C-G. 241 a; ll. 24–6 to C-G. 547 b; ll. 29–30 to C-G. 425 b; l. 57 to C-G. 41 b, 70 b; l. 94 to C-G. 182 b. The Scene contains 32 per cent. double endings and 37 per cent. run-on lines. The authorship of its two songs is less certain. Field was more given to song-writing than was Massinger, and the second of this pair is reminiscent in its conception of the Grace Seldom episode in Amends for Ladies (II, i). The short IV, iii is by Massinger. In evidence of him are its 36 per cent. of double endings and 55 per cent. of run-on lines, its involved sentence structure, and the familiar phrasing which makes itself manifest even in so brief a passage (e. g.: To play the parasite, l. 7—cf. V, iii, 78 and C-G. 334 b. Cf. also ll. 9–10 with D. III, 476; and l. 22 with C-G. 40 b, 153 a, 262 b.). The same dramatist’s work continues through the last Scene of the Act. This, the emotional climax of the play, representing a quasi-judicial procedure, affords him abundant opportunity for fervid moralizing and speech-making, of which he takes advantage most typically. Massinger commonplaces are l. 29, Made shipwreck of your faith (cf. C-G. 55 b, 235 a, 414 b); l. 56, In the forbidden labyrinth of lust (cf. C-G. 298 b); l. 89, Angels guard me! (cf. C-G. 59 b, 475 b); l. 118–9, and yield myself Most miserably guilty (cf. C-G. 61 b, 66 b, 130 a; D. VI, 354); etc.; while within a year or so of the time when he wrote referring to “those famed matrons” (l. 70), he expatiated upon them in detail (see The Virgin Martyr, C-G. 33 a). Yet more specific parallels may be found: for l. 63 cf. C-G. 179 a; ll. 76–7, cf. C-G. 28 a; l. 78, cf. C-G. 32 b; ll. 162–3, cf. C-G. 3 b, in a passage wherein there is a certain similarity of situation; l. 177, cf. D. IX, 7. Were any further confirmation needed for Massinger’s authorship, the metrical tests would supply it, with their 36 per cent. double endings and 34 per cent. run-on lines. The most cursory reading of V, i is sufficient to establish the conviction that its author is not identical with that of the earlier comic passages—is not Field, but Massinger. The humor, such as it is, is of a graver, more restrained sort—satiric rather than burlesque; it has lost lightness and verve, and approaches to high-comedy and even to moralizing. One feels that the confession of the tailor-gallant is no mere fun-making devise, but a caustic attack upon social conditions against which the writer nurtured a grudge. Massingerian are such expressions as And now I think on’t better (l. 77—cf. C-G. 57 b, 468 a, 615 a; D. XI, 28), and use a conscience (l. 90—cf. C-G. 444 a, 453 a), while the metrical evidence of
Prev.
Back
Top