CHAPTER V
COMEDY: LYLY, GREENE, PEELE, NASH
The term 'University Wits' is the title given to a group of scholarly young men who, from 1584 onwards, for about ten years, took up play-writing as a serious profession, and by their abilities and genius raised English drama to the rank of literature. Previous dramatists had also been men of good education and fair wit; Sackville, to name but one, was a man of great gifts and sound learning. But tradition has restricted the name to seven men whom time, circumstances, mental qualities and mutual acquaintanceship brought together as one group. The majority stood to each other almost in the relation of friends; they were rivals for public favour, were well acquainted with each other's work, and were quick to follow one another along improved paths. Taking up comedy at the stage of Ralph Roister Doister and tragedy at that of The Misfortunes of Arthur, they transformed and refined both, lifting them to higher levels of humour and passion, gracing them with many witty inventions, and, above all, pouring into the pallid arteries of drama the rich vitalizing blood of a new poetry. The seven men were Lyly, Greene, Peele, Nash, Lodge, Kyd and Marlowe—named not in chronological sequence but in the order of their discussion in these pages.
Perhaps no dramatist is more out of touch with modern taste than John Lyly. The ordinary reader, taking up one of his plays by chance, will probably set it down wearily after the perusal of barely one or two acts. And yet Lyly excels any of his contemporaries in witty invention, and is the creator of what has been called High Comedy. His importance, therefore, in the history of the growth of the drama is considerable. Nor is his fancy found to be so dull when approached in the right spirit. True, it requires an effort to step back into the shoes of an Elizabethan courtier. But the effort is worth making, since the mind, as soon as it has realized what not to expect, is better able to appreciate what is offered. The essential requirement is to remember that Lyly the dramatist is the same man as Lyly the euphuist, and that his audience was always a company of courtiers, with Queen Elizabeth in their midst, infatuated with admiration for the new phraseology and mode of thought known as Euphuism. If we consider the manner in which these lords and ladies spent their time at court, filling idle hours with compliment, love-making, veiled jibe and swift retort; if we read our Euphues again, renewing our acquaintance with its absurdly elaborated and stilted style, its tireless winding of sentences round a topic without any advance in thought, its affectation of philosophy and classical learning; if we remember that to speak euphuistically was a coveted and studiously cultivated accomplishment, and that to pun, to utter caustic jests, to let fall neat epigrams were the highest ambition of wit; if we take this trouble to prepare ourselves for reading Lyly's plays, we may still find them dull, but we shall at least understand why they took the form they did, and shall be in a position to recognize the substantial service rendered to Comedy by the author. Lyly's work was just the application of the laws of euphuism to native comedy, and it wrought a change curiously similar to the effect of Senecan principles upon native tragedy, transferring the importance from the action to the words. It may be remarked that this redistribution of the interest must always be of great value in the early stage of any literature. The popular taste for action and incident is sure to be gratified sooner or later; the demand for elegant and appropriate diction, usually confined to the cultured few, is more apt to be passed over. Euphuism never did the harm to comedy which tragedy suffered at the hands of the late Elizabethans who, in their pursuit of moving incident, lost themselves in a reckless licence of language and verse. Action, therefore, fell into the background. Refinement, elevation was aimed at. In the place of Hodge, Dame Chat and their company, there now appeared gracious beings of perfect manners and speech; and since things Greek and mythological had become the fashion, Arcadian nymphs and swains, beauteous goddesses and Athenian philosophers were judged the most fitting to stand before the English court. In scene after scene fair ladies talk of love, reverend sages display their readiness in solving knotty problems, lovers sigh into the air long rhapsodies over the charms of their mistresses, sharp-tongued (but rarely coarse) serving-boys lure fools into greater folly or exchange amusing badinage at the expense of their absent masters. The story does not advance much, but that is of small account so long as the dialogue tickles ears taught to find delight in well-spoken euphuism. It is like listening to a song in a language one does not understand: provided that the harmony is beautiful one is not distressed about the verbal message. Besides, there is some plot, slight though it be, and its theme is love, chiefly of the languishing, half-hopeless kind which was supposed to be cherished by every bachelor courtier for the queen. There is, too, for those who can read it, an allegory often concealed in the story of disappointed love or ambition which moves round Cynthia or Diana or Sapho. Was there no lover who aspired as Endymion aspired, no Spanish king meriting the fate of Mydas, no man favoured as was Phao by Sapho? Even at this distance of time we can amuse ourselves by guessing names, and so catch something of the interest which, at the time of the play's appearance, would set eyebrows arching with surprise, and send, at each daring reference or well-aimed compliment, a nod of approving intelligence around the audience.
Lyly wrote eight comedies: Campaspe (printed 1584), Sapho and Phao (printed 1584), Endymion (printed 1591), Gallathea (printed 1592), Mydas (printed 1592), Mother Bombie (printed 1594), The Woman in the Moon (printed 1597), Love's Metamorphoses (printed 1601). All these, with the exception of the seventh—which is in regular and pleasing, though not vigorous, blank verse—were written in prose, as we should expect from the founder of so famous a prose style; but as The Supposes, a translation by Gascoigne of Ariosto's I Suppositi, had previously appeared in prose, Lyly's claim as an innovator is weakened. The fact, however, that Ariosto wrote a prose, as well as a poetic, version of his play, and that Gascoigne made use of both in his translation, gives to the latter's prose a borrowed quality, and leaves Lyly fully entitled to whatever credit belongs to the earliest native productions of this kind. He was the first to announce, by practice, the theory that English comedy could find fuller expression in prose than in verse, for, beginning with verse, he deliberately set it aside in favour of prose, and, having proved the superiority of prose for this purpose, persisted in it to the end. Of his eight plays, the more interesting only will be dealt with here; the rest we leave to the curiosity of the reader.
Campaspe, his first prose comedy, is perhaps the most perfect example of the new euphuistic method at work. The plot is of the slightest. Alexander the Great is in love with the beauty of Campaspe, a Theban captive; but Apelles, the artist, who is ordered to paint her picture, having also fallen in love with her, and won her love, Alexander in the end graciously resigns his claim upon her. This is the plot, but it is very little guide to the contents of the play, which is crowded with characters. There are, in addition to the three leading persons, four Warriors to discuss the condition of the army, seven Philosophers to puzzle each other with disputation and metaphysical conundrums, three Servants to deride their masters behind their backs, a General to act as Alexander's confidant and counsellor, beside some nine others and a company of citizens. One of the chief characters, Diogenes, stands quite apart from the plot, his office being to provide an inexhaustible fund of shrewd, biting retorts for such as dare to question him. He is even elevated to the centre of a major episode in which the Athenian populace, credulous of a report that he is about to fly, is deceived into hearing a very sharp sermon as, on the wings of criticism, Diogenes executes an oratorical flight over their many failings. The following scene between him and a beggar reveals the nature of his wit.
Alexander (aside). Behold Diogenes talking with one at his tub.