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Carnival and Puritanism in Falstaff

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Carnival and Puritanism in Falstaff CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by Padua@thesis Università degli Studi di Padova Corso di Laurea Magistrale in Lingue e Letterature Europee e Americane Classe LM-37 Tesi di Laurea Carnival and Puritanism in Falstaff Relatore Laureando Prof. Rocco Coronato Elena Andreutti n° matr.1061433 / LMLLA Anno Accademico 2015 / 2016 ii Contents Introduction .......................................................................................................... p. 1 1. Introduction: Henry IV, Falstaff, Martin Marprelate Tracts ........ p. 6 Introduction ........................................................................................................... p. 6 1.1 Introduction to the play ................................................................................... p. 6 1.2 Shakespeare’s History Plays ........................................................................... p. 8 1.3 Shakespeare’s Politics .................................................................................... p. 11 1.4 “Plump” Jack Falstaff ..................................................................................... p. 13 1.5 Oldcastle – Falstaff Controversy .................................................................... p. 16 1.6 The Marprelate Controversy ........................................................................... p. 19 2. The Carnivalesque and the grotesque body ......................................... p. 23 Introduction ........................................................................................................... p. 23 2.1 The Carnivalesque ........................................................................................... p. 24 2.2 Festivity and popular tradition in Elizabethan Age ......................................... p. 25 2.3 Shakespeare’s festivity and Saturnalian pattern .............................................. p. 28 2.4 Bakhtin’s Carnivalesque .................................................................................. p. 33 2.5 Laughter and comedy ...................................................................................... p. 36 2.6 Laughter and the body ..................................................................................... p. 38 2.7 Grotesque realism and grotesque body ............................................................ p. 40 3. Puritanism and theatre in Elizabethan Age ......................................... p. 50 Introduction ........................................................................................................... p. 50 3.1 Introduction to Puritanism ............................................................................... p. 50 3.2 Puritans and laughter ....................................................................................... p. 58 3.3 Puritans and theatre ......................................................................................... p. 61 4. Carnival and Puritanism in Falstaff ....................................................... p. 67 Introduction ........................................................................................................... p. 67 4.1 Falstaff in 1 & 2 Henry IV ............................................................................... p. 68 4.2 History and Carnival ........................................................................................ p. 71 iii 4.3 The World Upside Down ................................................................................ p. 78 4.4 Kings and clowns: the dramatic roles in 1 & 2 Henry IV ............................... p. 82 4.5 Falstaff and his grotesque body: large as the drama itself .............................. p. 87 4.6 Falstaff’s Puritan wit ....................................................................................... p. 94 4.7 Falstaff and The Merry Wives of Windsor ...................................................... p.102 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. p.111 Bibliography ......................................................................................................... p.117 Riassunto ................................................................................................................ p.122 iv v Introduction “Counterfeit? I lie, I am no counterfeit. To die is to be a counterfeit, for he is but the counterfeit if a man who hath not the life of a man; but to counterfeit dying, when a man thereby liveth, is to be no counterfeit, but the true and perfect image of life indeed. The better part of valour is discretion, in the which better part I have saved my life”. (1 Henry IV, V, iv, 113-9) This study is focused on the analysis of the character of Falstaff in Shakespeare’s history plays 1 & 2 Henry IV; in addition I will study Falstaff’s role in The Merry Wives of Windsor. This topic aroused my interest when I attended a series of lectures on Shakespeare’s history plays at the University of Glasgow. Falstaff is a central character in Shakespeare and one of the most successful comic creations of the history of theatre. Harold Bloom claims that “only a few characters in the world’s literature can match the real presence of Falstaff, who in that regard is Hamlet’s greater rival in Shakespeare”1. The element shared by Hamlet and Falstaff is undoubtedly the superb wit; their common feature is the complexity of their consciousness and their incomparable dramatic presence. Falstaff, “the rouge”, the “trunk of humours”, “that huge bombard of sack”, “that reverend Vice”, rules the comic sub-plot in the history play. The main historical plot of Henry IV is the decadence of the illegitimate kingship of Henry IV under the threat of rebellious forces. Falstaff’s depraved lifestyle is in opposition to the court values, especially to the concept of honour, strongly present in 1 Henry IV in the valiant character of Hotspur. Falstaff’s values, on the other hand, are licence, “sack and sugar”, sex, deception, and his major vocation: “purse-taking”. His immorality is undeniable and shameless; however, his ability with language and his comic splendour exceed the moral concerns, and it is not by chance that he is one of the most loved Shakespearean characters. Falstaff’s devotion to a wide range of low pleasures, and his deformed physicality led some critics to associate him with the bakhtinian concepts of the carnivalesque and of the grotesque body. Mikhail Bakhtin based his theory of the 1 Harold Bloom, Shakespeare, The Invention Of The Human, New York, Riverhead Books, 1998, p. 279. 1 carnivalesque on the study of the popular forms in Rabelais’ work. He described the carnivalesque as the spirit of temporary licence, the popular inversion of the established hierarchy and order. The grotesque is strongly connected with the carnivalesque; it is focused on the bodily functions and represents the spirit of perpetual metamorphosis and generation. Falstaff’s body is grotesque, because he is fat, “a huge hill of flesh”, old, and indulges in body pleasures. Yet, Falstaff is not only a carnivalesque figure: his complexity introduces many possibilities for the analysis of the character. In addition to the carnivalesque features, criticism has underlined the theme of Puritanism as a possible perspective for reading the Henriad plays. Several studies consider Falstaff’s association with the figure of the “grotesque Puritan”: a stereotyped characterisation of the Puritans emerged in the late sixteenth-century, from a new satirical style in pamphlets and drama. My main interest is to provide a coherent analysis of the most relevant characteristics of Falstaff. The difficulty lies in putting together the several sides of his “gigantic” presence on stage: Shakespeare seems to have merged in Falstaff several traditional “types”. The rouge is linked with the Vice of the morality plays, with the Lord of Misrule, with the stage fool, with the grotesque Puritan, and with the miles gloriosus. The most important point, in my opinion, is how to understand Falstaff’s purpose on stage and in the plays: Shakespeare’s aim was the parody of Puritans or, perhaps, the parody of kingdom and social rules? Or did he simply follow the legend on Prince Henry’s dissolute youth with the subversive Sir John Oldcastle, the historical “father” of Falstaff? In the first chapter I will provide a general introduction to Shakespeare’s second tetralogy of history plays, which include Richard II, the two parts of Henry IV and Henry V. A part is centred on the political aspects of Henry IV and on the historical sources upon which Shakespeare’s based the plays. The theme of politics is important, because Falstaff, in his role of Lord of Misrule, opposes established order and kingship. With respect to the theme of politics, I have taken in consideration mainly the works of Holderness, Tillyard and Spiekerman, who examine in depth Shakespeare’s historical plays. After the general introduction on the plays, I will present the character of Falstaff, showing his remarkable “career” in vices, and his relationship with the Prince Hal. Merry Jack, though, in the early representations of the play was not called Falstaff, but John Oldcastle an historical figure lived during Henry V’s reign and executed for 2 heresy. I will devote a section of the chapter to this figure, clarifying why Falstaff was recognisable as Oldcastle by the Elizabethan audience. In conclusion, I will illustrate the Marprelate Controversy,
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