The opposite of subtle, Justice

There are many levels to the Justice's character in this play. His personality has depth as do his actions. In justice's name he disguises himself as a fool. All of his actions are written off in the name of the commonwealth, for the king and for justice. But is it justice to dress up and trick people? To serve justice through means of trickery? Isn't one form of trickery just as bad as cutpurse trickery? It is also interesting to think about the implications of one dressing up as a fool, it begs to question which really is the costume and the true character, justice or fool? That is just an initial thought; the particular speech I wanted to talk about is his rant against tobacco and beer. While he is sitting at a bar, and has finished one drink already and has called for another and called for company and an audience. He truly seems to be enjoying himself in his affrontery, and then denounces that which he just partook in. He rants against the wrongs of tobacco and beer in act 2 scene 6, and ends his speech with, "And still the bottle-ale slavereth, and the tobacco stinketh" (2.6.85-86). This is but one instance of the humor to be had by outright hypocracy, the joke is not a subtle one, but is still funny nonetheless. I am excited to keep an eye on this character in particular. If this were a horserace or a sporting event I would like to put my money on Knockem as the guy I like or the horse I want to bet on. He seems like a good fellow to me, his obsession with "Vapours" reminds me of a peaceful guy who is concerned about good vibes, and if you don't spread good vibes then don't project your bad vibes on him. He reminds me of Merrythought.

Justice Overdo "Over-does" It Again

A character I find particularly interesting in Jonson’s Bartholomew Fair is the Justice. Despite his attempts to remain inconspicuous (at least during parts of the play), he constantly finds himself in the middle of drama and difficult situations.  In a way, there is irony simply in the fact that Justice Overdo is supposed to be the Justice of the Peace—his duty is to maintain justice and peace, yet he is continually in the midst of chaotic scenarios.  In Act three, scene three, the Justice does himself a sort of in-justice (cheesey pun not-really-inteded J ) and goes into an overly long soliloquy.  The very first lines he speaks is that he “will make no more orations shall draw / on these tragical conclusions.” (Act 3, scene 3, lines 1-2)  Justice Overdo then proceeds to speak for forty-two straight lines—about said “tragical conclusions,” no less.  This soliloquy is the longest (so far as I remember, and can tell from skimming the rest of the play) single, solid section spoken by one character!  The fact that Justice “Over-do” overdoes his speech, as well as hypocritically stating that he will no longer speak of the very situation that he ends up giving a speech about, reveals that the Justice is yet another character whose own spoken words lead to a minor sort of self-demise. 

You Are What You Eat

In Act II, Jonson finally introduces us to Ursla, the infamous pig seller as she cries, "Quickly, a bottle of ale to quench me, rascal.  I am all fire and all fat, Nightengale; I shall e'en melt away to the first woman, a rib again, I am afraid.  I do water the ground in knots as I go, like a great garden-pot; you may follow me by the S's I make." (Act II, scene ii, lines 49-53).  This line conjures the image of a great woman, sweating profusely as she ambles about her stand.  However, though literally, the line says that we can follow the marks left on the dirt by herdrops of sweat, the footnote tells us that the "S's" she makes on the ground is a joke that implicates those S's are her own urine.  Indeed, "S's" calls to mind the sound in the word "pissing" as well as the sound urine makes.  Here we have a woman who is not only drenched in her own sweat (sweating like a pig, in fact), but waddling around in her own filth.  Very pig-like, no?  Not even a minute into her first appearance on-stage, Ursla unwittingly admits that she herself has become the very thing she sells and eats: an overweight, dirty, gluttonous swine.  Even the comment that she will melt away to "the first woman, a rib again" can implicate her piggishness... pork ribs are quite a tasty treat!  Ursla seems to have conquered the famous adage, "you are what you eat."  The question is, since many of the characters in the play, including the Puritans set out to the fair to eat Ursla's pigs, are they what they eat, too?  Might Jonson be suggesting we are all gluttonous pigs?

Kiss and Tell

The word proctor, initially was understood as a person involved in the legal field with a specialty in church law, wills etc.[1] I agreed with Robbie in my assumption that this position 'should' tale a certain amount of intelligence and "wit" to execute. Littlewit's parading of Win-the-Fight in un-puritan dress and his insistence that Win accept the kisses of both Winwife and Quarlous seem to prove that Littlewit has no wit at all. Johnson presents us with a man that seems to be willing to trade his wife's honor for the security of being in favor with the future husband of the duchess. The Duchess clearly has a hand in the support of Littlewit's household, Johnson seems to imply that the women will just have to adjust and accommodate everyone until a suitor is chosen by the Duchess. I think it is particularly scandalous that Littlewit allows two unmarried men, outside the immediate family, to kiss his pregnant wife despite her protests. Perhaps Littlewit is only 'witty' because he knows how to manipulate the perception of his family to his advantage. Is a man kissing another man's wife only a concern in modern times?

Bzzzzzz.....

Wasp is just one among the many appropriately-named individuals inhabiting Bartholomew Fair. He is always running around complaining and chastising in everyone's ears. In Act I, scene 4, Wasp declares how rushed he is: "Ay, quickly, good mistress, I pray you...(Now I am in haste.) " and yet less than a hundred lines later he stays to complain with Littlewit, even though Littlewit reminds him of his insistence on the need for quick delivery of the box: "you were in haste e'en now, Master Numps,"(14, 19, 99). Wasp agrees, but in a choice between hurrying off and telling everyone about how much he suffers because of his charge Bartholomew Cokes, complaining wins out. He acknowledges his need to leave, but nonetheless says, "yet I will stay too," (100). He then proceeds to bash poor Win as well as Cokes for their lack of wit and common sense. Like Polonius in Hamlet, Wasp seems to delight in the sound of his own voice, speaking at quite length even after receiving the package for which he waited so impatiently. In fact, he talks for so long that by the time he stops, his charge has met up with him! All his fuss and bother was for nothing – Wasp has been unveiled as being utterly ridiculous.

The humor of this moment lies in the fact that until the moment when Cokes walks in with Grace and Mistress Overdo, readers believe that Wasp is the ridiculous member of their little party. He’s rushing off to deliver this box to the poor young man that will be getting married shortly. Readers have no need to doubt who the clown is. Yet immediately upon meeting Cokes, readers become aware of the true measure of insanity with which Wasp has been forced to deal. Even the most unsympathetic of readers must wince at the annoying sound of Cokes voice, which is evident even when silently printed on a page. Wasp’s previous moaning and groaning becomes instantly understandable – who wouldn’t act the same when forced to reign in such an utterly brainless twit?

The Moral Lens

Although most of Johnson’s scathing critiques of society in “Bartholomew Fair” are highly entertaining, I found his satire concerning Busy in Act III to be quite interesting. Busy’s actions in scene 2 seem to reveal Johnson’s opinion on human morality quite clearly.  While Johnson uses the entire play to achieve this same critique, I felt this scene was particularly intense.  The religious fervor with which Busy addresses every aspect of the Fair is quite apparent throughout the play but we finally see his true personality in his search for the pig flesh.  In this scene, Busy does not hesitate to twist one of his frequent sermons into a way to justify his actions. Using Busy, Johnson shows the audience that one man (in this case an extremely religious man) is no better than any other. While this is no new concept, it seems like Johnson is telling us much more. He effectively shows that any man will succumb to his basic desires as long as he can find a way to fool himself into believing his actions are justified. Busy consistently builds up his religious pride to the point where he convinces himself and those around him that his search for fleshly satisfaction is more of a service to his companions. He shows how a man that sets moral standards for himself is bound to those morals primarily by the extent to which he can translate them. Although Johnson does not condone the actions of the clearly vulgar characters in the play, he gives the audience a sense that perhaps they have more moral fiber than the characters that express such religious zeal. By openly embracing their desire to satisfy themselves, they seem to achieve a level of honesty impossible for a man like Busy. Johnson shows us that Busy’s ideals are little more than a lens through which he can view himself as a righteous man no matter what his actions may be. The only problem with the lens is that it is imited to influencing Busy's perception.

Littlewit's little wit

In the opening act of the play, Littlewit, Win, Quarlous, and Winwife are engaged in a conversation, during which, Littlewit blatantly allows the other gentlemen to kiss his wife.  Win is very much in protest against this action and finds it ridiculous that her husband allows, if not, encourages it.  After Quarlous's kiss, she exclaims, "Why, John? Do you see this, John? Look you! Help me, John (1.3. 37-38)."  Littlewit replies by telling his wife that she has no need for objection, saying, "They'll do you no harm, Win, they are both our worshipful good friends (1.3 45-46)."  It seems quite strange for a man to allow others to kiss his wife, especially while she protests.  As we learned from "A Woman Killed with Kindness," extra-marital affection was scoffed at (to say the least) in this time period.  Littlewit's attitude seems to be quite a contrast to that of Frankford in "Woman Killed."  Having said that, what are we to expect from a character with such a name as "Littlewit?"  Jonson seems to be offering a glimpse into this man's apparently dim psyche right off the bat in the play.  This first act seems to set Littlewit up for complete failure as a husband and as the learned man he is expected to be (I'm not sure what a "proctor" was at this time, but I'm assuming it is a profession similar to that of a lawyer).

Busy Hypocrisy

The criticism Jonson makes about religion, class, and society as a whole are harsh in Bartholomew Fair, and sometimes downright cruel. Through his language and verse Jonson reveals the true nature of Bartholomew's characters, each upholding to thier own foolishness and hyprocrisy in different ways and actions. Zeal-of-the-land Busy illistrates this technique of Jonsons in end of Act I. While the fair and all its glory is the heat of the conversation in Act I, Busy speaks against it and all its evils: "The place is not much, not very much; we may be religious in midst of the profane, so it be eaten with a reformed mouth, with sobriety and humbleness, not gorged in with gluttony or greediness" (Act I, scene I.6, lines 73-78). Busy is referring to the pig that Win is "craving," although she is only faking so her and Littlewit have an excuse to go to the fair. Although Busy belittles the fair, he himself succombs to the fair, perhaps due to his own personal desires to attend but is too proud to admit. In the end of Act I he says: "In the way of comfort of the weak, I will go, and eat...There may be good use made of it, too, not I think on 't: by the public eating of swine's flesh, to profess our hate and loathing of Judiasm, whereof the brethren stand taxed. I will thereofre eat, yea, I will eat exceedingly" (Act I, scene I.6, lines 95-100). Through this last declaration, Busy proves himself a hypocrite. He has made an excuse to "eat exceedingly" although he has previously denounced his hate for the fair. Jonson is also criticizing religion (Puritans) as well in this verse, for Busy hates on the Jews, but Busy does not even hold up to his own religious values and beliefs, which portrays his religion as destorted and undisplined, which are characteristics he says are of the Jews. Busy is no better than "fools" he speaks of at the fair, for he attends and plans to eat pig, which helps the fair make profit and continue their services. Through his language and actions Busy proves himself a hypocrite without ever intentionally trying to do so.

A Fool of a Lad

Out of all the characters in Ben Jonson’s “Bartholomew Fair,” Bartholomew Cokes presents himself in a very unfortunate light as he sails about the fair, spending money, having his purse stolen from him while singing about cutpurses, and having even his servant have more wit, cunning, and control than he does. The scene that I find most intriguing about how he presents himself occurs in Act 3, Scene 5 when he withdraws his purse and dangles it in front of the fair folk (including the man who will eventually steal from him) only to have everyone around him assume him to be a fool. He taunts the cutpurses to do what they will when he joins in the song being sung by Nightingale and when he states, “A good jest, I’ faith; I would fain see that demon, your cutpurse you talk of, that delicate-handed devil. They say he walks hereabout; I would see him walk, now” (lines 36-38). These lines seem to indicate that Jonson was critiquing the upper class in their idiocy of not only squandering their money but being careless with their estates. This becomes even more apparent as Cokes buys good that he has no use of, loses not one but two purses, and still borrows money from Littlewit in Act 4.
By Cokes himself speaking about how he would like to see the “delicate-handed devil” walk among them and try and steal his purse, he demonstrates his complete lack of understanding of the world. He seems completely naïve and unable to comprehend the world around him. Quite frankly, he’s an idiot to throw/demonstrate his money around and still lose it more than once. By his speech about cutpurses simply being a jest, we can see that his upper class upbringing has made him careless. I think Jonson presented Cokes’ personality with his actions and his speech in this way in order to critique the upper class’ inability to comprehend the lifestyle of the lower classes (of the fair). Indeed, Cokes’ speech presents a social commentary at the expense of himself being the butt of the joke. He is the fool who only sees life through the lens of his upper class privilege; he cannot survive in the “fair world” nor can he survive in the lower class realm. From this, I am to understand that Jonson is mocking all of the upper class members of society who flounder their fortunes on meaningless “fairlings.”

Getting the “Vapours”: The Performance of Wit

Comic by Tom Gauld

In poetic homage, Francis Beaumont wrote of Ben Jonson:

Methinks the little wit I had is lost
Since I saw you; for wit is like a rest
Held up at tennis, which men do the best
With the best gamesters
Mr. Francis Beaumont's Letter to Ben Jonson, ca. 1608-1610

About fifty years later, John Dryden made the pithy remark:

In reading Shakespeare, we often meet passages so congenial to our nature and feelings, that, beautiful as they are, we can hardly help wondering why they did not occur to ourselves; in studying Jonson, we have often to marvel how his conceptions could have occurred to any human being.
An Essay of Dramatic Poets Works, 1668

As you have discovered this week while reading Bartholomew Fair, following Jonson’s language, euphemisms, and citational references, both classical and local, is no small achievement. As we noted in our discussion of the Induction, Jonson’s acerbic satire does not spare anyone (perhaps not even the playwright himself); he is famous for besting anyone in games of wit. In his drama, this often comes across as irony, since the words that indict his character types tend to come from their own mouths. Your job this week is to kill one of his bitter jokes by explaining it.

Frontispiece to The Wits or Sport upon Sport (London, 1662). Attributed to Francis Kirkman.

Please select a particularly “biting” passage in which a character unwittingly reveals something embarrassing, unpleasant, or unfortunate about him- or herself. Because Jonson’s lampooning often has many layers, you can feel free to take up what interests you most about his critique: cultural, political, theatrical, religious, ideological, personal (etc. etc.). All that is required is that you explain some dimension of a character’s speaking at his or her own expense.

Idolatry and antitheatricalism

The Contents of the several Chapters following.

1 THat the eie is the instrument of wantonnesse, gluttony, and covetousnesse.
2 Howe Idolatry hath a kinde of necessary dependance vpon the eye.
3 How pride is begotten and nourished by the eye.
4 That often seeing is the meanes to drawe both things and persons into contempt.
5 How curiositie and prying into other men busines is bred & maintained by the eye.
6 Of bewitching by the eye.
7 How the generall rebellion of the body is occasioned by the eye.
8 How the eye was the chiefe occasion of originall sinne and of examples in all those mischiefes which formerly are proved to arise from it.
9 Of the false report which the ey makes to the inner· faculties in the apprehension of naturall things.
10 A generall discourse of the delusion of the eye by artificial meanes, a also by the passions of the minde.
11 Of the delusion of the sight in particular by the immed[...]e working of the divell.
12 Of the delusion of the sight by the inchantments of sorcerers.
13 Of the delusion of the fight by the exocismes of onirers.
14 Of the delusion of the sight by the knavery and imposure of Priests & Friers.
15 Of the delusion of the sight by the distemper of the braine.
16 Of the delusion of the sight by the smooth carriage of Hypocrits.
17 Of the delusio~ of the sight by stratagems of warre.
18 Of the delusio~ of the sight by painting.
19 That the eies serue not only as trecherous porters & false reporter in naturall & artificiall things but also as secret intelligencers for discovering the passions of the mind, and diseases of the body.
20 Of the insinit diseases & casualies which the eie it self is subiect vnto.
21 That the eye is not so vsefull for the gathering of knowledge, as is pretended; whether we conside it absolutely in it selfe, or respectiuely in regard of hearing.
22 Containing an answere to an obiection that man alone hath therefore givn him an vpright figure of bodie to the ende hee might behold the heavens.
23 Setting downe at large the hindrances of the eie in the service of God.
24 That supposing the sigh did not hinder· yet is it proued that it furthr litle in the matter of religio~; together with the particular answers to sundry obiections.
25 That the popish religion consists more in eye-service then the reformed.
26 That the sight of the creature helpeth s little in the true knowledg of God.
27 That the eye of the sence failing, that of the vnderstanding & spirit wx more cleare.
28 Treating of the divers priviledges of blind men.
29 That blind men need not co~plain of the want of pleasures, especially the sense of many giefes, being by blindnes much lesned, which is proved by the strong impression of those obiects which to the inner faculties are presented by the eye.
30 That blind men need not co~plaine of their disability in serving the co~mon wealth which is proued by some reasons but chiefly by examples in all kindes.
31 A conclusion of the whole discours by way of meditation or soliloquie.

From Gosson: Playes Confuted in Five Action (1582)

so we giue thakes for the benefits we receiue, that we make the~ ye fountaines of al our blessings, wherin if we thinke as we speake, we commit idolatry, because we bestow yt vpo~
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the idols of ye Gentils, which is proper to God; if we make a diuorce betwene the tongue & the heart, honouringe the gods of ye heathens in lips, & in iesture, not in thought, yet it is idolatrie, because we do yt which is quite co~trary to ye outward profession of our faith. God tearmeth himselfe to be iealous, & iealosie misliketh the smallest iestures or signes of familiaritie, that are giuen to strangers. If Sidrach Misach, & Abednago had not knowne this, they might haue vailed and bended, to the Kings idoll, but because ye outwarde shew, must represe~t yt which is within, they would not seeme to be, that they were not: whose example is set dowe as arule for vs to followe. A bodie would thinke it to be somewhat tollerable, to sitt at the table of Idolators, or to eat of ye meate that hath bene consecrated vnto idols, whe~ we throw not our bodies downe before the~, yet is not yt to be suffred among Christians, as I proued before by ye Apostles, much les ought this to be suffred among vs, yt any should take vnto the~ yt names of ye idols, and iette vpon stages in theire attire, contrary to the counsel of Saint
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Iohn which exhorteth vs to kepe our selues fro~ idols, whrein he doth not onely forbid the worshipping, but the representing of an idoll. So subtill is the deuill, that vnder the colour of recreation, in London, and of exercise of learning, in the vniuersities, by séeing of playes, he maketh vs to ioyne with the Gentiles, in theire corruption. Because the sweete numbers of Poetrie flowing in verse, do wo~derfully tickle the hearers eares, the deuill hath tyed this to most of our playes, that whatsoeuer he would haue sticke fast to our soules, might slippe downe in suger by this intisement, for that which delighteth neuer troubleth our swallow. Thus when any matter of loue is enterlarded though the thinge it selfe bee able to allure vs, yet it is so sette out with sweetns of wordes, fitnes of Epithites, with Metaphors, Alegories, Hyperboles, Amphibologies, Similitudes, with Phrases, so pickt, so pure, so proper; with action, so smothe so liuely, so wanto~; that the poyson creeping on secretly without griefe chookes vs at last, and hurleth vs downe
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in a dead sleepe. As the Diuell hath brought in all that Poetrie can sing, so hath hee sought out euery streine that musicke is able to pipe, and drawe~ all kind of instruments into that compasse, simple and mixte.

Jonson in Contemporary Performacne

Bartholomew Fair at Stratford Canada this summer:

see http://www.stratfordfestival.ca/plays/bartholomew.cfm