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Erotic Language As Dramatic Action in Plays by Lyly and Shakespeare

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Erotic Language As Dramatic Action in Plays by Lyly and Shakespeare ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: EROTIC LANGUAGE AS DRAMATIC ACTION IN PLAYS BY LYLY AND SHAKESPEARE Gillian Knoll, Doctor of Philosophy, 2012 Dissertation directed by: Professor Theodore B. Leinwand Department of English This study closely examines the language of desire in the dramatic works of John Lyly and William Shakespeare, and argues that contemplative and analytical speeches about desire function as modes of action in their plays. Erotic speeches do more than express desire in a purely descriptive or perlocutionary capacity distinct from the action of the play—they incite, circulate, and create eros for characters, exposing audiences to the inner workings of the desiring mind and body. For many of Lyly’s and Shakespeare’s characters, words come to constitute erotic experience. My approach to dramatic language draws from the work of cognitive linguists such as George Lakoff and Mark Johnson who argue that our basic conceptual system, according to which we think, speak, and act, is metaphorical in nature. My focus on primary metaphors, which are based on sensorimotor experience, foregrounds the interdependence of erotic language and early modern notions of embodiment. Since language, thought, and action are all subject to this embodied metaphorical system, conceptual metaphors allow Lyly and Shakespeare to dramatize the often invisible, paradoxical, and potentially unknowable experience of erotic desire. My understanding of language as dramatic action derives from a theory about the attribution of human motives that Kenneth Burke, in The Grammar of Motives (1945), called dramatism. Burke uses five key terms to address human motivation—Act, Scene, Agent, Agency, Purpose—and I in turn use each of these terms to make sense of erotic desire on the early modern stage. I begin my study by exploring conceptual metaphors of physical motion that characterize desire as an action rather than a state of mind. In my second chapter, I investigate metaphors of permeability that dramatize erotic desire as a rupture between “agents” and their “scenes,” between self and world. My third chapter analyzes “purpose” and “agency”—the ways characters make intimate relationships—by exploring metaphors in which eros is conceptualized as a dynamic process of creation. EROTIC LANGUAGE AS DRAMATIC ACTION IN PLAYS BY LYLY AND SHAKESPEARE by Gillian Knoll Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2012 Advisory Committee: Professor Theodore B. Leinwand, Chair Professor Kent Cartwright Professor Theresa Coletti Assistant Professor Gerard Passannante Professor James F. Klumpp (Dean’s Representative) ©Copyright by Gillian Knoll 2012 ii Acknowledgements Along with Shakespeare, Lyly, and a colorful cast of philosophers and critics, the scene of my writing has been enriched by teachers, colleagues, friends, and family. I must begin by thanking my exceptional advisory committee, and especially its chair, Ted Leinwand. It has been a privilege and a genuine pleasure to write for someone who engages my thoughts and words with such meticulous care. For moving me to take risks in my work, for bringing the “maverick” Kenneth Burke into my life, for his belief in my potential as a scholar, and for his intellectual companionship throughout this process, Ted has my warmest gratitude. I also thank Kent Cartwright for reading each of my chapters with thoughtful interest; his challenges, objections, and encouragements broadened my perspective and strengthened my resolve. Theresa Coletti’s hard questions and generous feedback helped me articulate the larger import of my dissertation. Jerry Passannante and Jim Klumpp were also valuable readers; their responses give me much to consider as I move beyond this project. Seminars at the University of Maryland and at Shakespeare Association of America meetings provided many insights into my subject; I am especially grateful to Michael Israel for allowing me to audit his graduate course on cognitive grammar when I was beginning my project. I must also thank the Folger Shakespeare Library, a welcoming and inspiring scene for my research and writing. I have been blessed with the advice and example of several extraordinary women who have left a lasting mark on my project and on me. To begin at the beginning, I thank P.A. Skantze, an incomparable mentor and model whose gifts remain with me far beyond my undergraduate years at the University of Michigan. Adele Seeff is another phenomenal woman whose tenacity, wit, and unflagging support enrich my life and work more than I can say. I owe great thanks to Karen Nelson for her encouragement; working alongside Karen and Adele at the Center for Renaissance & Baroque Studies was among my most enjoyable and rewarding experiences at the University of Maryland. My thinking and writing over the years benefitted from lively conversations with friends and colleagues from graduate school, especially Megan Monserez, Brandi Adams, Katie Field, and Karen Kettnich. Chris Maffuccio’s friendship and wonderful company have been invaluable to me; she responded to countless iterations of this project with her characteristic insight, generosity, and understanding. My family’s enthusiastic support sustained me throughout this long journey. I thank my parents, Anne and Fred Knoll, my brother Michael, and my grandmother Portia for their unconditional love and faith in me. The Staffords continually offered love and encouragement along the way. My greatest thanks will always go to Justin, my abiding scene and purpose. Table of Contents Acknowledgements . ii Introduction . 1 “Things untold are undone”: Erotic Language as Dramatic Action Chapter 1 . 24 “I’ll do, I’ll do, and I’ll do”: Desire as Act I. The Name of Action . 25 II. “My desire… did spur me forth” . 30 The Event Structure Metaphor III. “Entrapped in love” . 36 Metaphors of Desire in Lyly IV. “Our raging motions” . 52 Metaphors of Desire in Shakespeare Chapter 2 . 79 “More than all the world”: Intimacy and the Scene-Agent Ratio I. Where is Silvia?. 81 Containment and Permeability II. “A petty world of myself” . 90 Permeability and Desire in Lyly’s Endymion III. Binding the Void . 109 Erotics of the Scene in Antony and Cleopatra Chapter 3 . 141 “Love’s use”: Agency and Purpose of Erotic Desire I. Subject, Object, Instrument . 141 II. The Means and Ends of Erotic Desire in Lyly’s Campaspe . 146 III. “You lie, in faith” . 180 Making Marriage in The Taming of the Shrew Conclusion . 202 The Success of Failure and Beyond Appendix A: Desire Metaphors in Lyly and Shakespeare. 208 Appendix B: Erotic Language in Plays by Lyly. 211 Appendix C: Erotic Language in Plays by Shakespeare . 247 Bibliography . 284 1 Introduction “Things untold are undone” Erotic Language as Dramatic Action For Shakespeare’s Troilus, erotic language is dramatic action. Things happen to him as he speaks these lines: I am giddy. Expectation whirls me round. Th’imaginary relish is so sweet That it enchants my sense. What will it be When that the wat’ry palates taste indeed Love’s thrice-repured nectar? Death, I fear me, Swooning destruction, or some joy too fine, Too subtle-potent, tuned too sharp in sweetness For the capacity of my ruder powers. I fear it much, and I do fear besides That I shall lose distinction in my joys As doth a battle, when they charge on heaps, The enemy flying. (Troilus and Cressida 3.2.16-27)1 While awaiting Cressida in the orchard, Troilus experiences giddiness and “sweet” pleasure, followed by fear, first of a “joy too fine” and then of “losing distinction in [his] joys.” His desire for Cressida “whirls” and “enchants” him even as he stands alone onstage, arguably doing nothing at all except talking to himself, or perhaps to us. Troilus undoubtedly is different at the end of his soliloquy than when he began: his initial giddiness gives way to, or is supplemented by, fear—fear of a very particular kind of loss. Speaking his desire, even to himself, is enough to change him, and change is the surest marker of action. But how does this change occur, and what can it tell us about the workings of erotic desire on the early modern English stage? 1 All quotations of Shakespeare’s plays are from The Complete Pelican Shakespeare, ed. Stephen Orgel and A.R. Braunmuller (New York: Penguin, 2002). 2 These questions begin to address the relationship between erotic language and desire that is the focus of my dissertation. In this study, I argue that erotic speeches do more than express desire—they incite, circulate, and create desire for characters and for audiences. My dissertation analyzes some of the richest and most potent erotic language in plays by John Lyly and William Shakespeare. I discuss the advantages of examining Lyly’s language alongside Shakespeare’s later in this introduction; for the moment, suffice it to say that although they wrote for different types of theaters and only partially- overlapping audiences, both dramatists created characters who speak erotic language at considerable length and in extraordinary depth. For such characters, words constitute erotic experience. While Troilus waits for Cressida to appear in the orchard, erotic language acts on him and it alters him. It even objectifies him: Eros is the subject of his action verbs. It is “expectation” that “whirls [him] round”; “imaginary relish” that “enchants [his] sense”; and his “joys” are what “charge on heaps.” Desire is happening to Troilus, whose only “I” in the soliloquy governs verbs of being (“I am giddy”), of feeling (“I fear”), and of loss (“I shall lose…”). It might be argued that he is merely imagining future events, but is not the act of imagining itself a source of drama in the present? The prospect of future pleasures is enough to create present-tense fear (“I do fear”) and even present-tense pleasure (“th’imaginary relish is so sweet / That it enchants”).
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