Tony Prince is a third year PhD student at the University of Sheffield, studying ‘Bastardy and Illegitimacy in the plays of William VOLUME 5 NUMBER 1 SUMMER 2014 Shakespeare’. He is the convenor of a Shakespeare community reading group called Sheffield’s Shakespeare; a student rep on the Joint Staff Student Council; a member of the Arts and Humanities PGR Forum Committee; and has taught and delivered workshops on Shakespeare to undergraduates. Tony achieved an MA in Critical Theory from the University of Sussex and a BA single honours degree in English Literature from the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth. [email protected] Article ‘Bastards of the Time’:1 the Violent Contexts and Dramatic Ancestry of Bastards and Illegitimates in Titus Andronicus and King John Tony Prince / __________________________________________ Stage Vices and Violent Legacies: The Dramatic Lineages of Shakespeare’s Bastards Aaron the Moor and Philip the Bastard offer much scope for exploring the relationship between bastardy and violence, and the links of both to the theatrical tradition of the Vice. To begin with, I will examine the role of the Vice in two late medieval Morality plays, The Castle of Perseverance (1425), where a number of characters represent this type, and in Mankind (c. 1477), where the character of Myscheff is the primary Vice. This will allow a comparison of the Vice’s typical features, characteristics and dramatic role, firstly in relation to the depiction of Aaron the Moor and his bastard newborn in Titus Andronicus (c. 1594), and secondly to the portrayal of the Bastard, Philip Faulconbridge, in King John (c. 1595).2 The roots of this theatrical type can be traced back to Ancient Rome, in Prudentius’ Psychomachia3 and Augustine’s City of God, both written in the early fifth century. As Glynne Wickham explains, over time the ‘angels and devils’, essential to the Christian representation of the spiritual struggle within Tony Prince, ‘Bastards of the Time’, Dandelion 5.1 (Summer 2014) 1 Dandelion: postgraduate journal and arts research Tony Prince Vol. 5, No. 1 (Summer 2014) ‘Bastards of the Time’ Man, ‘came to be augmented by their agents on earth in the battle for men’s souls, the Virtues and the Vices’.4 The idea of patterning and the interplay of order and disorder is structurally and thematically central to The Castle of Perseverance; 5 beginning with two standard-bearers spelling out the fundamental characteristics of the social, political and religious order (l. 1-10). The Prologue suggests that destructive, uncontrollable forces in the form of the illegitimate other, the bastard who degrades the family name, threatens Church and society in general, as well as the family; as ‘there schal com a lythyr ladde’ called ‘I-Wot-Nevere-Who’, who will ‘eryth the erytage that never was of hys blod’ (l. 109-11). Youth, especially if it is illegitimate, is associated with idleness (‘lythyr’ meaning ‘lazy’), familial degradation and sin, whilst the importance of having a legitimate family name is also highlighted. Later in the play this character actually appears, as Mankind’s heir, just as the latter realises the outcome of sinful behaviour (2925), when he is informed that Mundus (The World) has identified a boy who ‘schal have thy erytage’ (2964-50) and pronounces that he is the very ‘lythyr ladde’ he had been warned of from the outset. Mankind fixates on the horror of this situation at length while dying, warning others of the dire consequences of lechery and adultery, thus strongly implying that this boy is his bastard son. In the medieval Morality plays illicit sex, exorbitant sexuality, illegitimate conception and anti-social disruptiveness circulate around the Vice figures. In The Castle of Perseverance Luxuria (Lechery) celebrates sexual activity explicitly, looking forward to being ‘bobbyd [...] in bed’ with Mankind (1185) and delighting in the idea that ‘I’ my cunte thou schalt crepe’ (1195). Such overt physicality and sexual forwardness is linked to forcefulness and violence, as when Detraccio (Backbiter) boasts about his superhuman strength (1839). There is also a strong sense of the Vice’s irrepressible animal vitality: Detraccio displays speed and agility (691), as does Invidia (Envy), who is ‘flete as a fox’ (938) and able to ‘lepe as a lyon’ (940). These physical features, forged with the allegorical abstractedness of their names, give these Vices a dramatic double-sidedness. The Vices are belligerent and always quick to engage in direct verbal exchanges with their enemies, the Virtues. Ira (Wrath) insists that consistent verbal aggression enables domination through fear, and that Mankind should challenge anyone who opposes him, ‘thane schal no man thee ovyr-lede’ (1103). The Vices’ self-assertive dominance is contrasted at first to Mankind’s sense of ‘shame’ (284) and vulnerability in nakedness (278) but, under the influence of the Vices, he shifts positions, insisting that a beggar should ‘sterve and stynke’ rather than be helped (878-9). Ultimately, Mankind recognises the Vices as wicked tempters, and is saved, but only after a terrifying experience of inner struggle: ‘Wyth this foul fiende I am ner mad’ (2022). The play leaves us in no doubt that the Vices are ruinous to Mankind’s soul and savour their role in accentuating human suffering, yet their rootedness, immediacy and verbal dexterity means that they nevertheless remain paradoxically alluring. Mankind presents the same fundamental spiritual contest between good and evil as other plays in the Morality tradition. Mercy directly quotes bible stories, like Job’s self-belief during tribulation (286-8) 6 and biblical aphorisms such as ‘The corn shall be saved, the chaff shall be brent’ (43),7 and sums up how Mankind must act in order to fulfil his god-given role: ‘Do truly your labour and keep your holy day’ (300). In reply, Myscheff, the primary Vice, who exploits language for humorous effect from the outset of the play, interrupts and parodies Mercy’s homiletic message and hectoring style with onomatopoeic, anaphoric constructions, ‘Mish-mash, driff-draff | Some are 2 Dandelion: postgraduate journal and arts research Tony Prince Vol. 5, No. 1 (Summer 2014) ‘Bastards of the Time’ corn and some are chaff’ (49-50), employing mock Latin phrases on ordinary subjects directed at the audience (56-60). He pretends to quote from a written source, offering a mock sermon in doggerel Latin (57), followed by a mock exegesis (59-63). Bernard Spivack notes that, ‘as well as dramatizing the Psychomachia, the moralities verbalise it exactly’. 8 The rhyming ripostes Myscheff makes to Mercy’s attempts to push him away (68-9) show him to be quick-witted and opportunistic. Moreover, his bawdy comment which follows, ‘My dame said my name is Raff | Unshut your lock and take an ha’penny!’ (51-2) again illustrates that his onomastic versatility is related to libido. Robert Weimann goes further, explaining how Myscheff ‘becomes particularly complex as he moves easily from dialogue to sportive self- expression and back to farcical dialogue’, involving the ability to move from the representational locus of the stage to the platea.9 This ability is central to the dramatic function of the Vice, and employed ubiquitously in Mankind. Nowadays and Nought arrive ‘through the audience’ (331) and immediately begin to sing, the former ‘making the audience sing after him’ (336). When music is used soon after to conjure up the Mephistophelean Titivillus, with Nought playing the ‘Walsingham whistle’ and punning on ‘naughtiness’, or licentiousness, 10 the audience would struggle not to be caught up in the merriment. Extra-dramatic elements are introduced when Newguise, one of the secondary Vices, approaches the owner of the property for a donation (468), and shortly after, confirms that he will visit other named local people (505-6). These elements are taken further still when the Vices seek donations from the audience to pay for Titivillus’ appearance, their requests border on threats (466-74), as they transgress boundaries between character and player, life and theatre, platea and locus simultaneously. Weimann notes ‘the traditional convention of popular audience address remained a trait of the comic or disreputable characters’ and ‘broke through the illusion of their role’ to ‘involve the least dignified members of the in the play world’.11 The Vice invariably glories in violence, and also embraces it, as when Newguise jokes about how he and his fellow criminals have been busy learning ‘our neck-verse’ (520), usually Psalm 50, 12 this legal ‘loophole’ sometimes enabling culprits to avoid hanging. Mankind strongly links the Vice with gallows humour and the latter in turn with risk. Newguise, for instance, talks about his fortuitous escape from hanging when ‘the grace was, the halter brast asunder’ (616), being typically blasphemous in his use of the spiritual term ‘grace’. He is quickly followed by Myscheff, with his broken shackles still on, telling of his escape from near death, adding that he killed the jailer and had sex with this man’s wife immediately after. The language of, and punning on, biological functions and genitalia are often the Vice’s subject matter, as when Newguise jokes about losing ‘my jewels’ (381), and puns on ‘chop’ to repeat the idea of castration, when Mankind strikes him with his spade (441). Punning and verbal competition are closely linked, such as when Nowadays replies to Newguise’s reference to Titivillus’ enormous head with the proverbial phrase ‘Keep your tail in goodness’ (461-2).13 Such references remind us that it is precisely these Vice characters who resemble the social types most likely to be on the receiving end of punishment for criminality, as well as most likely to be seen to be committing it. Myscheff’s revenge is to satirise the hierarchised power of church and state, creating a play within a play by conjuring up a pseudo-ecclesiastical court, and passing mock-sombre judgement that Mankind should ‘go rob, steal and kill as fast as you may’ (707).