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'An Ancient Tale New Told' Shakespeare's Use of Folk- AND ‘An ancient tale new told’ Shakespeare’s use of folk- and Fairy Tales as Sources for his Plays Submitted by Ciara Rawnsley BA (Hons) This thesis is presented for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy of The University of Western Australia School of Humanities The University of Western Australia Crawley, WA 6009 Australia August 2013 ABSTRACT hakespeare drew inspiration for his plays from a wealth of different sources, but the ones usually discussed are in written, literary forms which are still accessible: the chronicles of Holinshed and Plutarch’s The Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans, Ovid’s Metamorphoses and popular romance, Italian novelle pre-eminently. What has long been neglected, however, is the abundance of traditional oral stories in circulation during Shakespeare’s youth: folk- and fairy tales in particular. This thesis aims to identify and explore Shakespeare’s reliance on this major, though largely unrecorded, well of inspiration, and argues that the playwright made frequent use of folktale plotlines, motifs, and figures in his plays, often superimposing several folk stories in one drama. This may partly explain why Shakespeare has so often been adapted for children, by writers from Charles and Mary Lamb to the present day. The thesis proposes, moreover, that Shakespeare not only drew on the narrative patterns and plots of folktales, but that he also utilised the powerful but latent emotional subtexts such tales encode. This is particularly evident in All’s Well That Ends Well and Cymbeline, the two plays discussed in detail, which have proved theatrically effective but have always puzzled critics, arguably because their links with folktales have not been investigated. In these works, which have been chosen to show that he drew on this material at different parts of his writing career, Shakespeare brings to the surface the dormant emotional subtexts of folktales – which are in turn based on some of the most frightening subconscious fears possible – and uses these skillfully to complicate and darken his apparently ‘innocent’ dramatic actions, creating new and disturbing affective responses in characters and audience alike. In utilising as sources common fairy tales, then, Shakespeare was also evoking their rich emotional and personal resonances, which allowed him to add layers of subtle meaning to his plays, and connect with his audience on an emotional, albeit largely subconscious level. i CONTENTS Abstract i Acknowledgements iii Note on Texts iv Introduction 1 Chapter 1 14 Chapter 2 56 Chapter 3 105 Conclusion 169 Motif Index 172 Bibliography 175 ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS nce upon a time, it was hard to imagine reaching the end of what seemed like such a lengthy and ambitious project. Thanks to a number of people, however, not only has the end arrived, but the journey was made infinitely more enjoyable. To my supervisor Bob White, I extend my humblest thanks; without his unrelenting support, encouraging advice, and keen insights this thesis would never have reached its happily-ever-after. Bob has been a constant source of inspiration throughout almost my entire university career, and for this I am truly grateful. I must also thank the staff in the School of Humanities at The University of Western Australia, in particular Van Ikin, for always being ready to offer a helping hand whenever obstacles obscured my path. I was fortunate enough to travel to Europe during my candidature to continue my research overseas, which would not have been possible without the generous financial support of the School of Humanities and the Graduate Research School at UWA, for which I am grateful. Heartfelt thanks go to my family, for their unceasing faith in my abilities, gentle words of encouragement, and careful guidance. My parents, Kevin and Shirley, have supported me emotionally, financially, and even physically throughout my years of study, allowing me to pursue my passions and realise my scholarly dreams. It is to them I dedicate this work. I would also especially like to thank my sister, Alyssa, for listening endlessly to all my fears and desires, and helping to ward off the big, bad wolf whenever he got too close for comfort. Without her support, I would have been lost. To my partner, Aidan, for remaining an unshakeable pillar of strength and love, reminding me that there is life outside of work, and accompanying me on the ups and downs of this adventure, I am genuinely grateful. Finally, I would like to thank Sassy, for her unconditional companionship on early mornings, late nights, and long days, and her determination to get me to leave my desk every so often to entertain her. iii NOTE ON TEXTS All references to Shakespeare‘s plays are from: The Norton Shakespeare, gen. ed. Stephen Greenblatt, USA: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1997. Unless otherwise indicated, fairy tales referred to generally throughout this thesis may be found in either the Complete Fairy Tales, Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, London, New York: Routledge, 2002; or The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales, ed. Maria Tatar, USA: W.W. Norton & Co, 2002. iv INTRODUCTION rson Welles‘ film Citizen Kane opens with a shot of an old, sick man lying alone in a bed. He whispers one word, ‗Rosebud‘, and then dies. We soon learn that the man, Kane, was a wealthy and prominent newspaper publisher, whose death has become a matter of public interest. A journalist embarks on a mission to dig up all he can on Kane in an effort to portray accurately the man‘s life and career. The journalist quickly becomes fixated, however, on trying to solve the enigma of Kane‘s seemingly meaningless dying word. He explores every avenue and follows every lead he comes across, interviewing Kane‘s work associates, lovers, family, and so on; an investigation which takes up the duration of the film. But despite his best efforts, the journalist never discovers what ‗Rosebud‘ means, and resignedly concedes that Kane‘s last word will forever remain a mystery. It is a very unsatisfying conclusion. Just before the film ends, however, after the journalist has relinquished his quest and left, the camera pans to a group of workers who are burning some of Kane‘s old and apparently worthless possessions. In the fire is a worn child‘s sled, on which Kane used to play in his youth. The camera slowly zooms in, focusing on the blazing sled, and it gradually becomes clear that there is a word painted on its back: Rosebud. The journalist, then, was unsuccessful in discovering the meaning of Rosebud because he was looking in the wrong places: he assumed that Rosebud would be someone or something of significance from Kane‘s adult life. In reality, Rosebud was a commonplace yet powerful symbol of Kane‘s childhood. So, on one level, Citizen Kane explores the potent, often unrecognised effect that one‘s childhood can have on one‘s adult life. Similarly, I would argue that previous investigation into Shakespeare‘s dramatic influences has been incomplete because we, too, have been looking in the wrong places. We have scoured the great classic works and contemporary literature which Shakespeare would have been exposed to in his adult life in an attempt to demystify his source material. In the meantime, we have neglected a major, though largely intangible, well of inspiration: the treasure trove of traditional oral stories in circulation during Shakespeare‘s youth. That Shakespeare seems to have preferred reworking established tales to inventing his own is well-known. It is no secret that that the chronicles of 1 Holinshed and Plutarch‘s The Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans were the stimuli for Shakespeare‘s history and Roman plays; and that many of his romances and comedies drew on Ovid‘s Metamorphoses and popular romance; or that Italian novelle motivated several of his comedies and tragedies. All these renowned sources are in written, literary forms and are still accessible. What has been long overlooked, however, is the playwright‘s frequent use of folk- and fairy tales in his plays. The general neglect of folk- and fairy tales by Shakespearean scholars of both literature and early modern popular culture is understandable: these old stories are elusive and difficult to trace. Created by anonymous oral storytellers and passed on by word of mouth for countless generations, fairy tales have obscure origins. Only when they make their way into the literary record can we sketch their history. The majority of the stories that we know today as folk- and fairy tales were recorded for the first time from the end of the eighteenth century, well after Shakespeare‘s era.1 When it comes to sources, scholars generally prefer studying tangible, published evidence, and exploring the mostly unrecorded stories in oral transmission when Shakespeare was creating his plays involves a lot of speculation. Our ignorance of oral fairy tales before 1800 is compounded by the fact that the research done on these old stories is now itself getting old;2 and most new scholarly work on the general subject of fairy stories necessarily uses written versions of the tales which appeared post-1800, because of the scarcity of earlier written versions. But, admitting the elusiveness of such unwritten sources should not deter us from examining the area: the evidence contained in Shakespeare‘s plays alone, especially All’s Well That Ends Well and Cymbeline, reveals their ubiquitous influence and importance. While this hole in Shakespeare scholarship has generally gone unnoticed, recently it has come to the fore as an emerging issue needing consideration. Ann Thompson, in her introduction to The Taming of the Shrew (1984), asserts that critical discussion on the matter of sources for that play has been hampered by ―the reluctance of literary scholars to deal with folktale and oral tradition‖.3 The Taming of the Shrew has a three-part structure: a main plot, a sub plot, and what Thompson terms ―the 1 D.
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