Twelth Night can be dated between 1581, the

Transcription

1 Twelft h Night, or what you will Twelth Night can be dated between 1581, the publication of Barnabe Riche s Farewell to Militarie Profession, and 1602, when it was described in performance by John Manningham. Publication Date Twelfth Night was entered in the Stationers Register on 8 November 1623 as one of eighteen plays not previously published: Mr Blounte Isaak Jaggard. Entered for their Copie vnder the hands of Mr Doctor Worral and Mr Cole warden, Mr William Shakspeers Comedyes Histories, and Tragedyes soe manie of the said Copies as are not formerly entered to other men. vizt. Comedyes. The Tempest. The two gentlemen of Verona. Measure for Measure. The Comedy of Errors. As you Like it. All s well that ends well. Twelft night. The winters tale. Histories. The thirde parte of Henry the sixt. Henry the eight. Coriolanus. Timon of Athens. Julius Caesar. Tragedies. Mackbeth. Anthonie & Cleopatra. Cymbeline. It occupies the thirteenth position in the F1 comedies, coming after All s Well that Ends Well and before The Winter s Tale. Performance Dates The notebook of John Manningham, a student of law at the Middle Temple, gives a detailed description of a performance there in 1602 of a play called Twelue night or what you will. Commedy of Errores, or Menechmi in Plautus, but most like and neere to that in Italian called Inganni a good practise in it to make the Steward beleeve his Lady widdowe was in love with him, by counterfeyting a letter as from his Lady in generall termes, telling him what shee liked best in him, and prescribing his gesture in smiling, his apparaile, &c., and then when he came to practise making him beleeue they tooke him to be mad. The diary is in the British Museum and Arlidge presents a photocopy of it. Although Race made suggestions that the nineteenth-century writer, John Payne Collier, may have tampered with some entries in Manningham s handwritten diary, the Arden editors, Lothian & Craik, offer four reasons for finding this particular entry genuine: 1. This passage is consistent in lay-out and presentation with other entries in the diary; 2. The mistake that Olivia is in mourning for a lost husband rather than a brother is easier to make when watching the play; 3. The statement that Gl Inganni was the source is not made elsewhere by Collier (who stated Riche as the main source); 4. Collier printed inscribing his apparell rather than correctly reading in smiling, his apparraile. All editors have accepted the entry as genuine. The King s Men revived the play at Court, under its present title on 6 April 1616, and probably on 2 February 1623 as Malvolio. Feb. 2 At our feast wee had a play called Twelue Night, or what you will, much like the 1

2 Sources Bullough confirms John Manningham s entry that the ultimate source of the play s story is the Italian play Gl Ingannati ( The Deceived Ones ), written and performed in Siena in 1531, first published in Venice in 1537 and often reprinted. It was translated into French as Le sacrifice by Charles Estienne in 1543, republished as Les Abuséz in Most orthodox scholars accept that Shakespeare read the original in Italian. Helen Kaufman argues that two other Italian plays, both by Nicolò Secchi, Gl Inganni ( The Deceived ) (composed c. 1547, published in Florence, 1562) and L interesse ( Interest composed c. 1547, published in Venice 1581), were probably used by the dramatist; in these a woman, dressed as a man, helps another man woo another woman. Bullough identifies only one major source in English: the prose story of Of Apolonius and Silla in Riche his Farewell to Militarie Profession, published in While ultimately adapted from Bandello s 1554 Italian play, Barnaby Riche s narrative is derived from Belleforest s 1579 French translation. In writing Twelfth Night Shakespeare evidently did use Riche s story, for both include details absent from all previous versions. Firstly, the dramatist used four words found in Riche, (coisterell, garragascoynes, pavion and galliarde) which are not used elsewhere in the canon; secondly, the references to dancing in 1.3 seem to draw on Riche s dedicatory epistle; thirdly, the punishment of Malvolio seems to draw on another of Riche s stories ( Of two brethren and their wives ). There was also a Latin version, Laelia, which was produced at Queens College, Cambridge, possibly as early as (the college accounts show the purchase of costumes for the play) and again in 1595 when the Earl of Essex stayed at the college (Moore Smith, xxvi xxviii). Orthodox Date Chambers dates the play , immediately preceding As You Like It (as does the Signet editor). Most commentators date it : Alexander, Lothian & Craik, Warren & Wells and Donno, propose the middle of 1601, Mahood suggests the end of 1601; Wells and Taylor suggest , as does the Riverside edition. Halliday has the slightly earlier dating of Leslie Hotson proposed that the play was written for performance on the twelfth night of Christmas, 6 January 1601, in his full-length study, The First Night of Twelfth Night. Arlidge argues that the play was commissioned for performance on 2 February Wiggins dates this play to Cairncross makes the unusual proposal of Internal Orthodox Evidence Orthodox commentators have found a few topical allusions to support their dating. Two references to the Sophy (the Shah of Persia) ( ; ) are generally accepted as references to the journey of Sir Anthony Shurley to the Persian court; it was first known about in the summer of 1598, and two accounts of his travels (he became a roving ambassador for the Shah) were subsequently published, the first in September 1600, the second late in At Warren and Wells see an allusion ( like an icicle on a Dutchman s beard ) to the Arctic voyage of William Barentz, an account of which was mentioned in the Stationers Register in Further possible allusions from the text concern Will Kemp, a former member of the Lord Chamberlain s Men, who in summer 1601 returned from a continental tour during which he had met Sir Anthony Shirley in Rome. The Clown s comment: I might say element, but the word is overworn ( ) is taken to be an allusion to the triple use of out of [one s] element, as a catch-phrase, in Dekker s Satiromastix, performed in the second half of 1601 by the Lord Chamberlain s Men and the Children of Paul s. The sung dialogue between Sir Toby and the Clown ( ) is closely based on the song Farewel dear loue since thou wilt need be gon, first published in Robert Jones s The First Book of Songes and Ayres in Hood Phillips argues that a celebrated case which went before the Star Chamber in 1602, between Sir Posthumous Hoby and William Eure, involved night-time disturbances and probably inspired the scene between Sir Toby Belch and his friends. Finally, commentators generally agree that Maria s comic image of Malvolio s newly adopted physiognomy he does smile his face 2

3 into more lines than is in the new map with the augmentation of the Indies ( ) alludes to Edward Wright s A Chart of the World on Mercator s Projection, published in Hakluyt s Voyages in 1599 and again, with minor corrections, in 1600; the map has radiating rhumb lines, suggesting the wrinkles around Malvolio s eyes. A different interpretation is offered under Internal Oxfordian Evidence, below. Mahood, however, observes that playwrights often revise their script in rehearsal, and adds: other changes in a play may be made years later and without the playwright s knowledge. Shakespeare s fellow actors presumably saw no harm in adding the odd topical joke to his plays from time to time. Thus if the topical allusions are no more than few, it is possible that they were added at a later stage to an existing text. External Orthodox Evidence Manningham s reference to the Middle Temple performance is the only reliable evidence for the existence of the play by The Arden editors assert there is no reason to believe that this was the first production of the play. They adduce the following arguments: a) Manningham did not mention that the play was new; b) the manuscript shows the word mid, crossed out before the title twelve is written, suggesting he had heard of the title A Midsummer Night s Dream and momentarily confused the titles; c) Manningham records similarities with other plays, suggesting that Twelfth Night had been on the stage long enough for there to have been talk about its sources. None of the above arguments seems strong enough to discount the play as newly composed in February Anthony Arlidge, the Master of Entertainments at the Middle Temple in London, argues that the play was commissioned for performance on 2 February, He points out that there are a large number of legal phrases, correctly used, which show it was intended for an Inn of Court. These include Sir Andrew s proof upon the oaths of judgement and reason (3.2.13) and his knowledge of the distinction between battery and assault as well as the right to strike first in self-defence to prevent a threatened attack ( ): I ll go another way to work with him. I ll have an action of battery against him, if there be any law in Illyria. Though I struck him first, yet it s no matter for that. Secondly, Arlidge notes some references which he calls inn-jokes. John Shurley, who made the journey to Persia cited above and was Treasurer to the Middle Temple in 1602, is twice the object of ridicule, firstly at : Fabian I will not give my part of this sport for a pension of thousands to be paid from the Sophy. The second reference occurs at : Sir Toby They say he has been a fencer to the Sophy. Sir Andrew Pox on t. I ll not meddle with him. Thirdly, Arlidge links Shakespeare with one of the law students, Thomas Green, who completed his studies at the Middle temple in 1602 and moved to Stratford was where he linked to Shakespeare through legal actions concerning the Welcombe Enclosure (Chambers, WS, ii, ). Leslie Hotson researched contemporary records and argued that the play was especially written for performance on 6 January In a memorandum, George Carey as the Lord Chamberlain, Lord Hunsdon, gave instructions: To confer with my Lord Admirall and the Master of the revells for taking order generally with the players to make choyse of [the] play that shalbe best furnished with rich apparell, have greate variety and change of Musicke and daunces, and of a Subiect that may be most pleasing to her Maiestie The occasion was when Queen Elizabeth s guest was Don Virginio Orsini, Duke of Bracciano. According to Hotson, the noble Orsini was lovesick for the unattainable Olivia, identified as Queen Elizabeth. In his letters in Italian, this 3

4 Orsini describes how he sat next to the Queen in the Palace at Whitehall and saw a play performed on 6 January. Hotson describes him as virtuous, noble, of great estate, of fresh and stainless youth. Three arguments against Hotson s claim have been advanced: a) The Lord Chamberlain s memorandum for choosing a suitable play mentions neither title nor author, and it stipulates that it include expensive costumes and a great variety of music and dancing: Twelfth Night is not such a play (Much Ado is said to be a much better candidate). This does not appear to be a very strong argument: both Orsino and Olivia are high ranking personages and would be expected to dress in expensive clothing; there is certainly a lot of music in Twelfth Night and much scope for dancing. b) the announcement of the Duke s impending visit left only eleven days, in the busy Christmas period, to write and rehearse a new play; against this it might be said that the play had been planned since the Duke was expected at some point. The coincidence would only be in the title (which appears to have no relation to the action of the play). c) it is unlikely that the Queen would allow a performance to continue in which she was presented as love-sick for an errand boy or that the visiting Duke would approve the use of his name for the lovesick hero of a comedy. Hotson s proposal has not found general support among scholars, but certainly raises some interesting connections. Oxfordian Date Clark and Ogburn Jr favour ; Holland opts for 1587 (or at least finds evidence of revision then). Hess et al. find late 1600 the likeliest date, but allow that the present play could have been revised from an earlier version. Internal Oxfordian Evidence We return to the new map, with the augmentation of the Indies, suggested as evidence that the play was written in Cairncross, not an Oxfordian but prepared to reconsider historical evidence with an open mind, identified the new map as the Molyneux map or globe of Its forthcoming publication was announced in 1589, and Emery Molyneux engraved his very large and most exact terrestriall globe three years later. The newness of this map was emphasised in Blundeville s Exercises (1594): there are found out divers new places towards the North Pole as in the East and West Indies, which were unknown to Mercator. Wright s 1600 map was based on his projection of Molyneux s 1592 globe; indeed, geographers often designate this cartographic landmark the Wright Molyneux Map. Like the later map which copies it, the globe has the rhumb lines which evoke Maria s unusual simile. Curiously, one of Molyneux s globes stands in the library of the Middle Temple. 1 Cairncross also states that the Clown s sentence But indeed, words are very rascals, since bonds disgraced them ( ), was interpreted by some commentators as a reference to the Privy Council s inhibition against the players in 1600 or 1601 an explanation which he finds unsatisfactory. But is it not obvious that some equivocation in the terminology or interpretation of legal bonds is intended? It suggests rather the situation in the sub-plot of Greene s Looking Glass for London and England (acted March 8, 1592), where a usurer takes advantage of his debtor s failure to comply with the literal conditions of the bond. Such a case seems to be alluded to in Twelfth Night. Greene and Shakespeare might well be alluding to the same case. Such an event would confirm the evidence of the map, and fix the date of Twelfth Night around (Cairncross, 132) Other evidence concerning the acting companies leads Cairncross to conjecture that Twelfth Night was written for performance at the Middle Temple by Pembroke s Men on 6 January Chambers (ES, ii, 128) confirms that pembroke s Men performed at Court at that time but the title of the play was not recorded. Two further reasons support Oxfordian authorship and an earlier date: firstly, the sources were in Italian and/ 4

5 or French, which would have been easy enough for the Italianate earl to read. Secondly, Oxford had studied at Gray s Inn and was therefore in a position to have learned much of the legal knowledge evident in this play. 2 External Oxfordian Evidence There is a record from the archives of Abraham Fleming, one-time secretary to Oxford, and his literary protégé, of Oxford writing a play which follows the plot of Twelfth Night: a pleasant conceit of Vere, earl of Oxford, discontented at the rising of a mean gentleman at the English court, circa 1580 This was mentioned in a list published in 1732 by the antiquarian, Francis Peck, of documents he intended to have printed. Unfortunately, Peck failed to achieve his aim and the document has disappeared. Clark and all the Ogburns base their date on the identification of this pleasant conceit with the first draft of Twelfth Night. So the play is assumed to allude to the contemporary rivalry for Queen Elizabeth s favour between Oxford and his upstart rival, Sir Christopher Hatton, satirised in Malvolio Some are born great and some have greatness thrust upon em ( ). Hatton was a leading Puritan, and Malvolio is termed a Puritan three times within seven lines ( ); Hatton s nickname was Sheep or Mutton, and Malvolio is called a niggardly rascally sheep-biter (2.5.5); Hatton s Latin pen-name was Felix Infortunatus (the happy unfortunate one) and this is reversed The Fortunate Unhappy ( ) in the signature of the prank letter that Malvolio receives. That Hatton was jealous of Oxford has been noted by Alison Weir (289): Hatton, who was prone to expressing his resentment in tears or sulks, deeply resented the favour shown by the Queen towards Oxford [i.e. in 1572] because he had recently apparently been given cause to believe that he himself stood higher in her affection than anyone else. The rivalry between Hatton and Oxford continued over many years. Various identifications have been made between characters in the play and other historical personages. Apart from the clear likeness between Olivia and the Queen, Clark identified Orsino with François, duc d Alençon (a suitor to Elizabeth at the time) and Sir Andrew Aguecheek with Sir Philip Sidney. Anderson (148 50) has noted the striking parallel between the play and the events in 1579 when Alençon sent ahead of himself an envoy called Jean de Simier. Elizabeth was though to have fallen in love with the envoy instead of with the Duke. As Alison Weir observes (318 21): Anyone observing them together might have been forgiven for concluding that she meant to marry him rather than his master. Mallin concurs that Twelfth Night is based on events some twenty years before its [earliest known] performance concerning the Alençon Simier wooing of Elizabeth as well as problems with Puritans. A further identification concerns the role of the Fool. Many commentators have noticed the exceptional licence of the Fool to mock Olivia openly (1.5) and Orsino (5.1). They see Oxford as the Fool, who is excused in the words of Olivia (1.5.88): There is no slander in an allowed fool, though he do nothing but rail; The play may have been linked with an academic performance at Cambridge. On 1 March 1595 an anonymous Latin play, Laelia, was performed (or revived; see section Sources ) at Queens College, Cambridge to celebrate Essex s visit. The one surviving manuscript (edited by Moore Smith) reveals several similarities to Twelfth Night. Sebastian s meeting with Olivia s clown ( ) is paralleled in Laelia. Both plays have a time discrepancy: in Twelfth Night, the elapse of three months is twice mentioned ( & 97), yet the stage action lasts three days; in Laelia the action lasts two days, while a fortnight is supposed to have elapsed. Viola s readiness to follow Orsino to death ( ) parallels Laelia. The adjective festus [= festal, celebratory], which occurs twice in the Latin play, suggests the name Feste and a pang of heart (2.4.89) matches cordolium. Boas is alone among orthodox commentators in linking Laelia with Twelfth Night. Oxfordians believe that the author of Laelia adopted aspects of the existing Shakespearean play. Interestingly, as a boy, Oxford had studied at Queens College, Cambridge, where the play was staged. 5

6 Conclusion This play can be dated between the 1581 publication of Barnaby Riche s Farewell to Militarie Profession, and 1602, when it was described in performance by John Manningham. There are a few internal references to support a date c. 1601, but these may be no more than topical additions to an existing play. Cairncross s arguments for dating the play, while not designed to support Oxfordian authorship, indicate the likelihood that Twelfth Night was largely in its present form by the end of 1592, about nine years before the date conventionally assumed. There are strong indications, from events and people at Court, to suggest an original date of composition c Notes 1. For the Molyneux Globe of 1592, see D. B. Quinn, The Roanoke Voyages, (1955: 850). Mark Monmonier (2004: 11) has described the Wright Molyneux map. See C. E. A. Bedwell A Brief History of the Middle Temple (1909: 83) for the acquisition of the globes. 2 Nelson (23 5) describes how the young earl attended Queens College, Cambridge and (37) how his daily educational timetable at Cecil House (37) included two hours of French and two hours of Latin. Oxford enrolled at Gray s Inn in 1567 (Nelson, 46) but his purchase of expensive books in French, Italian and Latin showed literary interests. Oxford spent about a year (1575 6) in Italy where an Italian servant testified to the earl s proficiency in Italian and Latin (Nelson, ; 155 7). Other Cited Works Arlidge, Anthony, Shakespeare and the Prince of Love: The Feast of Misrule in the Middle Temple, London: Giles de la Mare, 2000 Alexander, Peter, Shakespeare s Life and Art, London: James Nisbet, 1939 Anderson, Mark, Shakespeare by Another Name, New York: Penguin, 2005 Blakemore Evans, G. (ed.), Riverside Shakespeare, New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1997 Boas, F. S., The University Drama in the Tudor Age, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1914 Bullough, Geoffrey, Narrative and Dramatic Sources of Shakespeare, vol. II, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1958 Cairncross, A. S., The Problem of Hamlet a Solution, London: MacMillan, 1936 Chambers, E. K., The Elizabethan Stage, 4 vols, Oxford: Clarendon, 1923 Chambers, E. K., William Shakespeare, A Study of Facts and Problems, 2 vols, Oxford: Clarendon, 1930 Clark, Eva Turner, Hidden Allusions in Shakespeare s Plays, New York: Kennikat, 1931 (reprinted 1974) Donno, E. S. (ed.), Twelfth Night, Cambridge: CUP, 1985 (updated 2004) Elam, Kier (ed.), Twelfth Night, or what you will, London: Arden, 2008 Halliday, F. E., A Shakespeare Companion, London: Duckworth, 1952 Hess, W. R., et al., Shakespeare s Dates, The Oxfordian, 2, Portland, 1999 Holland, H. H., Shakespeare, Oxford and Elizabethan Times, London: Denis Archer, 1933 Hood Phillips, Owen, Shakespeare and the Lawyers, London: Routledge, 1957 (reprint 2005) Hotson, Leslie, The First Night of Twelfth Night London: Rupert Hart-David, 1954 Kaufman, Helen A., Nicolò Secchi as a source of Twelfth Night, SQ, 5 (1954), Lothian, J. M. & T. W. Craik (eds), Twelfth Night, London: Arden, 1975 Mahood, M. M. (ed.), Twelfth Night, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1968 Mallin, E. S., Inscribing the Time: Shakespeare and the End of Elizabethan England, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995 Moore Smith, G. C. (ed.), Laelia, Cambridge: CUP, 1910 Nelson, Alan, Monstrous Adversary, Liverpool: LUP, 2003 Ogburn, Charlton, The Mysterious William Shakespeare, Virginia: EPM, 1984 Race, S., Manningham s Diary: the case for Reexamination in N&Q, 199, 1954, Warren, Roger, & Stanley Wells (ed.), Twelfth Night or what you Will, Oxford: OUP, 1994 Weir, Alison, Elizabeth the Queen, London: Pimlico, 1998 Wells, Stanley & Gary Taylor (eds), William Shakespeare: The Complete Works, Oxford: OUP, 1986 Wells, Stanley & Gary Taylor, William Shakespeare: A Textual Companion, Oxford: OUP, 1987 Wiggins, Martin (ed.) British Drama : A Catalogue, Volume IV: Oxford, OUP,