of Middleton s career, dealing with the various changes the author had to cope with. After the death of Queen Anne, for instance, the London companies were reorganized, with Prince Charles s Men moving from the Red Bull to the Cockpit (p. 407). Such an event probably influenced Middleton s plays and collaborative alliances, and this is what this volume makes clear. Gary Taylor s Preface focuses on the relationships between literacy and orality, print and manuscript, books and non-books (p. 25), and proceeds to explain that Middleton has been chosen precisely because he represents the full range of textual practices in early modern England (p. 28). The quality of the writing, as well as the authoritative grasp of subject matter, is a strong point of the Companion. This is a book that deserves to be read for the sake of its insights, rather than merely consulted for information. Part I, devoted to the culture of the time, highlights the importance of the individual list-text in early modern texts, and is illustrated by various documents showing lists of taxpayers, baptisms, plays, deceased parishioners, characters, or contents (one is for instance surprised to find a table of contents from John Locke s An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, p. 50). MacDonald P. Jackson brings to his efforts the vexed issue of early modern authorship, and partly accounts for the editorial decisions taken about what should belong to the Collected Works, and what should not. Middleton, Music and Dance is the subject of another lengthy section by Gary Taylor and Andrew J. Sabol, assisted by John Jowett and Lizz Ketterer. While readers are made aware of Renaissance notation systems, they also come to realize that even though jigs and entr acte performances never or seldom appeared in stage directions, they were part and parcel of the spectacle. Numerous musical copy-

9 Sophie CHIARI Moreana Vol. 47, texts are commented upon and reproduced, and this will prove valuable for future performances seeking to recapture the magic of Middleton s works. In another essay, Richard Burth dwells on censorship and how it operated in Middleton s time, and editing and censorship overlapped, producing revisions and regulations which excluded certain types of literary strategies. Printing in Middleton s age is not forgotten and is discussed in a stimulating chapter written by Adrian Weiss, an expert in typographical evidence in regard to various fundamental aspects of the book production process in early modern England. Readers are offered concise explanations on the three major items of the compositor s printing equipment, namely the type-cases, the frame, and the composing stick. In the next article on visual texts, much attention has been paid to the quality of the engraved plates reproduced here, and it helps us a lot to understand the work of the craftsmen and the importance that Middleton himself seems to have given to the decorative quality of some of his books. As to Cyndia Susan Clegg, she tackles the vast topic of the London book trade ( ), and she does an excellent job of questioning accepted arguments. While early modern playwrights have been presumed innocent of any participation in the printing of their works, Clegg claims that [t]he associations of Middleton with particular publishers and printers [ ] points to significant author involvement in publishing an involvement which is borne out by the texts themselves (p. 251). Maureen Bell then contributes to this extensive first part with a suggestive glimpse at the posthumous publication of Middleton s plays in an essay entitled Booksellers without an Author, She proceeds to note the boom in the publication of the plays between 1652 and 1657, thanks to the considerable work of Moseley. In the 1660s however, things changed when the theatres were

10 286 Moreana Vol. 47, Sophie CHIARI reopened, and new plays had to be proposed. Meanwhile, Bell explains, the rights to the old repertoires were fiercely contested (p. 275). The last essay of this first part is devoted to Middleton s early readers, and one regrets here that readers marginal notes cannot be found in the volume elsewhere so beautifully illustrated (even though color is lacking). Part II examines the author in detail, and Gary Taylor s introduction on the Middleton canon echoes MacDonald P. Jackson s essay. One would have expected this part to come sooner in the Companion, as a means to justify the editorial choices made in the Works. As Taylor acknowledges that some decisions were arbitrary for lack of evidence, he displays convincing data and discusses the significance of scraps which originated in the Revels Office and which contain precious information about the dates of some of the texts. As to the works excluded from the Works, they are also briefly examined. Plays such as Blurt Master Constable (1602), pamphlets like The Life of a Satyrical Puppy, Called Nim (first published in 1657 and occasionally attributed to Thomas May), or poems such as Pimlico; or Run, Red-Cap (1609), are amongst the texts whose authorship remains uncertain, and whose colloquial forms do not seem to reflect Middleton s linguistic preferences. Moreover, Thomas Middleton and Early Modern Textual Culture gives further information on points already developed in the Collected Works, and proposes several bibliographies of works cited or, occasionally, works consulted, which were lacking in the first volume. Textual notes are added for each text, along with stage directions, lineation notes, and press variants when necessary. Middleton s oeuvre is so varied that, unavoidably, readers feel confused or amazed when faced with so much information on so many texts. Fortunately, a selective topical index concludes this Companion, allowing us to select important

11 Sophie CHIARI Moreana Vol. 47, topics ranging from abridgement to works published posthumously. This rich and multifaceted Companion, like all other Companions, tackles a vast range of material, but it is done in an imaginative way, for Thomas Middleton and Early textual Culture also engages in interesting speculations for further research on all the questions related to Middleton, in absence of hard evidence. This is a brilliant book, weaving together seemingly disparate topics, and which will delight scholars concerned not only with Thomas Middleton, but with early modern studies as a whole. No doubt, too, that it will serve graduate students specializing in the (not only textual) culture of the 16 th and the 17 th centuries. Sophie Chiari chiarisophie@hotmail.com

12 288 Moreana Vol. 47, Read the Gazette s feature article: Where less is more, by Mary Gottschalk, a stimulating paper, which questions Thomas More s very personal translation of The Life of Giovanni Pico. A découvrir dans la Gazette: l article de Mary Gottschalk : «Where less is more», qui dans un style vif et stimulant, remet en cause la traduction très personnelle que fait Thomas More de La Vie de Jean Pic de la Mirandole. * * * The Newsletter / Gazette 23 is published at the same time as your journal Moreana It is available for downloading from the association web site: