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Show 68 Utah Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters [Vol. XIV, terse, vigorous style is frequently lavished with unclassical unrestraint upon superfluities. Why did Jonson do this? No doubt one factor was pride in the learning which caused him to be ranked with Chapman as one of the two most learned men of the generation. But chiefly I think he freighted his plots with the treasures of antiquity because, as he declares in Timber, he regarded it as better for a reader to riot out of learned plenty than to starve. He had a strong admiration for learning, and a desire to put real substance into his work. This admiration and this desire are not in themselves with clas incompatible sicism, but they often caused Jonson to confuse abundance with comparative irrelevance. _ In the same way they led him into difficulties with his structure. As a critic, truly, Jonson saw eye to eye with Aristotle on the basic importance of the unity of plot or action. Indeed in Timber he uses a translation of the Greek's own words to expound the meaning of this unity. In connection with the unity of time, he went beyond Aristotle's mild observation that the best tragedies tried to concentrate their actions within one revolution of the sun; Jonson said the "uttermost bounds of a fable" are twenty-four hours. But in practice he was sometimes more liberal. In V Olp011-e, for example, he lightly attached to the main plot a chain of incidents which could be trimmed away easily without damage to the heart of the action. In his tragedies he largely disregarded the unity of time. These deviations from his own expounded doc trines are, in my opinion, best explained by his desire to widen the scope of a play to include more opportunities for presenting corrective satire or learn ing. Both tragedies contain satires on cosmetics and aids to beauty. Every Man Out of His Humour has technical unity of plot; but actually, it has only a loose-jointed framework, elaborate enough so that a wide variety of typical follies and affectations may be revealed. Justice compels the admission that, if Jonson exceeded Aristotle in inter preting the unity of time, he observed that unity most carefully, at least in his comedies. In almost all of them; the action is confined to a day or less. If he was able to do this only by an unrealistic compression of incidents, critics should not complain; for classic literature abounds in dramas with the same concentration of action. As for the unity of place, which he does not men tion in Timber, he observes it well. Not nearly so rigidly as Castelvetro would wish, perhaps, for the Italian critic said that "the scene of the action must be constant, being not merely restricted to one city or house, but indeed to that one place alone which could be visible to one person." (Clark. Euro pean Theories of the Drama, p. 64) But in most of his plays he confines the scenes to one city. In his best ones he does even better: The Silent Woman and The Alchemist are commonly regarded as his ablest dramas; and both are strong in the unities of action, time, and place. Moreover, in his best comedies Jonson is classical in his chief purpos:. What he seeks to do in Every Man in His Humour, Every Man out of His Humour, Volpone, The Silent Woman, and The Achemjst, is to.. satirize typi cal frailties and affectations. He should be given credit for this, instead of being blamed for not making each character a many-sided, complex person ality. To etch typical follies sharply upon the minds of spctators, he _usually gives each of his characters only one trait or folly. ThIS one quality, not confused by others and strongly drawn with the detils supplied by J oson's keen observation thus becomes exaggerated into a picture at once unrnistak ably recognizable and ludicrous. When a skilful satirist uses this method upon the proper qualities and frailties, he can have a salutary effect upon manners and morals. Likely Jonson's plays had a wholesome effect upon the braggart |
