The below threads appeared on the www.Shaksper.net discussion board after I posted the paper article there. The primary “critic” of the article – Armado – evidently spent large chunks of time (quite possibly all of his waking hours during the two-week period of his participation) attempting to come up with a persuasive way of refuting it. Because Armado has a certain eloquence – combined with immense self-confidence – there is the danger that the unaided reader will find some of his arguments persuasive, especially given the temporal and textual lag between Armado’s posts and my responses.
Although I found myself writing a post nearly every day, Armado was in the habit of posting at least once, and sometimes two or three times a day. As a consequence, to read my response to a given Armado argument, you might have to skip through the remainder of the voluminous post in which it appeared, one or two subsequent Armado posts that day, my response to Armado’s previous day’s post(s), and then Armado’s next day’s post(s) before finding my response to the argument of interest. To make things easier, in the below excerpts I have embedded brief responses within his posts, so that illogical arguments are flagged, distortions of my thesis corrected, and mistakes of fact pointed out as they occur.
It would be unseemly for me not to acknowledge a debt of gratitude to Armado for drawing so much attention – some of it quite beneficial – to the paper, and I will even go far as to say that I made some modifications in response to some of Armado’s comments – the ones where he seemed to have become genuinely confused by something that might also be confusing to others, as opposed to the ones where he was just plain off base.
For those who like shortcuts, I provide a list of the top ten bad arguments and factual mistakes that Armado makes here: Armado Top Ten
More context:
The Measure for Measure debate ran on www.shaksper.net from a thread that began on August 9, 2005 and continued into a thread that ended on October 25, 2005 . The initial question was about whether St. Luke’s, where the “moated grange” was located, had some real-world antecedent. One member pointed out that Lever said that a “moated grange” was a “country house,” but that “at St. Luke’s” suggested it was “‘an outlying farm-house belonging to a religious establishment’ (O.E.D. 2b.)” This poster had googled the question, found reference to the “The Brotherhood of St. Luke,” a 19th century group Vienna group whose goal was to revive pre-1500 German and Italian art, and wondered whether this later brotherhood might have been based on some earlier brotherhood based in Vienna.
Another poster (hereinafter “Nathaniel,” as he becomes prominent in the debate to follow) pointed out that the title of Measure for Measure appears to come from St. Luke’s in the Bible (“For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again” (Luke 6:38)), but the next day said that he had been informed that the same quote appears in St. Mathew as well, and seemed to retreat from his suggestion.
Yet another member cited Naseeb Shaheen in “Biblical References in Shakespeare’s Plays,” who says the title comes from Jesus’s words in Matthew 7.2, which “was proverbial in in Shakespeare’s day.” Nathaniel then returned to say that it probably was indeed Matthew rather than Luke, since in Shakespeare’s day, the passage in Luke did not repeat the word “Measure” (while the passage in Matthew did). Thus, while the post-MFM King James Bible had “For with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again” for both Matthew 7:2 and Luke 6:38, the pre-MFM Bibles only had that wording in Matthew (in Luke it was either “For with the same measure that ye mete withall, shall other men mete to you again” (Bishop’s Bible), or “For with what measure ye mete, with the same shall men mete to you again” (Geneva Bible).
The next suggestion was that WS might have invoked St. Luke, the patron saint of physicians, because “the world of Measure for Measure is deeply diseased – literally and Figuratively.”
Someone (Leonato) then said that he believed that an argument in the forthcoming “Shakespeare and the Mediterranean” had MFM originally set not in Vienna, but in some Italian city.
Nathaniel agreed that an Italian city made sense, given the Italian names of the characters (Vincentio, Angelo, Claudio, Isabella, Lucio, Mariana, Francesca). Given Shakespeare’s “dreadful” knowledge of geography, Nathaniel doubted that Shakespeare had a specific location in mind (he then cited as examples of Shakespeare’s geographical innocence that he has Milan as a seaport in both TGV and the Tempest, and that “neither of the two plays set in Venice mention canals.” (overlooking the fact that The Merchant of Venice does in fact refer to a gondola.)
At this point, I decided the time was ripe to introduce the world to the debasement theory of Hamlet and Measure for Measure. If the theory is correct, AND the Shakeshaftian theory is correct, then there’s a strong chance that St. Luke’s referred to Luke Kirby, a Catholic priest who had stood trial with Edmund Campion and was executed at the same time as Thomas Cottam, brother of the Stratford schoolmaster. At this point, there is no substitute for the exact language of the posters. I have deleted posts that do not have to do with my thesis and have made additional comments in brackets, to keep the reader oriented.
The Threads
n.b. In these threads I have replaced everyone’s name but my own with that of a Shakespearean character, mostly from Love’s Labour’s Lost.
[2]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause tkrause@cox.net
Date: Thursday, 19 Aug 2004 23:26:11 -0400
Subject: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
I’ll propose the following answers to all the questions raised in this thread so far:
“Measure for Measure” is a reference to the “true” theme of the play, which has to do with debasement of the currency. (“weight by weight” in Shakespeare’s day referred to the principle that if you turned in certain weight of precious metal to the mint, you would receive in return coins having a precious metal content of a corresponding weight).
St. Luke = a reference to Luke Kirby, a Jesuit missionary who was martyred in 1582, along with Thomas Cottam, brother of Stratford schoolmaster John Cottom.
Moated Grange = a reference to Lyford Grange, the moated manor house at which Jesuit Missionary Edmund Campion was captured in 1581.
The references to Jesuits Kirby and Campion point to Mariana as representing Juan de Mariana, a Spanish Jesuit scholar who argued against debasement.
References to Mariana’s brother the great soldier Frederick (who = Federigo Spinola, Spanish-Italian leader killed in a naval action off Ostend in 1603) also point to Juan de Mariana.
The Duke (who = James), Isabella (who = Elizabeth) and Mariana all work in concert to save Angelo – who is named after a coin, the English Angel – from the debasement that he would suffer were he to deflower Isabella or execute Claudio.
The Duke wants Angelo married to Mariana (that is, the anti-debasement principles of Juan de Mariana) for the sake of the stability of the coinage.
The reference to the Duke having still’d Mariana’s brawling discontent is a servile reference to King James’s book on the divine right of kings, which can be viewed as refuting arguments made in Juan de Mariana’s book “On the Education of the King” (which took issue with the divine right).
The theory is spelled out in excruciating detail in my essay “A Picture in Little Is Worth a Thousand Words: Debasement in Hamlet and Measure for Measure” which is will be posted [n.b. the moderator introduced this typo in an attempt to account for the fact that the paper was not yet posted – I had intended that the paper appear at the same time as my post] in the papers section of Shaksper shortly, and which I presented at the 2004 West Virginia Shakespeare and Renaissance Association Conference.
I’d be interested in hearing any comments on either the Measure for Measure argument or the Hamlet argument (which starts from the proposition that “picture in little” refers to coins, and moves on from there).
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1570 Monday, 23 August 2004
From: Nathaniel
Date: Sunday, 22 Aug 2004 11:59:53 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1559 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Tom Krause writes …
“The Duke wants Angelo married to Mariana (that is, the anti-debasement principles of Juan de Mariana) for the sake of the stability of the coinage.”
Are you at all related to the “credulous Krause” who appears in the footnotes to Flann O’Brien’s The Third Policeman? There is a certain similarity in your thinking. [a window into Nathaniel’s mindset – that he can classify my “thinking” without having read my paper, which had not yet been posted]
Nathaniel
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1576 Tuesday, 24 August 2004
[1]
From: Costard
Date: Monday, 23 Aug 2004 14:51:37 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1570 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 00:09:57 -0400
Subj: Re: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Costard
Date: Monday, 23 Aug 2004 14:51:37 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1570 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
I am very grateful to Ms. Setari [who had produced a lengthy digression on Italian Saints in response to Costard’s comment that the Padua’s patron saint was St. Anthony, and his observation that all that remained of him was a dessicated tongue] for taking the time to answer my question. The answer confirms that the history is, indeed, fascinating.
[2]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 00:09:57 -0400
Subject:
Re: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Nathaniel writes . . .
“Are you at all related to the “credulous Krause” who appears in the footnotes to Flann O’Brien’s The Third Policeman? There is a certain similarity in your thinking.”
Nathaniel- “Credulous Kraus” had no “e” — no relation. What we have in common, however, is a critic (in my case you, and in his case the narrator) who casts aspersions on our work without troubling to explain the criticism and quite possibly without reading the work. “Credulous” is a particularly strange word to describe me, since my work shows me skeptical of just about everything that has ever been written about Measure for Measure.
When the paper is up, I hope you will read it and rethink your thinking about my thinking, and provide some feedback that might give me a basis to rethink my thinking about your thinking.
Here is some of my thinking, in case you don’t get a chance to read the paper.
1. Juan de Mariana was a Spanish Jesuit who argued against debasement of the currency.
2. A character in Shakespeare’s play, “Angelo”, is clearly named (at least in part) for the English Angel coin (based on plays on the name about “testing” his “mettle”, etc.; see the notes to Lever’s Arden edition).
3. Mariana saves the coin (Angelo) from becoming debased.
Facts 1-3 invite the hypothesis that Mariana is Juan de Mariana. To test this hypothesis, look to what might be the “identifying features” of Mariana. Apart from (1) her willingness to marry Angelo (the coin) — which in itself points to Juan de Mariana, there are two others: (2) Mariana’s brother the great soldier Frederick, who miscarried at sea; (3) The moated grange near St. Luke’s.
Federigo Spinola is by far the strongest candidate for the great soldier “Frederick” (the only other one I have heard of is Frederick Barbarossa, who died while crossing or swimming in a river, but nobody has explained what Shakespeare might have meant by such a reference). Spinola died at sea in 1603, fighting for Spain, and would have been known to Shakespeare’s audience. Spinola points to Spain and thus to Juan de Mariana (Mariana’s support of privateering, and Spinola’s status as a sort of glorified privateer is another connection).
As to the moated grange, I am not aware of any other attempts to identify a “real” moated grange. But “Lyford Grange” was a grange that had a moat, and would have been well known to at least some members of Shakespeare’s audience as the site at which Jesuit Edmund Campion was captured in 1581. The “moated grange” thus points to Jesuits and thus to Juan de Mariana.
To further test the hypothesis, consider how well it explains other aspects of the play, including aspects that have been identified as “problematic.”
1. Isabella’s name: Isabella is Spanish for Elizabeth. That fact, plus the presence of other Spanish elements in the play, points to Isabella as Queen Elizabeth.
2. Isabella’s refusal to exchange her chastity for the life of her brother: points to the Virgin Queen.
3. Isabella’s silence in the face of the Duke’s proposal: points to the Virgin Queen.
4. Isabella’s stand against debasement: points to Elizabeth’s restoration of coinage that had been debased by her father and brother.
5. Excision of the entire text of Measure for Measure in a 1632 Folio version of Shakespeare’s plays that was censored by the Spanish Inquisition: points to Isabella as Elizabeth, in that references to Elizabeth in other plays were removed. Also points to Mariana as Juan de Mariana, in that Mariana had fallen out of favor with the Inquisition due to his views on debasement.
6. The Duke’s role in the debasement allegory is also that of a monarch: Points to King James; consistent with opinion of many if not most scholars who see parallel between Duke and James.
7. The Duke’s requirement that Angelo marry Mariana: necessary to the debasement allegory.
8. Claudio’s name: resonates with debasement theme, given debased and/or counterfeit coins in England of two Roman Claudians (Emperors Claudius and Nero).
9. The 19-year period that the laws have not been enforced: matches the period during which English coinage was debased (1542-1561).
10. The 14-year period that the laws have not been enforced: matches the period during which debased coins bearing King Edward’s image were in circulation (1547-61).
11. The 5-year period that Angelo has been apart from Mariana: matches the period of time since Spain initiated a debasement.
12. St. Luke’s: points to Luke Kirby, who stood trial with Edmund Campion.
13. Numerous references to debasement of the currency in Measure for Measure: points to larger debasement theme.
14. Debasement themes in Troilus and Cressida and Hamlet: point to debasement theme in Measure for Measure.
15. Debasement allegory not present in underlying sources: points to intentional insertion of theme by Shakespeare.
Thus, in addition to the choice of the name Mariana, and the three identifying features of that character (the brother, the grange, and her participation in saving the coin), there are at least 15 more “pointers” that support the debasement theme, or can be explained by the debasement theme. For many of these 18 pointers (i.e. the listed 15 plus the original 3), we can certainly come up with alternative explanations. For example, St. Luke’s: it’s quite possible that Shakespeare (1) had the disease metaphor in mind, (2) was thinking of Padua, or (3) had read something approaching the title of the play in Luke in the Bible (note that the delayed publication of Measure for Measure gives you plenty of room to argue that St. Luke’s was added after the King James version of the Bible came out, if you want to); or (4) chose St. Luke at random. St. Luke’s as Luke Kirby is not essential to the debasement theory, although it fits in nicely with it. [Note that despite this statement, I will later be accused of insisting that St. Luke’s must refer to Luke Kirby]
But show me another theory that tells you who the brother Frederick is, where the moated grange is, and why the Valladolid copy is missing Measure for Measure. There is something attractive about having a unified theory to explain just these three points, and it’s all the more attractive given how much else it explains.
The above is not a complete exposition of the paper or the theory, but it has often sufficed to get thoughtful individuals to acknowledge that there may be something there. You should read the paper before committing yourself to any further positions.
By an odd coincidence, I just this evening received my copy of the Sept.-Oct. issue of Harvard Magazine, which has an article in it about Stephen Greenblatt’s new book “Will in the World.” Apparently, Greenblatt subscribes to the “Shakespeare as Shakeshafte” theory and thus has Shakespeare knowing Edmund Campion personally. Perhaps you consider me “credulous” because you think that my theory of Measure for Measure derives from that theory. Actually, I am undecided on Shakespeare as Shakeshafte. While the two theories happen to be mutually reinforcing, neither depends on the other.
Tom
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1586 Wednesday, 25 August 2004
[1]
From: Kent
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 10:05:10 -0400
Subj: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Rosaline
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 11:23:24 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Holofernes
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 18:22:58 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Nathaniel
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 23:33:51 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Kent
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 10:05:10 -0400
Subject: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
I’ve just read the recent exchange between Nathaniel and Tom. I was the reader who evaluated and then accepted Tom Krause’s essay on Measure for Measure for publication. In my view, Tom makes a fascinating and extremely well supported argument for an allegorical reading of M for M. I wrote in my evaluation that Tom’s reading uncovers PART of Shakespeare’s intention but not all of it. In other words, there’s plenty of room for discussions of justice versus mercy, forced marriages, etc.. But on an allegorical level, Tom cold-cocked the play: he’s right.
I understand that Tom will post his essay. When you read the whole argument, I think you’ll be as impressed as I was. [Thanks, Kent]
Kent Editorial Board Member SRASP (Shakespeare and Renaissance Association: Selected Papers)
[2]————————————————————-
From: Rosaline
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 11:23:24 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Personally, I’m swooning over Mr. Krause’s theory. I like the link of “debased” to the name Claudio/Claudius in Shakespeare’s mind so much better than the meaning “lame” considering the characters to whom he assigns it. [Thanks, Rosaline] And the “debased” theme is certainly in the play. What jumps into my mind is “fond sicles of the tested gold.” Sure, it’s a fun play on “testicles,” but it won’t be the first time Shakespeare has used sexual imagery to lead into a political theme. The temple garden scene in H VI part 1 with its “plucking a rose” (deflowering a virgin) pissing match between the scions of York and Lancaster was a pretty caustic reference to the rape of England in those rose wars.
But I’m going to have to sit for a while with the romance between Elizabeth (Isabella) and James (the Duke). I don’t hate it. Basically, it makes Elizabeth wrong for refusing to marry and encourages James to leave off his Catholic leanings (masquerading as a monk) and take responsibility for ruling a Protestant kingdom (Elizabeth). Wouldn’t you say?
[3]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 18:22:58 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Tom Krause wrote:
“Nathaniel writes . . .
‘Are you at all related to the “credulous Krause” who appears in the footnotes to Flann O’Brien’s The Third Policeman? There is a certain similarity in your thinking.’
“Nathaniel – “Credulous Kraus” had no “e” — no relation. What we have in common, however, is a critic (in my case you, and in his case the narrator) who casts aspersions on our work without troubling to explain the criticism and quite possibly without reading the work. “Credulous” is a particularly strange word to describe me, since my work shows me skeptical of just about everything that has ever been written about Measure for Measure.”
I must confess that I have not read “The Third Policeman”, but I shall remedy the deficiency if the footnotes contain nonsense of such quality. I have not heard of Federigo (Federico) Spinola who, perhaps unfairly, has not troubled historians. More to the point, Shakespeare would not have done so either (let alone poor William Shakeshafte in rural Lancashire). It was Federico’s younger brother Ambrogio (Ambrosio), millionaire banker and self-taught military genius, who was a “great soldier” – the greatest general of his age, but he did not achieve any fame until his capture of Ostend in 1604, a trifle late for notice in “Measure for Measure”. [A peculiar observation, given that the “great soldier Frederick” would hardly have referred to someone named Ambrosio]
Holofernes
[4]————————————————————-
From: Nathaniel
Date: Tuesday, 24 Aug 2004 23:33:51 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Tom Krause writes …
“Juan de Mariana was a Spanish Jesuit who argued against debasement of the currency.”
Yes he did. But Mariana’s De Monetae Mutatione (On the Alteration of Money) was published in 1605. Whereas Measure for Measure was first performed late 1603 or early 1604.
“As to the moated grange, I am not aware of any other attempts to identify a “real” moated grange. But “Lyford Grange” was a grange that had a moat, and would have been well known to at least some members of Shakespeare’s audience as the site at which Jesuit Edmund Campion was captured in 1581. The “moated grange” thus points to Jesuits and thus to Juan de Mariana.”
Lyford Grange was in Berkshire. May I propose two alternative moated granges that WS might have known in Warwickshire? And both with religious connections?
The Benedictine Priory outside Coventry (situated where the Keresley and Sadler roads met) was a moated grange. And so was (and still is) Baddesley Clinton, which was used in 1603 as a meeting place for the Jesuit mission under Henry Garnet (he of Macbeth fame). [of course, using the word “grange” is much more likely to evoke Lyford Grange than some other structure that arguably meets one of the OED definitions of “grange”]
“1. Isabella’s name: Isabella is Spanish for Elizabeth. That fact, plus the presence of other Spanish elements in the play, points to Isabella as Queen Elizabeth.”
Actually the Spanish for Elizabeth is Isabel. Isabella is Italian. And most of the other characters in the play have Italian names too. [answered below]
I’m not sure what you mean by Spanish elements in the play pointing to Isabella as Queen Elizabeth. Elizabeth had no Spanish blood and hated both Spain and the memory of her father’s Spanish wife. [answered below]
“5. Excision of the entire text of Measure for Measure in a 1632 Folio version of Shakespeare’s plays that was censored by the Spanish Inquisition: points to Isabella as Elizabeth, in that references to Elizabeth in other plays were removed.”
I wasn’t aware of this, but if it is true, isn’t it more likely the Inquisition had the same problem with the play that Thomas Bowdler had, centuries later? That once they’d removed all the bawdy jokes and references to sex and syphilis, there wasn’t much of a play left to read? [answered below]
Nathaniel
[What about 6-15?]
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1598 Thursday, 26 August 2004
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Wednesday, 25 Aug 2004 23:42:44 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1586 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Rosaline writes . . . .
“But I’m going to have to sit for a while with the romance between Elizabeth (Isabella) and James (the Duke). I don’t hate it. Basically, it makes Elizabeth wrong for refusing to marry and encourages James to leave off his Catholic leanings (masquerading as a monk) and take responsibility for ruling a Protestant kingdom (Elizabeth). Wouldn’t you say?”
Well, I guess one way to look at it is that “Isabella = Elizabeth” explains why there never really WAS a romance between the Duke and Isabella. Viewed this way, the second of the Duke’s “proposals” can be read as a reference to James’s succession of Elizabeth (admittedly, the first one does look like a proposal; perhaps a concession to the fact that the play did have multiple layers, and that some members of the audience would have liked a bit of romance). Not sure I follow how it makes Elizabeth “wrong” (in that Isabella doesn’t agree to marry the Duke, and everything turns out ok in the end), but your point about James leaving off his Catholic leanings is certainly intriguing.
Holofernes writes:
“More to the point, Shakespeare would not have done so either (let alone poor William Shakeshafte in rural Lancashire).”
I don’t think the Shakeshaftians are arguing that Shakespeare wrote his plays from Lancashire . . . . As for whether Shakespeare would have heard of Federigo, see below.
Holofernes writes:
“It was Federico’s younger brother Ambrogio (Ambrosio), millionaire banker and self-taught military genius, who was a “great soldier” – the greatest general of his age, but he did not achieve any fame until his capture of Ostend in 1604, a trifle late for notice in “Measure for Measure”.”
I think even the “credulous Kraus” would see another argument against equating the “great soldier Frederick” with someone named “Ambrosio.”
Federigo/ico’s military record was certainly mixed (the paper at n.102 [now n. 111] cites some of his more positive reviews), but he was one of the most prominent military men in Spain from the period 1593-1603, and between the two brothers, he was clearly the “leader” (even though he was in fact the younger brother). He was the first one to go to Spain and pledge the family’s money in support of the Spanish cause in the early 1590’s; he was the one clamoring to invade England in 1597; Ambrosio didn’t take up the Spanish cause until later. The news of the various battles of Ostend would certainly have made it to England (there was an English presence in Ostend, of course), and I think we can safely assume that the death of the Spanish leader there would have been widely reported. I will go one step further here and say that Shakespeare MUST have heard of Federigo, and would not have named Mariana’s brother Frederick UNLESS he meant to refer to Spinola. If the name of the “brother” had no significance, Shakespeare would have avoided picking a name that corresponded to that of a famous soldier who had recently died at sea.
Nathaniel writes:
“But Mariana’s De Monetae Mutatione (On the Alteration of Money) was published in 1605. Whereas Measure for Measure was first performed late 1603 or early 1604.”
Actually, as indicated in the paper, this is the point where we may have to say: “Everything points to Juan de Mariana, ergo, Shakespeare must have known of Mariana’s views when he wrote Mariana into Measure for Measure.” In other words, the fact that Shakespeare named the character at the center of a debasement allegory “Mariana” means he knew of the views of Juan de Mariana. That’s not to say I haven’t tried to place Mariana in Shakespeare’s hands; just that in the end, we may never be able to prove it one way or another. The paper suggests several ways of dealing with this issue, and I’ve got a few more:
(1) At least one biographer (Alan Soons) writes that Mariana’s views on debasement appeared in the first publication of his De Rege book in 1599. Although I have reason to doubt the accuracy of this statement (see paper), I don’t have access to the primary sources.
(2) For that matter, I have not reviewed Mariana’s massive history of Spain, which was published long before Measure for Measure was first performed, but is today available in English translation only in rare book rooms. Given the role that debasements played in Spanish history, there is some chance that Mariana mentioned them, and did so in his typical judgmental fashion (on the other hand, I acknowledge that doing so might have been dangerous politically).
(3) A famous historian, teacher, and theologian like Mariana did not have to publish his views in book form for them to be known. Given that the Spanish debasement began in 1599, he had plenty to complain about for the five years preceding the appearance of Measure for Measure. His views may have found their way to an English university, and from there . . . (is it ok to suggest on this site that Shakespeare might have had university connections?).
(4) As indicated in the paper, we can place Shakespeare in the same building as the Spanish peace delegation of Spring-Summer 1604, so it’s conceivable that he learned of Mariana and his views then. Having worked debasement into Hamlet (see paper), Shakespeare’s ears would have been acutely tuned to the subject.
(5) Again, although it would be nice, I don’t think we need to find independent “proof” that (a) Mariana had expressed his views on debasement prior to the appearance of Measure for Measure, and (b) that Shakespeare knew of those views. If you feel strongly that such proof is needed, then until someone goes to Spain and finds it you are stuck with arguing that the debasement allegory was added sometime after Mariana’s views were published. As noted in the paper, at least one prominent scholar has argued that Measure for Measure must have been revised after its initial performance.
(6) Here’s one lead that I haven’t been able to track down, but would be interested to hear any ideas as to how to do so (that don’t involve travelling to Madrid and looking through some Spanish archive): Lytton Strachey’s book, “Elizabeth and Essex,” mentions a Spanish document from the mid-1590s in which Philip II says something about asking a select group of theologians about how best to legally raise funds for a fourth Armada and an invasion of England. If this question was asked, you can bet it raised the question about the propriety of debasement. Even if Mariana wasn’t one of the theologians asked, he might well have heard about the inquiry and formulated his own views. I have gone through dozens of biographies of Philip but have not found any further references to this document or the basic inquiry. A more diligent researcher, perhaps with access to Spanish records, might be able to follow this trail to documents showing that there was a debate in Spain about debasement in the mid to late 1590s (note that it was Philip III who initiated the debasement in 1599; Philip II might well have been following Mariana’s advice [or that of some similarly-minded theologian] in not doing so). I don’t have the Strachey book on hand, but you can find the reference to the document somewhere around pp. 155-160 of the version I was reading (look up Philip II in the index). [I still think this is an intriguing lead]
Again, even if we find some documentation of Mariana’s views prior to 1605, it will be very difficult to establish a channel to Shakespeare. The “proof” is in Shakespeare’s use of Mariana. Res ipsa loquitur.
P.S. If you have an authoritative source showing De Monetae as having been independently published in 1605, I’d be interested to hear of it. [he obviously got this from a website that has the date of independent publication wrong, although it is true that the substance of Mariana’s views on debasement was published in 1605]
P.P.S. Not sure where you get your performance dates for Measure for Measure. My sources all put the first documented performance at December 26, 1604. Although I have seen arguments [which I did not find persuasive] that it may have been written in early 1604, I don’t remember seeing the play pushed back to 1603.
Nathaniel writes . . .
“Lyford Grange was in Berkshire. May I propose two alternative moated granges that WS might have known in Warwickshire? And both with religious connections?
“The Benedictine Priory outside Coventry (situated where the Keresley and Sadler roads met) was a moated grange. And so was (and still is) Baddesley Clinton, which was used in 1603 as a meeting place for the Jesuit mission under Henry Garnet (he of Macbeth fame).”
Excellent — all the moated granges point to Catholics, and two out of three point to Jesuits!
Still, unless the “moated grange” reference is completely meaningless [which I take it is your argument?], I like Lyford best, mainly because it has the word “grange” in it, and because [I’m fairly sure] it would have been better known to Shakespeare’s audience [especially any Catholics among them] than the other ones. [Why do you think that Shakespeare, possessor of one of the most expansive minds of his time, only knew about the moated granges in Warwickshire?] Shakeshaftians will have reasons to like Lyford better as well (especially if they like Luke Kirby, given the Kirby-Campion nexus). Nevertheless, I’d be happy to settle for Baddesley Clinton if that will make you happy . . .
Nathaniel writes . . .
“Actually the Spanish for Elizabeth is Isabel. Isabella is Italian. And most of the other characters in the play have Italian names too.”
This is not necessarily true. I first realized that Isabella meant Elizabeth when I was attempting to read a book on this period that happened to be in Spanish. And I have to imagine that Isabella was an accepted form of the name even in Spain (or have we been calling Isabella of Castile the wrong name all these years?). In any event, notice how the vast majority of the spoken references in Measure for Measure to “Isabella” are to “Isabel.” You’re making my case for me!
PS — at one point I did have “Spanish connections” for all the names in the play, but I concluded that they were rather speculative if not downright weak. For example, Vincentio Saviolo was an Italian fencing master (from Padua, no less) who had spent time in Spain and who may have had an influence on the fencing in some of Shakespeare’s plays, and thus has a parallel to the way the Duke manipulates the other characters . . . . Bernardino de Mendoza was a Spanish Ambassador implicated in one of the plots against Queen Elizabeth, but wasn’t killed (like everyone else) because he enjoyed diplomatic immunity . . . . I’ve already explained Claudio’s name elsewhere.
Nathaniel writes . . .
“I’m not sure what you mean by Spanish elements in the play pointing to Isabella as Queen Elizabeth. Elizabeth had no Spanish blood and hated both Spain and the memory of her father’s Spanish wife.”
The Spanish elements are the ones I have identified: Mariana, Federigo, and a possible reference to debasement of the Spanish coinage. These elements point to Spain/Spanish, and provide a basis for looking to the Spanish language to figure out who Isabella is. . . . I’m not sure what Elizabeth’s hatred of things Spanish has to do with anything here . . . .
Nathaniel writes . . .
“I wasn’t aware of this, but if it is true, isn’t it more likely the Inquisition had the same problem with the play that Thomas Bowdler had, centuries later? That once they’d removed all the bawdy jokes and references to sex and syphilis, there wasn’t much of a play left to read?”
What’s interesting is that in the other plays, bawdy jokes and references to sex, syphilis etc. are all left intact. The only thing that is removed in other plays are references to Elizabeth and Cranmer (this is my understanding from the secondary sources I have seen; if anyone knows otherwise, please correct me). In Measure for Measure, the censor was faced with the problem of what to do when Elizabeth appeared on practically every page, and the only solution he came up with was to rip out the whole play. Of course, this might only mean that the censor thought Isabella was Elizabeth, not that Shakespeare did. But then again . . . .
Tom
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1604 Monday, 30 August 2004
[1]
From: Montano
Date: Thursday, 26 Aug 2004 08:42:57 -0700 (PDT)
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1598 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Katharine
Date: Friday, 27 Aug 2004 00:22:34 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Montano
Date: Thursday, 26 Aug 2004 08:42:57 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1598 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Tom Krause writes, “A famous historian, teacher, and theologian like Mariana did not have to publish his views in book form for them to be known. Given that the Spanish debasement began in 1599, he had plenty to complain about for the five years preceding the appearance of Measure for Measure.”
OK: what do you make of Will S.’s borrowing the title from Jesus’ words, and the meaning of those specific words, in all of this historical context?
Montano
[2]————————————————————-
From: Katharine
Date: Friday, 27 Aug 2004 00:22:34 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1576 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Further to the recent discussion on the significance of St Luke in Measure for Measure, a note from Charles Whitworth printed in Shakespeare Quarterly Vol 36 No 2 (Summer 1985) argues that St Luke’s Day (October 18) was, in Renaissance England, considered to be propitious for choosing a husband. It seems that AR Wright in his book British Calendar Customs (1940) records a ‘charm’ recited by young women: “St Luke, St Luke, be kind to me / In dreams let me my true love see”. Whitworth notes that Shakespeare also refers to St Luke in Taming of the Shrew and he further cites Chapman’s Monsieur D’Olive and Peele’s Old Wives’ Tale as other examples of references to St Luke’s Day and its matrimonial connections. Whitworth considers it symbolically appropriate that Mariana should be at St Luke’s while she awaits her husband. [This seems perfectly plausible to me; see my Aug. 24 post – listing four possibilities other than Luke Kirby for Saint Luke’s]
Katharine
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1621 Wednesday, 1 September 2004
[1]
From: Nathaniel
Date: Tuesday, 31 Aug 2004 13:50:57 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1604 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Wednesday, 1 Sep 2004 0:00:10 -0400
Subj: Re: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Nathaniel
Date: Tuesday, 31 Aug 2004 13:50:57 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1604 Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Montano asks …
“OK: what do you make of Will S.’s borrowing the title from Jesus’ words, and the meaning of those specific words, in all of this historical context?”
Well, exactly. Jesus was talking about judgement; Shakespeare’s play is also about judgement. Why look for a highly unlikely – if not ridiculous – esoteric explanation for the play? Mariana published his book on currency at least a year after Measure for Measure appeared. End of story. [addressed above and below]
Unless WS was psychic, that is. And he must’ve been if he was able to predict that Luke Kirby was going to be canonised a saint in 1970. [addressed below]
Nathaniel
[2]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Wednesday, 1 Sep 2004 0:00:10 -0400
Subject: Re: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Montano writes:
“Tom Krause writes, ‘A famous historian, teacher, and theologian like Mariana did not have to publish his views in book form for them to be known. Given that the Spanish debasement began in 1599, he had plenty to complain about for the five years preceding the appearance of Measure for Measure.’
OK: what do you make of Will S.’s borrowing the title from Jesus’ words, and the meaning of those specific words, in all of this historical context?”
As Kent pointed out in a previous post, there is much more to “Measure for Measure” than the proposed debasement message. The name “Measure for Measure” most likely does come from the Bible, and the biblical saying can be seen as having something to do with the surface plot of the play.
But the beauty of the name is that it is also a statement of the position that Shakespeare is taking with respect to the coinage – that it should not be debased. The word “measure” in Shakespeare’s time was often linked to coinage, as in Gerard de Malynes’ 1601 statement that money is a “publica mensura” (see de Malynes, the Canker of the Commonwealth (1601) at 11 (available on line at http://socserv.socsci.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/malynes/canker.pdf))and the publication of books (including one by Juan de Mariana) with the title “De Ponderibus et Mensuris” (“Of Weights and Measures”). As mentioned in a previous post, “Measure for Measure” refers to the expectation that someone bringing a certain “measure” of precious metal to the mint will receive back coins having a corresponding “measure”of precious metal (i.e. a “weight by weight” system).
Mariana’s Treatise, On the Alteration of Money, also contains various statements reflecting the link between “measures” and money. Here is the beginning of Chapter 5 of that work, as translated by Patrick T. Brannan, S.J. (available at http://www.acton.org/publicat/m_and_m/2002_fall/mariana/ch5.html):
“Weights, measures, and money are, of course, the foundations of commerce upon which rests the entire structure of trade. Most things are sold by weight and measure-but everything is sold by money. Everyone wants the foundations of buildings to remain firm and secure, and the same holds true for weights, measures, and money. . . .”
Katharine writes:
“Further to the recent discussion on the significance of St Luke in Measure for Measure, a note from Charles Whitworth printed in Shakespeare Quarterly Vol 36 No 2 (Summer 1985) argues that St Luke’s Day (October 18) was, in Renaissance England, considered to be propitious for choosing a husband.”
I like this better than St. Luke’s as a reference to the “disease” theme, or the Bible’s Luke as the source of “Measure for Measure.” If Shakespeare also intended a reference to Luke Kirby (as proposed in my article), then he must have been very pleased with how well “St. Luke’s” fit in with the surface plot of the play!
Tom
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1632 Thursday, 2 September 2004
[1]
From: Kent
Date: Wednesday, 01 Sep 2004 09:27:16 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Wednesday, 1 Sep 2004 11:22:51 -0400
Subject: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Kent
Date: Wednesday, 01 Sep 2004 09:27:16 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
Peter, you wrote:
“Why look for a highly unlikely – if not ridiculous – esoteric explanation for the play? Mariana published his book on currency at least a year after Measure for Measure appeared. End of story.”
This is unfair and really chop logic, Peter. First, currency issues and Mariana’s link to them were well known long before he published his book. Second, you seem to think that Shakespeare does not put little allegories in his plays. You are dead wrong. Look at the correspondences between the main plot of TN and the famous Anjou affair.
No one is saying that currency is the ONLY thing M for M is about, either. But you apparently don’t know that the phrase “fair measure” was used to mean currency that was not debased.
If you were an astute Elizabethan reading Tom’s paper, you would not think that his interpretation is highly unlikely or ridiculous or even esoteric. You would think, “How clever”!
What we need here are critics/readers who are willing to give authors a chance to make and defend their arguments. Tom has done both – and he has done both quite well.
Ed
[2]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Wednesday, 1 Sep 2004 11:22:51 -0400
Subject: Question Concerning Measure for Measure
Nathaniel writes:
“Well, exactly. Jesus was talking about judgement; Shakespeare’s play is also about judgement. Why look for a highly unlikely – if not ridiculous – esoteric explanation for the play? Mariana published his book on currency at least a year after Measure for Measure appeared. End of story.”
I’m not sure why you characterize the debasement allegory explanation as “highly unlikely – if not ridiculous.” Are you familiar with the literature cited in footnote 19 [now endnote 22] of my article? There have been many books and articles written about economic themes in Shakespeare’s plays. Measure for Measure itself is full of economic references (see article at 3-4, 30-33 [58-59, 72-74]; see also Lever’s notes to his Arden Measure for Measure). It is neither unlikely nor ridiculous to think that Shakespeare – a product of his time, and a member of a middle class increasingly concerned with debasement of the coinage – might have gently worked a debasement theme into one or more of his plays.
Beyond that, we obviously have a disagreement on the proper “standard of proof” for a logical argument. I have proposed a unified theory that explains much of the play – including things that are NOT explained by the “it’s a play about judgment, nothing more” theory. You refuse to consider the theory because I cannot provide “proof” of something that may simply be unprovable by extrinsic means – that Shakespeare knew of Mariana’s views on debasement. You either did not read or dismiss out of hand the various proposals that I have for dealing with this issue. For example, why can’t I argue that the debasement gloss was added long after the first performance of Measure for Measure? And why isn’t the fact that Shakespeare placed Mariana at the center of a debasement allegory enough?
Your method of argumentation reminds me of the flat-earth objection to the Copernican model: “If the Earth were round, people would fall right off. End of story.” With that kind of attitude, you will go through life missing a lot of good stories, some with surprising endings.
Nathaniel also writes:
“Unless WS was psychic, that is. And he must’ve been if he was able to predict that Luke Kirby was going to be canonised a saint in 1970.”
I hope I didn’t lead you to believe that I thought that Kirby had been canonized in Shakespeare’s time. The point is, any martyr was an obvious candidate for Catholic sainthood, and Shakespeare may well have been honoring Kirby’s memory by “promoting” him in advance.
I feel that you are still missing the point of the argument: As indicated in a previous post, there are 18 or more pointers that can be explained by the “debasement” theory. No single one of them “proves” the theory, as any individual one can be explained by other means, or attributed to coincidence. But all of these “pointers” were added by Shakespeare on top of the stories from his original sources, and all of them converge upon a debasement theme. Mathematically speaking, the probability that the convergence of all these different elements upon a single theme arose by random chance is very small.
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1644 Friday, 3 September 2004
[1]
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 2 Sep 2004 13:54:59 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1632 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Nathaniel
Date: Thursday, 2 Sep 2004 21:36:23 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1632 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 2 Sep 2004 13:54:59 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1632 Question on Measure for Measure
[This is Armado’s first contribution]
“‘Why look for a highly unlikely – if not ridiculous – esoteric >explanation for the play? Mariana published his book on currency at least a year after Measure for Measure appeared. End of story.’ This is unfair and really chop logic, Peter. First, currency issues and Mariana’s link to them were well known long before he published his book.”
I have to say that I agree with Nathaniel far more than with Kent or Tom Krause. Having read the essay, it looks suspiciously like the trivial pieces of information on which Krause’s claims are formed are the sort that might be easily assembled and referenced by a person with modern research tools (in particular the internet) who can feed in search terms until he forcibly finds a minor connection between the name “Claudius” and “debasement” for example [I’m not sure why this is a “minor” connection – if Emperor Claudius was associated with debasement – and he almost certainly was, given the prevalence of base Claudius coin in Shakespeare’s day (the baseness making them all the more available to even coin collectors of modest means) – then it’s a very useful point, especially given that it was only discovered after I had found what seemed to me strong evidence of debasement in Hamlet], but they do not look anything like the sort of information that would normally be known to your ordinary Jacobean Englishman, and this hypothetical Englishman (who just happens to know everything that we do – and a little bit more) certainly couldn’t have put it into literature and expected anybody in his audience to recognise the significance of his supposed “allegory” unless the person watching the play had happened to read Tom Krause’s essay (or something very like it) beforehand, and therefore had immediate contact with all the same pieces of obscure trivia and the ability to decipher them from the play in just the right way. [most of what Armado calls “obscure trivia” would have been common knowledge to Shakespeare’s audience. Beyond that, we only know of one performance of MFM, before the Court in December 1604 – even if some references were obscure to the public at large, they might have been “in-jokes.”]
Krause’s “coincidences” [By calling the pointers and connections “coincidences,” Armado simply assumes the conclusion that he wants to reach] are characterised by triviality, tenuous connections that require long explanations to make clear, and special pleading – for example, Mariana didn’t publish his book on the debasement of coinage until after “Measure for Measure” was written and performed, but somehow the play was massively rewritten [massively?] (despite the fact that Krause’s argument depends on major elements of the story having been created around the theme that he creates, so that the major elements of this theme being first introduced in rewrites would seem virtually impossible), or Shakespeare not only heard masses [masses?] about this foreign historian and philosopher (despite the fact that virtually nobody in England is likely to have known his views in any great detail, given that the Jacobean world was not a global village with a global media) but this included a lot of information that happens to have been entirely lost to us, and which makes up for the fact that a lot of the things that Krause built his theory on hadn’t happenedat the time that Shakespeare wrote his play. [an impressive one-sentence paragraph, but a tad distortive]
Kent says “currency issues and Mariana’s link to them were well known long before he published his book”. This would be a lot more relevant if Kent told us what evidence he has for this claim. What makes us think that a middle-class Englishman in Jacobean London would have had any idea of the non-printed views of an academic who spoke in a different language and for an audience in a completely different country? Is Kent – even in this modern world with international media and international scholarship – able to tell me what any major Spanish economic theorist thinks of the state of the Euro (without any printed source for this knowledge – so he must know what they are saying, not what they are writing)? How likely is Kent to write a play in which he uses an “allegory” based on that Spanish economist’s name and opinions? Unless Kent and Krause can produce English sources discussing Mariana and his views on currency debasement before “Measure for Measure” was written and performed, then they cannot claim that this is information that Shakespeare is even remotely likely to have known. [ignoring the circumstantial case] Of course even if they did find this evidence it would not prove their case, since there are almost certainly English-language journals talking about the views of modern Spanish economists on the Euro, but that doesn’t mean that a particular individual (Kent, say, or myself) has read these documents. [so: I need to find the English source, but even that won’t get me anywhere]
I am afraid that Kent and Krause are both suffering from extreme gullibility in relation to “coincidences” [same usage problem noted above], and the theories that can be built up from these coincidences. If they want to show themselves how many corrupt and ridiculous theories can be built on the basis of the sort of logic used in Krause’s essay, they need only read their way through the mountain of ridiculous anti-Stratfordian scholarship, which daily uses similar techniques to prove all sorts of entirely contradictory things about Shakespeare’s plays and their author. [addressed below] It is true that, like Krause’s essay, these works sometimes have you saying to yourself “What a coincidence!” [same usage problem] and “What a clever rhetorical argument!”, but since they routinely prove the opposite of what other logically and evidentially identical arguments prove (some say that “Hamlet” is about King James, some that it is about Queen Elizabeth, some that it is about the Earl of Oxford, and it can’t be about all of them with each individual line meaning six hundred different things) it is fairly obvious that all – or virtually all – of these arguments are wrong. [a fine rebuttal of the anti-Stratfordians] Just as Krause is almost certainly wrong. [non-sequitur]
Besides, Kent claims that Shakespeare did use allegory of this kind in his plays. I would be interested to see a single instance of similar allegory being openly discussed in Renaissance documents about any play. A real allegorical Renaissance play is likely to look more like “A Game at Chess” (which took digs at particular real figures) than like the fantasy concoction based on tenuous trivia and wordgames that Krause constructs, and of course the allegorical nature of “A Game at Chess” was well recorded at the time that it was produced.
Armado.
[As it turns out, Armado and Kent had had a vigorous debate about the merits of modern criticism just before the conference at which I presented my paper. Kent had begged off of the argument, citing his obligations to the conference, and inviting Armado to attend, in the hopes that he might learn something. Armado thus had a strong stake in finding fault with anything that came out of the conference]
[2]————————————————————-
From: Nathaniel
Date: Thursday, 2 Sep 2004 21:36:23 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1632 Question on Measure for Measure
For Kent and Tom Krause …
… you seem to think that Shakespeare does not put little allegories in his plays. You are dead wrong.
Of course he puts allegories in his plays. King Lear is one big allegory. [tell it to Armado!]
Measure for Measure was written in 1603 as Elizabeth died and James came to the throne. To English Catholics this was a time of great hope. The new queen, Anne of Denmark, was a Catholic convert and had promised Rome she would bring up her children as Catholics. The powerful Earl of Northumberland had sent Thomas Percy up to Edinburgh and had secured a promise of religious toleration from James. Henry Garnet, head of the Jesuit mission in England, wrote in 1603: “a golden time we have of unexpected freedom … great hope is of toleration”. Garnet’s great hope was that English Catholics would soon have the religious toleration that Protestants enjoyed in France.
This is the atmosphere in which Measure for Measure was written. At a time when members of Catholic religious orders were banned from England, on pain of death, Shakespeare wrote a play peopled with Franciscan monks and nuns of St Clare. Not only is the Duke disguised as a friar, he hears confession from prisoners and absolves them of their sins. In 1603 the real friars (disguised as noblemen) in London were risking execution for practicing the sacraments.
Whether Shakespeare was a Catholic recusant like his dad, or a church-papist like so many of his friends, or just a bleeding-heart liberal like me who opposes the death penalty, we do not know. What we do know is that he wrote a play in 1603 that is very clearly a plea for toleration. [not necessarily untrue, and it’s the argument made by Ellison and Asquith and doubtless others, but it doesn’t even address my thesis].
Nathaniel
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1659 Monday, 6 September 2004
From: Kent
Date: Friday, 03 Sep 2004 09:37:26 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
Nathaniel acknowledges that allegory is a mode Shakespeare could and did employ, and I am grateful for that. To King Lear we might add Venus and Adonis, in which the allegory (Venus = Love, Adonis = Beauty, Boar = Death) is probably the central focus of the work. Peter also writes of Measure for Measure: “What we do know is that he wrote a play in 1603 that is very clearly a plea for toleration.” Exactly, and so the debasement theme is a little added bonus for the sensitive reader / playgoer.
As for Armado, I’m afraid that his sour, constricted “principles” have made him into an ideological reader where his “theories” come first and the evidence and the experience of reading and being persuaded come second. (It should be the other way around, Thomas.) Juan de Mariana’s 25 books on the history of Spain first came out in 1592; throughout his history, issues of currency come up again and again. Mariana was to Spain what Alexander Hamilton would be to America. And just as all of intellectual Europe knew about Hamilton, intellectuals and well-informed Englishmen knew, in a general sense, about Mariana.
It is interesting that Armado’s point of view necessitates that he disagree with anything new about Shakespeare. Given that, how can he give a fair reading to anybody who doesn’t just copy what has been said before? I wonder if Armado is Richard Levin in disguise?
Kent
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1670 Tuesday, 7 September 2004
[1]
From: Holofernes
Date: Monday, 6 Sep 2004 16:49:29 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1632 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Monday, 6 Sep 2004 12:22:10 -0400
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Armado
Date: Monday, 6 Sep 2004 17:42:31 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1659 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Holofernes
Date: Monday, 6 Sep 2004 16:49:29 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1632 Question on Measure for Measure
Kent wrote:
“First, currency issues and Mariana’s link to them were well known long before he published his book. Second, you seem to think that Shakespeare does not put little allegories in his plays. You are dead wrong. Look at the correspondences between the main plot of TN and the famous Anjou affair.”
As there are no “correspondences between the main plot of TN and the famous Anjou affair”, this is not the crushing rejoinder that Kent must imagine it to be. Dame Frances Yates once compared Henri III to Hamlet, but did not – as far as I am aware – compare his brother Alencon/Anjou to Sir Andrew Aguecheek.
Holofernes
[2]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Monday, 6 Sep 2004 12:22:10 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
Armado writes:
“. . .it looks suspiciously like the trivial pieces of information on which Krause’s claims are formed are the sort that might be easily assembled and referenced by a person with modern research tools (in particular the internet) who can feed in search terms until he forcibly finds a minor connection between the name “Claudius” and “debasement” for example . . .”
Your reference to “claims” (plural) shows that you are not getting the point. My basic “claim” – singular – is that Shakespeare modestly extended a theme that was already abundantly present in the play. Everything else – what you seem to consider “trivia” – are matters that the basic claim helps to explain – not premises needed to support the claim.
This is not some extravagant theory that requires knowledge of vast amounts of “obscure trivia” to uncover or understand. We have a play in which Shakespeare has already made an inordinate number of references to coinage in general and debasement in particular. We note that a portion of the plot – a portion that was added by Shakespeare on top of his original sources – can be seen as a debasement allegory: A certain character saves a character that Shakespeare intentionally named for a coin (Angelo) from becoming debased. All I’m suggesting is the character who saves the coin from debasement (Mariana) is intentionally named for one of Shakespeare’s contemporaries (Juan de Mariana) who argued against debasement.
The other alternative – the one which you seem to be 100% confident in – is that Shakespeare just happened to give the name “Mariana” to the character who saves the coin from debasement.
Which alternative is the more far-fetched?
Applying something akin to the scientific method, we can “test” the debasement hypothesis to see how well it fits with the rest of the play, and whether it adds to our understanding of the play. The more extraneous matter it explains, the more likely the theory is correct. As a starting point, we see that it explains very neatly the reference to the “great soldier Frederick.” The only arguable “great soldier Frederick” to die at sea within 300 years of the play was Federigo Spinola, who died at sea just the year before. And Federigo Spinola as “Frederick” is very consistent with the hypothesis that Mariana is Juan de Mariana and in fact gives us a high level of confidence in that hypothesis. Why would Shakespeare introduce a Frederick who died at sea if not as a reference to a famous Frederick who had recently died at sea? [I make this point a number of times in the threads, yet nobody ever responds to it. It must be right.] If he didn’t mean anything by it, surely he would have picked a name that did NOT correspond to that of a famous soldier who had recently died at sea. And doesn’t Frederick’s Spanish connection suggest that we should look for a Spanish connection in his sister’s name as well? The fact that Juan de Mariana advocated privateering, and that Spinola could be considered a privateer, is an additional connection worthy of our attention (since it may well suggest that Shakespeare was familiar with Mariana’s De Rege book) [never addressed, yet it’s a key point], but it’s not essential to connect Spinola to Mariana.
As mentioned before, the theory also provides plausible explanations for “the moated grange,” “St. Luke’s,” “Claudio”, “Isabella”, 5 years, 14 years, and 19 years, as well as several lines of the play that have not been satisfactorily interpreted. It also explains the otherwise-difficult-to-understand behavior of some of the characters, including Isabella, Mariana, Angelo, Lucio, and the Duke. It is also consistent with scholarship that associates the Duke with King James. It explains why Measure for Measure was the only one of Shakespeare’s plays to be completely excised from the Valladolid copy of the second Folio. [Another point never addressed by any critic] It’s conceivable that some of these “pointers” are in fact coincidences. Thus, perhaps Shakespeare never heard of Luke Kirby and did not intend St. Luke’s to denote him. [and yet, I will repeatedly be accused of basing my theory on the Luke Kirby premise] But the chances that ALL of these connections are coincidental becomes less and less probable.
Armado writes on . . .
” . . . but they do not look anything like the sort of information that would normally be known to your ordinary Jacobean Englishman, and this hypothetical Englishman (who just happens to know everything that we do – and a little bit more) certainly couldn’t have put it into literature and expected anybody in his audience to recognise the significance of his supposed “allegory” unless the person watching the play had happened to read Tom Krause’s essay (or something very like it) beforehand, and therefore had immediate contact with all the same pieces of obscure trivia and the ability to decipher them from the play in just the right way. Krause’s “coincidences” are characterised by triviality, tenuous connections that require long explanations to make clear, and special pleading . . .”
Again, look at it this way: All the audience had to recognize was that Angelo was named for a coin (which Shakespeare made obvious by having characters make clear references to that fact) and that the debasement of Angelo was at issue (which Shakespeare also made obvious by various lines in the play, including the early one by Angelo about his “mettle” being tested). After that, all the audience had to recognize was that Mariana saved the coin from debasement. Those in the audience who knew of Juan de Mariana’s views on debasement would likely have recognized soon after Mariana was introduced that she was named for Juan de Mariana, especially given the Spanish reference to the “great soldier Frederick.”
I’m not even sure which of my “connections” you think are trivial, tenuous, or forced. Again, these connections are NOT my support for the theory; rather, they are what the theory potentially explains (although, as above, the more the theory explains, the stronger the theory). The only connection that you specifically identify and seem to disparage is the Claudius-Claudio-Debasement connection, so I’ll address that.
If you have read the essay, you realize that my first association of the name “Claudius” with debasement is from the text of Hamlet. The Hamlet argument is very different from the MFM argument, because it is almost completely text-based, and does not involve anything that might be characterized as a “trivial” or “tenuous” connection. It’s merely a common-sense reading of the text, with which you are free to agree or disagree (but I’d be interested to hear what your objection to it is, if any). [No critic ever addresses the differences between the two arguments. The Hamlet argument proposes double-meanings for a few of the lines; the Measure for Measure argument takes the plot as metaphor]
Given that Hamlet’s Claudius and the Claudios from both MFM and Much Ado can be considered debased – and that Hamlet’s Claudius appears to have issued debased coins – what’s wrong with investigating whether there is a connection between the Roman Emperor Claudius and debasement? And why is it trivial or tenuous to point out that that many coins bearing Claudius’s image were minted in England, and there was rampant counterfeiting of these coins? That has good resonance with the “counterfeit presentment” line from Hamlet. And what’s wrong with pointing out that Claudius’s successor Nero – also a Claudian, whose name might have supplied the “o” in Claudio – had debased the Roman coinage? [the paper no longer even mentions Nero, since I later learned that it was only recently that scholars determined that the base Claudius coins were in fact counterfeit, rather than official, debased coinage, as previously thought]. It’s true that I found the connection I was hoping to find, but how does this make the connection “forcibl[e],” “tenuous,” or “trivial”?
In the paper, I provide reasons why Shakespeare might have known about these coins, and why some of his audience would have known of them. As explained in the paper, these ancient Roman coins were the most tangible links that Renaissance dramatists had with the ancient world. The best – if not the only – way for someone writing a play featuring Julius Caesar, Caesar Augustus, Cymbeline, Marc Antony or Cleopatra to find out what these individuals looked like would be to look at an antique coin bearing that image. How can you be so sure that Shakespeare didn’t have some familiarity with Roman coins, especially given that he specifically referred to Roman coins in Love’s Labour’s Lost, and might have referred to them in Cymbeline as well?
Armado continues by saying:
“. . . for example, Mariana didn’t publish his book on the debasement of coinage until after “Measure for Measure” was written and performed, but somehow the play was massively rewritten (despite the fact that Krause’s argument depends on major elements of the story having been created around the theme that he creates, so that the major elements of this theme being first introduced in rewrites would seem virtually impossible) . . . .”
Let me stress that I proposed the “rewrite” hypothesis only to satisfy people like Mr. Bridgman and you who appear to require stronger documentary proof that Shakespeare knew of Mariana’s views. I believe that given everything that the “debasement allegory” explains, it’s almost certain that Mariana’s name was no coincidence. That may be as much “proof” as we are going to get that Shakespeare knew of Mariana’s views at the time he wrote MFM.
But I can’t help but observe that any rewrite need not have been “massive.”
Armado continues his paragraph:
“. . . or Shakespeare not only heard masses about this foreign historian and philosopher (despite the fact that virtually nobody in England is likely to have known his views in any great detail, given that the Jacobean world was not a global village with a global media) but this included a lot of information that happens to have been entirely lost to us, and which makes up for the fact that a lot of the things that Krause built his theory on hadn’t happened at the time that Shakespeare wrote his play.”
Shakespeare didn’t need to know “masses” about Mariana – he just had to have heard that Mariana was Spanish and against debasement. If we know anything about Shakespeare, it’s that he was highly intelligent, had a vast vocabulary, probably had an phenomenal memory, and had an astonishing breadth of knowledge about many different subjects. He probably spent a good bit of time in conversation with highly educated people – quite possibly including Spaniards, and maybe even Jesuits. How can you be sure that the subject of Juan de Mariana simply never came up in Shakespeare’s conversations?
I don’t know what you are referring to when you say the theory relies on: “a lot of . . . things that hadn’t happened at the time Shakespeare wrote his play.” [no answer to this; although I suppose it’s obvious that Armado cannot accept that Juan de Mariana’s views might have become known in the year before they were [apparently] first published]
Armado continues:
“Kent says “currency issues and Mariana’s link to them were well known long before he published his book”. This would be a lot more relevant if Taft told us what evidence he has for this claim. What makes us think that a middle-class Englishman in Jacobean London would have had any idea of the non-printed views of an academic who spoke in a different language and for an audience in a completely different country? Is Kent – even in this modern world with international media and international scholarship – able to tell me what any major Spanish economic theorist thinks of the state of the Euro (without any printed source for this knowledge – so he must know what they are saying, not what they are writing)? How likely is Kent to write a play in which he uses an “allegory” based on that Spanish economist’s name and opinions?”
The difference between knowing the views of a modern economic theorist on the Euro, and that Mariana was against debasement, is like night and day. Shakespeare knew full well what debasement was – he referred to it frequently in his plays – all he had to know was that Mariana was against it.
Armado goes on:
“Unless Kent and Krause can produce English sources discussing Mariana and his views on currency debasement before “Measure for Measure” was written and performed, then they cannot claim that this is information that Shakespeare is even remotely likely to have known.”
We don’t need English documentary sources to be able to infer that Shakespeare knew of Mariana – the play is telling us that. Again, why are you so insistent that Shakespeare was not “even remotely likely to have known” that Mariana was against debasement? How can you be so sure of what Shakespeare knew or didn’t know? Do you realize that your statements – in which you express absolute certainty about things that neither you nor anyone else can truly know – are much more controversial than anything I have said in any of my posts, or in my essay? [the irony is resounding, yet it never penetrates]
Armado goes on:
“Of course even if they did find this evidence it would not prove their case, since there are almost certainly English-language journals talking about the views of modern Spanish economists on the Euro, but that doesn’t mean that a particular individual (Kent, say, or myself) has read these documents.”
You are now making my case for not expending an enormous amount of resources on satisfying your demand for documentary proof. You’re absolutely right, even if I find the document, I can’t prove Shakespeare read it. The point is, for the nth time, the intrinsic evidence demonstrates – almost conclusively – that Shakespeare knew Mariana’s views.
Armado continues:
“I am afraid that Kent and Krause are both suffering from extreme gullibility in relation to “coincidences”, and the theories that can be built up from these coincidences. If they want to show themselves how many corrupt and ridiculous theories can be built on the basis of the sort of logic used in Krause’s essay, they need only read their way through the mountain of ridiculous anti-Stratfordian scholarship, which daily uses similar techniques to prove all sorts of entirely contradictory things about Shakespeare’s plays and their author.”
You are way off target. The anti-Stratfordian literature bears no resemblance – analytically or otherwise – to the modest theory proposed in my paper. To put it another way: All I am arguing is that a theme that is already abundantly present in Measure for Measure is just slightly more pronounced than has been recognized. I have drawn all of my “pointers” from a very narrow universe – the text of Measure for Measure itself – and it’s worth noting that they all come from parts of the text that were added by Shakespeare to his underlying sources. Given the organic nature of the theory – in that it flows from a preexisting theme of the play – comparisons to extravagant theories like those of the anti-Stratfordians – all of which require at a minimum an improbable conspiracy of silence, as well as rejection of much of the documentary record – are particularly inapposite.
[He never addresses this, and yet this is the fundamental determination one must make prior to dismissing something as “coincidence” – i.e., how likely is it that the “natural” (i.e., non-coincidence) explanation is the correct one. There are numerous reasons to believe that Oxford did NOT write the plays, thus, the probability that the similarities in Oxford’s life are coincidence is reasonably high. By the same token, if we knew for a fact that Oxford HAD written the plays, then we could be quite certain that the similarities were not coincidences, but rather were autobiographical. In order to dismiss the evidence of a debasement theme in either Hamlet or Measure for Measure as based on “coincidence,” one first has to assess how likely Shakespeare would have been to insert the theme, which involves a determination of whether or not Shakespeare had an interest in economic issues that worked itself into his plays.]
Armado writes on:
“It is true that, like Krause’s essay, these works sometimes have you saying to yourself “What a coincidence!” and “What a clever rhetorical argument!”, but since they routinely prove the opposite of what other logically and evidentially identical arguments prove (some say that “Hamlet” is about King James, some that it is about Queen Elizabeth, some that it is about the Earl of Oxford, and it can’t be about all of them with each individual line meaning six hundred different things) it is fairly obvious that all – or virtually all – of these arguments are wrong.”
You have almost placed your finger on a key difference between my argument and the anti-Stratfordian arguments, but you breeze right past it. In a large body of data – including all of Shakespeare’s 37 plays, 154 sonnets, and 5 poems, plus the biography of any given anti-Stratfordian candidate – one will necessarily find a certain number of coincidences. The fact that we find a certain number of coincidences when we map Shakespeare’s works against the Earl of Oxford’s life, and an approximately equal number of coincidences when we map the plays against Francis Bacon’s life (or that of any of the other prominent anti-Stratfordian candidates) is evidence that what we are seeing are, in fact, coincidences. You make a very ill-considered leap when you argue – if I am understanding you correctly – that because the anti-Stratfordian arguments are based on “coincidences,” all arguments for which you can say the word “coincidence” must be wrong.
The relatively small and self-contained universe of Measure for Measure simply should not give rise to the number of “coincidences” that YOU have to argue it contains (for me, they are not coincidences; most if not all of them are intentional references).
Another difference between the anti-Stratfordian arguments and mine is that in the case of authorship, there is already a perfectly suitable and well-supported answer: William Shakespeare of Stratford. Extending the debasement in Measure for Measure as suggested in my essay provides plausible answers to questions for which suitable answers have not even been proposed.
Armado concludes:
“Besides, Kent claims that Shakespeare did use allegory of this kind in his plays. I would be interested to see a single instance of similar allegory being openly discussed in Renaissance documents about any play. A real allegorical Renaissance play is likely to look more like “A Game at Chess” (which took digs at particular real figures) than like the fantasy concoction based on tenuous trivia and wordgames that Krause constructs, and of course the allegorical nature of “A Game at Chess” was well recorded at the time that it was produced.”
As before, you are insisting on evidence that simply may not exist. There are no extant reviews of any of Shakespeare’s plays, much less any “Renaissance document” that identifies any of them as being allegorical. And yet even Mr. Nathaniel can provide two examples of allegories in Shakespeare’s plays.
Nathaniel writes:
“What we do know is that he wrote a play in 1603 that is very clearly a plea for toleration.”
I’m still curious as to where you get 1603, instead of 1604 (I asked you once before). The idea that MFM can be read on a level that makes it a plea for tolerance of Catholics is not implausible. As Kent points out, it’s also not necessarily inconsistent with the notion that on another level, Shakespeare had something to say about debasement of the coinage. Why are you so ready to believe that “a play populated with Franciscan monks and nuns of St Clare” is a “plea for toleration”, but cannot even entertain the possibility that a play populated with references to debasement and coinage, in which a character who shares a name with an anti-debasement writer saves a character named for a coin from becoming debased, might be in part an allegory for debasement of the coinage? And why, if you think that Shakespeare might have been sympathetic to Catholics, are you sure that he didn’t work Edmund Campion, Luke Kirby and Juan de Mariana into the play as well?
[Nathaniel never answered this question]
Tom Krause
[3]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Monday, 6 Sep 2004 17:42:31 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1659 Question on Measure for Measure
“As for Armado, I’m afraid that his sour, constricted “principles” have made him into an ideological reader where his “theories” come first and the evidence and the experience of reading and being persuaded come second.”
Kent fails to answer my arguments, and instead gives an ad hominem attack based on a smearing characterisation of my views that is nothing like the reality of them. I do believe that new things can be argued about Shakespeare, I simply hold all such arguments to the same standard of evidence to which I hold all other arguments. Kent, by contrast, apparently has one rule for Tom Krause’s orthodox-flavoured ramblings, and another for the railings of anti-Stratfordians (who use exactly identical methods to reach conclusions that Kent would presumably reject) [In Armado’s defense, he did not have the benefit of my last post, which clearly explained the difference. But I can’t defend his subsequent refusals to acknowledge the difference]. I would be interested to hear (offline, since I’m sure we don’t want a detailed discussion of it here on SHAKSPER, which would in any case be against the rules) why Kent would reject, for example, the Oxfordian argument that Horatio in “Hamlet” was a portrait of Horace Vere, Edward de Vere’s cousin, part of the “evidence” that they assemble in attempting to claim that Hamlet himself is a portrait of Edward de Vere. The argument about Horatio is identical in form to Krause’s method of working at many points in the essay that Kent acclaims so: take a name, randomly find somebody with a related name and perhaps a very vague connection to the play or its themes and subjects or its author or your own theories, or just about anything else, and claim that the name of the character is a secret reference to the person who you have selected. [distortion] If Kent accepts all such arguments then he should promptly convert to Oxfordianism (at the same time as converting to just about all the other versions of anti-Stratfordianism and various other forms of Shakespearean nuttery, since most use very similar methods). The fact that he presumably will not do so shows that he is not applying his own intellectual “principles” (assuming that he has any) to all arguments in the same way, but is instead judging the arguments not on the intellectual value or lack of intellectual value of the methods, but simply on the basis of whether or not he is happy to accept the conclusions that these methods – in each instance – happen to reach. [red herring: anti-antistrat argument]
Kent amusingly claims to be following “evidence and experience”, but it seems that Kent has instead been “persuaded” by Tom Krause claims along the lines of:
“Unless WS was psychic, that is. And he must’ve been if he was able to predict that Luke Kirby was going to be canonised a saint in 1970.”
I hope I didn’t lead you to believe that I thought that Kirby had been canonized in Shakespeare’s time. The point is, any martyr was an obvious candidate for Catholic sainthood, and Shakespeare may well have been honoring Kirby’s memory by “promoting” him in advance.
Might I be so bold as to point out that if Kent believes this peculiar claim, he apparently also believes that any reference to a Saint in a Renaissance play is actually likely to refer to any martyr of the same name (even if he or she never became a Saint, or only did so centuries later), [distortion] and since we only have a limited number of common names in English-speaking countries (and in much of Christian Europe in general), and even fewer in the Renaissance, and a good number of them religious names of the type likely to be shared by real Saints and hundreds of Catholic martyrs (who – often members of pious Christian families – tended to have been given the names of Saints and Biblical and other religious figures), this basically allows us to substitute just about whoever we like for any Saint mentioned in any play. [I suppose if the beginning and end of my argument was that St. Luke’s refers to Luke Kirby, this would be a reasonable response. But my argument doesn’t even require Luke Kirby, as I’ve pointed out several times already]
Let’s show this method at work in a rather rough form that will give some idea of how worthless this method is. [it will come as no surprise that Armado can prove that the “method” of assuming that any reference to a Saint is a reference to a martyr is worthless] Opening my concordance at the word “Saint”, I have (as I am typing this and without knowing what I will find) randomly picked the name of “Saint George” as mentioned in 1 Henry VI (1.1.154), “Bonfires in France forthwith I am to make, / To keep our great Saint George’s feast withal”. Now this is rather obviously a reference to the English patron Saint and his festival, but let’s spend a few seconds with a search engine and see if we can find an appropriate martyr who has something to do with bonfires, and/or France, and/or feasts, who we can pretend (Krause-like) was Shakespeare’s secret real meaning, so we can try to ignore the fact that there was an obvious real meaning already present within the text, which makes much more sense than the “secret” meaning we are trying to add on (purely to show how clever we are).
[Note: I wrote the paragraph above before doing any searching].
Now that I’ve done some searching, let’s start with the first martyred George that I’ve come across, purely at random. George Blaurock. Jörg vorn Haus Jacob, to give him his non-anglicised name, lived from 1491-1529 and was co-founder of the Swiss Brethren church in Zurich, and “thereby one of the founders of modern Anabaptism”. See http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/George%20Blaurock . He was burned at the stake for his religion on September 6, 1529. So immediately we have a Krause-style coincidence. OBVIOUSLY, the reason Shakespeare wrote about “bonfires” and “Saint George” was because he was secretly referring to George Blaurock, who was martyred by burning, on a bonfire! Is Kent convinced? If he was convinced by Krause’s examples, then I’m not sure why he should not also be convinced by this (note that Luke Kirby has much less to do with the reference to “Saint Luke’s” in Measure for Measure, since he had nothing to do with the text of the play at this point, nor with Sainthood in Shakespeare’s time, nor with Krause’s major theme of currency debasement at any time ever, nor does he even have any direct connection to Shakespeare himself [although Krause’s only reason for suggesting that this is a reference to him is apparently that he was burned on the same day as the brother of somebody that Shakespeare probably once knew (although even if he did know him, we have no idea how well or little, and he was almost certainly never taught by him, given Shakespeare’s age at the time that John Cottam became schoolmaster)]).
Let’s continue the Anabaptist theme, though. Obviously Shakespeare was too scared to admit his Anabaptist sympathies overtly, which is why he pretends that he is referring to Saint George, patron Saint of England. However he hints at the truth by both the bonfire reference and by his subtle reference to the real Saint George’s feast day (April 23rd) which was not only on or near Shakespeare’s birthday, but also the day on which an Imperial Mandate by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V declared that “We .. renew the previous imperial law … that … every Anabaptist and rebaptized man and woman of the age of reason shall be condemned and brought from natural life into death by fire, sword, and the like …” (April 23 1529). http://www.mhsc.ca/index.asp?content=http://www.mhsc.ca/mennos/hpersecut.html . The very same year that George Blaurock was burned! Notice, again, that Shakespeare’s reference to “Bonfires in France” is CLEARLY picking up on the reference to “death by fire” in this very document. [proof complete – the “method” of equating every “Saint” reference with a martyr is worthless!]
OK. It’s all garbage, of course, and produced with much less time and effort than Krause is likely to have put into his own similarly nonsensicalclaims (and I’m sure I could do much better if I used all of my reference books and spent days or weeks rather than minutes working on my deliberately false “theories”), but it is Krause-style garbage, and this is effectively all that most of Krause’s arguments consist of. [technically speaking, the demonstration that my arguments are “garbage” should include an enumeration and refutation of those arguments, not merely the refutation of an obviously bad argument of your own invention] It may convince Kent, but that just tells you a great deal about Kent’s inability to distinguish good arguments from bad. Given a bit of time and effort we could doubtless all come up with many coincidences as good as any individual coincidence in Krause’s essay (and note that most of Krause’s coincidences have nothing or next to nothing to do with any of his other coincidences, so in reality each one stands or falls alone). [again, the “coincidence” usage problem] Kent is then left with the choice of keeping to his standards and accepting all such minor and trivial coincidences as evidence of Shakespeare’s real intentions (since this is what he does, apparently unquestioningly, when confronted by Krause’s essay), or he can randomly reject the ones that he doesn’t like the sound of (as with George Blaurock, above – and whole libraries of anti-Stratfordian “coincidence” spotting) despite the fact that they use identical methods and make the same level of connections with Shakespeare and his text as those made by Krause, and should therefore have the same evidentiary value or lack of value. [combining two red herrings – the antistrat and Blaurock arguments]
I’ll probably have some more to say about Tom Krause’s essay (and Kent’s gullibility) at a later date, but I think for a three-minute hasty response this is quite enough to show that, using Krause’s methods, we can make up more or less any claims we like about the meaning of names and events in Shakespeare’s plays and insist that it was what Shakespeare really meant.
Armado.
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1679 Wednesday, 8 September 2004
[1]
From: Holofernes
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 13:26:22 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 16:38:45 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 17:55:40 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Nathaniel
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 18:28:37 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 23:57:27 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1670: Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Holofernes
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 13:26:22 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
Tom Krause wrote:
A certain character saves a character that Shakespeare intentionally named for a coin (Angelo) from becoming debased. All I’m suggesting is the character who saves the coin from debasement (Mariana) is intentionally named for one of Shakespeare’s contemporaries (Juan de Mariana) who argued against debasement.
Actually, we don’t know that Shakespeare intentionally named Angelo after the coin. There is only the familiar mettle/metal gag and similar, but not clearly directed at Angelo’s name. There is not even the obvious joke “noble Angelo”. In fact, there is only a single angel/Angelo reference – there seems to be very little play on Angelo’s name. The names seem to be just names. [Nearly all editors of the play would beg to differ] Unfortunately, we can’t be certain of the order of “All’s Well That Ends Well”, “Othello” and “Measure for Measure”, so we don’t know which use of “Mariana” comes first – the three plays have overlaps in names, themes and sources. [Mariana in Othello?] One could suppose that Shakespeare repeats himself, the first time as tragedy, the second as farce – but that is just a guess.
Holofernes
[2]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 16:38:45 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
I do not have time to make endless detailed answers to Tom Krause and Kent on the subject of Krause’s essay on “Measure for Measure”, and rather obviously have much less to motivate my expenditure of time on the question than the man who wrote the essay, or the one who rather oddly approved it for publication in a scholarly journal.
I am fairly certain that the flaws in Krause’s claims and method are obvious to the vast majority of those who will read the piece, [n.b. this has not been my experience] and I am equally certain that Krause and Kent will never admit that they are wrong,; even as Krause is driven to make more and more extreme and ridiculous claims about his “research” (his latest is to claim that a particular character name “might” be partially based on that of Nero because it ends with an ‘o’. More sensible commentators might ask themselves how many letters there are in the English alphabet, and in particular how many Italianate names – particularly those in Shakespeare’s plays – end with the letter ‘o’, before making such a ludicrous assumption, even in passing). [acknowledging that I made the observation in passing, and yet attaching deep significance to it] I will however continue to make answers for as long as I have time and patience, although they may be shorter and less detailed than I might ideally wish. [soon, we’d all wish for this] I’ll try to pick out the highlights of Krause’s recent reply to me, and respond to those.
“Your reference to “claims” (plural) shows that your are not getting the point. My basic “claim” – singular – is that Shakespeare modestly extended a theme that was already abundantly present in the play. Everything else – what you seem to consider “trivia” – are matters that the basic claim helps to explain – not premises needed to support the claim.”
If you had written a different essay, this might be a reasonable argument, but in fact the essay that you did write is based almost entirely on trying to claim that “debasement” is the major theme of both “Hamlet” and “Measure for Measure” [distortion] on the basis of “trivia” [his quotes] and supposed wordplay that you like to imagine that Shakespeare inserted into the play and you are merely ‘rediscovering’. Discussion of this “trivia” takes up at least 95% of your essay, so you can hardly pretend that the main theme of the essay is anything other than the “trivia” which you like to think that you have dug up.
What, other than the “trivia”, do you have to offer to suggest that Shakespeare’s metaphorical references to coinage, debasement, and forgery (or at least those references which are generally recognised by other critics, and are not entirely personal to you) were not precisely that, artistic metaphors, rather than the single major ‘allegorical’ theme of the play? Precious little, it seems, or you would have spent more time producing real evidence (if you had any) and less playing pointless wordgames of the kind that anybody can play with just about any piece of English writing.
“A certain character saves a character that Shakespeare intentionally named for a coin (Angelo) from becoming debased. All I’m suggesting is the character who saves the coin from debasement (Mariana) is intentionally named for one of Shakespeare’s contemporaries (Juan de Mariana) who argued against debasement.”
Now the Angelo / Angel (coin) argument is probably the strongest in your essay – since Shakespeare’s text explicitly, as you say, makes a metaphorical connection between Angelo and a coin. [tell it to Holofernes]
“Now, good my lord, Let there be some more test made of my metal, Before so noble and so great a figure Be stamp’d upon it” (1.1.47-50).
It is unsurprising, therefore, that you did not invent this argument, but simply borrowed it from other sources. The Arden 2 “Measure for Measure” (edited by J.W. Lever, 1965), for example, already points out “the coin imagery” of this section, and also – in regard to 3.2.264-265, “O, what may man within him hide / Though angel on the outward side!” – makes explicit the likely link between the name Angelo and the Angel coin, noting “Angelo is the spurious ‘angel’ in terms of the coin imagery, and also …”. If this were all that your essay consisted of, then it would be merely an act of quotation or plagiarism, and would have no value whatever as a new academic essay. [given that I’ve cited Lever and indeed recommended listmembers to read his notes – since the coinage allusions Lever recognizes clearly support my case – “plagiarism” seems bit overstated] The only original arguments that you add to this sort of material are your claims based in “trivia” and supposed wordplay, which are therefore – rather obviously – the main purpose and only distinguishing characteristic of your essay.
Why am I willing to consider accepting the Angelo / Angel wordplay, but so ready to reject the Krause attempts to add various new forms of wordplay on a similar theme? The answer is very simple. The Angelo / Angel theory is based on a detailed reference to Shakespeare’s writing. The four lines quoted above from the first scene of the play seem very clearly and obviously to be a reference to coinage. [so we need four reinforcing lines before we can admit the possibility of a pun?] The Arden even keeps the Folio spelling (“metal” not “mettle”) which would make this an overt punning metaphor, with the coin imagery as Angelo’s primary meaning. This is not an obscure hidden code that could easily have been wrongly invented by a commentator and projected at the play, nor one which we could easily duplicate with other texts, instead the coin reference is a deep and integrated part of Shakespeare’s original text. [and, as several commentators observe, the coin image “runs throughout the play”; Armado, however, has the ability to “stop a speeding metaphor”]
Let’s compare this, for a moment, with the many Krause theories, and note how threadbare they look by comparison. Note how often the Krause argument depends entirely upon the coincidence of a single word or just a part of a word, [distortion] with no detailed textual reference or support to suggest that Krause’s interpretation is correct, and with almost all of the evidence for the claim being based not on Shakespeare’s text, but on Krause’s own theorising about the text. As a result we find ourselves faced by an entirely circular logic. [distortion; Armado is making a circular circular argument argument] The reason that Krause suspects that there is a reference to a particular person is because it would fit with his theory of the meaning of the play, but at the same time the only evidence that Krause has for his theory as to the meaning of the play is that it contains these references to particular people. There is nothing holding up Krause’s claims except other claims made by Krause, which themselves are held up by nothing, but the first set of claims. And so, ad infinitum.
[Distortion – he’s just admitted there are references to coins in the play and plays on Angel = Angelo. Other scholars cited in footnote 22 have found more references in MFM and other plays and have concluded that Shakespeare had a lot to say about economics. Given the political climate – a debasement-resisting monarch having been replaced by a monarch who had a history of debasement –the theme could not have been more topical]
“A certain character saves a character that Shakespeare intentionally named for a coin (Angelo) from becoming debased. All I’m suggesting is the character who saves the coin from debasement (Mariana) is intentionally named for one of Shakespeare’s contemporaries (Juan de Mariana) who argued against debasement.”
Now here, for example, we have a lot of Krause theory. Krause *assumes* that Shakespeare would have considered Mariana to have saved Angelo from being tainted by sin (actually, wasn’t that the Duke using Mariana as a tool?), he *assumes* that there is a connection between this risk of moral taint and the deliberate “debasement” of coinage by governments decreasing the level of base metal [in literature, of course there is, going all the way back to Aristophanes. See paper, n. 1] (but when Shakespeare talks of coins full of base metal, he is usually talking about forgery or coin-clipping or error, as he does explicitly in the example in 1.1, where Angelo states that the figure of the Duke could only be stamped upon him if he had been tested and proved to be sufficiently good metal, there is no reference in the play to the Duke or anybody else deliberately authorising coins with base metal), the reference to deliberate debasement by an inflationary government therefore exists primarily in Krause’s imagination [note that Dante made no such distinction – he viewed debasing monarchs as counterfeiters (see Paper, n. 45)] and is not overtly expressed within the play itself, and finally Krause *assumes* that this inflationary debasement theme in “Measure for Measure” (which he just made up) proves that when Shakespeare named his character Mariana, he must have been doing so as a reference to Juan de Mariana, who wrote a book condemning inflation
nary debasement … but, oooppss … we’re still not finished. Unfortunately Juan de Mariana wrote that book *AFTER* Shakespeare wrote this play, and there seems to be no evidence anywhere in the world (certainly none that Kent and Krause can find) which proves that Mariana was famously associated, by his own countrymen let alone by people in England, with the subject of debasement until he wrote that book, so Krause conveniently assumes that Mariana must have been excessively interested in the subject several years beforehand, and that Shakespeare *must* have heard about Mariana’s interest by some indirect means or other (not that Krause can explain how, he just must have), and what’s Krause’s evidence for all this? … Why – the fact that Shakespeare called his character Mariana, of course. So there we have a perfectly circular argument, with no evidence to support it at either end of the chain. The evidence is in my reply – this is another circular circular argument argument by Armado]
“The other alternative – the one which you seem to be 100% confident in – is that Shakespeare just happened to give the name “Mariana” to the character who saves the coin from debasement. Which alternative is the more far-fetched?”
Which do you think? The one where we have to make up an interpretation of Shakespeare’s play, make up a chain of links between Shakespeare and Spain for him to hear about Mariana, and make up a fame for Mariana for which we have no evidence on an opinion that we do not even know that he discussed in any detail with anybody before that date? Or the one where we accept that Shakespeare used a Christian-name which appears in a good deal of Renaissance literature and happens by pure coincidence to have been the surname of a man who somewhere virtually on the other side of the Renaissance world was destined eventually to write about inflationary debasement (a theme that Shakespeare does not seem to treat on in this play)? [nice rhetoric, but he still hasn’t addressed the argument]
But I’ve been criticising you for not providing evidence for your claims, so here is some in support of mine. I put the name “Mariana” into the EEBO (Early English Books Online) database, and found a good variety of hits before and after Shakespeare wrote “Measure for Measure”. One of these hits was on a play by Robert Wilson, published in 1591, shortly before Shakespeare wrote “Measure for Measure”. The play is called “A pleasant commodie, of faire Em the Millers daughter of Manchester with the love of William the Conqueror”. [interesting that he admits that he found a “good variety of hits,” but then attaches “mystical significance” to the one that “supports” his view]
To my great amusement, this play turns out not only to contain a “Mariana”, but by her second scene this Mariana is immediately involved in the plotting of a bed-trick, by which an unwanted suitor is tricked into marrying a woman who has fallen in love with him, and to whom he originally committed himself, instead of the woman he was wrongfully pursuing.
I’ll describe the plot. William the Conqueror (now King of England) sees the picture of a beautiful woman on the shield of the Marquis of Lubeck, who is staying in his court. He tells Lubeck that he has fallen in love with the woman in the picture and asks him, if he can do it without dishonouring himself, to pass the woman’s love on to William. Lubeck is happy to do so, saying that the woman is Blanche, the daughter of his King (the King of Denmark) and deserves a love far better than that of a mere Marquis. William is delighted and vows a religious oath to rapidly obtain the lady’s love, and declares that he and Lubeck will travel to the Danish court with William disguised as an English Knight, with the alias of Robert of Windsor.
William as Robert and Lubeck arrive at the Danish court, but William is hugely disappointed by Blanche, who he considers ugly. Blanche, however, promptly falls in love with “Robert” alias William at first sight. William, meanwhile, is more interested by the sight of another girl, who the Danish King is holding as a prisoner-of-war for ransom. This girl’s name is Mariana. She is the sworn love of Lubeck. William declares his love for her, and Lubeck is horrified, but William swears that he will challenge him for Mariana’s love.
After a break for the subplot (the story of the said “Em”), Mariana returns with Lubeck. Lubeck has danced with Mariana at a masque, pushing aside the rival William who was making for her, and in revenge William has stabbed him. Their identities revealed (both having been masked), they forgive one another for the affront and the assault, but the rivalry for Mariana remains. The two men exit, and Blanche enters, bitterly angry with Mariana as a result of her jealousy. A letter for Mariana is brought in, and Blanche rudely opens and reads it – it is a love-letter from William making it clear that he wishes to obtain Mariana, and morally cuckold his former friend. Blanche is still more angry, but Mariana reads the full letter and realises that the supposed Sir Robert is actually William the Conqueror, a King and suitable match for Blanche. Mariana promptly declares that William shall not push aside Lubeck in her love, and decides to win the friendship of Blanche and retain her love, Lubeck, by assisting Blanche in her pursuit of the disguised William the Conqueror.
After another break for the “Em” subplot, Mariana and Lubeck return. Lubeck in a tone of self-sacrifice declares his continuing love for Mariana, but begs her to love William the Conqueror instead of himself, in order to obtain wealth and position worthy of her. Their discussion is interrupted by the appearance of Blanche, and Lubeck leaves. Mariana promptly suggests to Blanche that:
“The next tyme that Sir Robert shall come In his woonted sort to solicit me with Love, I will seeme to agree and like of any thing That the Knight shal demaund so far foorth As it be no impeachment to my chastitie: And to conclude, poynt some place for to meete the man, For my conveiance from the Denmarke Court: Which determined upon, he will appoynt some certaine time For our departure: whereof you having intelligence, You may soone set downe a plot to were the English Crowne”.
Blanche leaves, and William arrives, confident that Lubeck has told Mariana to love William instead of himself. Mariana persuades him to help her escape from the Court, where she is prisoner, and William agrees if she gives him her consent. She tells him that she will wear a mask in order to escape undetected, and she makes him swear an oath that he will not offend her chastity.
After another short break, William is shown eloping with Blanche, who he thinks is Mariana. Blanche urges him to follow his former oath:
“But this I urge you with your former oath You shall not seeke to violate mine honour, Untill our marriage rights be all performed”.
And William replies:
“Mariana, here I sweare to thee by heaven, And by the honour that I beare to Armes, Never to seeke or crave at hands of thee The spoyle of honourable chastitie Untill we do attaine the English coast, Where thou shalt be my right espoused Queene”.
After William steals away with Blanche he is pursued to England by the Danish King, who demands to have his daughter returned. After some confusion William finally realises that he has eloped with Blanche, but refuses to marry her, expressing a new misogynistic hatred for deceiving women. At this point the comic sub-plot arrives, and William – seeing their romantic tangles – is converted back to a respect for women. He finally accepts that Blanche is beautiful and modest, and agrees to marry her. The romantic confusions of the sub-plot (which I haven’t bothered to read) are resolved, and everybody lives happily ever after. [I never actually read this lengthy and beside-the-point description, and in my response assumed that it contained an actual “bed-trick” but I see now that it doesn’t – the disguised woman merely receives a promise of marriage from the “tricked” man]
So after all that, I think we can be fairly certain that it is more than a coincidence that Shakespeare’s Mariana carries the same name as Wilson’s Mariana, since both women are involved in very similar bed-tricks that persuade men to marry the right women.Furthermore, it seems obvious that my theory is on much stronger footing than Krause’s alternative suggestion of Shakespeare’s “source” for the name Mariana, since my suggestion does not hinge on a personal interpretation of the play (for which there is no direct evidence) as Krause’s does, but is instead based on the main plot of both plays where numerous scenes are given over to the bed-tricks by which the two men are persuaded to marry the morally right woman by mistake, when they would rather have married or slept with the morally wrong woman deliberately. Furthermore I do not have to invent Krausian fantasies about how the mere conversations of a Spanish academic should end up in the ears of an ordinary English playwright, nor do I have to play with time to make the contents of a source appear in history before the source was written (there is no evidence that anybody in Spain, let alone anybody in England, associated Juan de Mariana with the debasement of currency before he wrote his book), by contrast my suggested source is an English play, which would have been written and performed by Shakespeare’s fellow actors in a theatre in the very city where he lived, and then printed and sold in the very London bookshops that he frequented. While it is all but impossible [hyperbole alert] that Shakespeare would have heard the views of the Spanish academic Juan de Mariana before writing “Measure for Measure”, it is equally all but impossible that he would not have seen the script or a performance of the very well known play “Fair Em”, which – to top it all – was written by Robert Wilson (it is presumed, although the play was printed anonymously) in circa. 1590 for performance by Lord Strange’s company. Guess which company it was that, only two years later, gave what was almost certainly the first performance of Shakespeare’s “Henry VI: part one”? It is widely assumed that Shakespeare had joined Strange’s men (whose patron later became the Earl of Derby) as his first theatrical company, in which case he is most likely not only to have read Fair Em, and to have seen it performed, but quite possibly acted in it himself. Shakespeare’s membership of Strange’s is the only piece of conjecture that I need to enter into to support my theory, and it really makes no difference to me whether he was there or not, since he was clearly associated with the company, and as a novice actor and playwright he must have been attending plays in London and reading them when they were published, so there is little doubt that he must have known “Fair Em” before writing “Measure for Measure” in which he used one of the character names and a very similar plot device, and – most revealing of all – the character name and the plot device were kept together.
[One might think that he was engaging in a clever parody of what he claims are my methods, but subsequent posts make it clear that he is serious: He has gone through a “good variety of hits” on the name Mariana in Elizabethan plays, found one in which the Mariana participates in a switched-identity scheme to get a man to marry the right woman, and thinks he’s discovered an association between Mariana and bed tricks]
So, to ask Krause’s question back at him, which sounds less likely to you? –
1) Shakespeare named his “Measure for Measure” character Mariana as part of an obscure and peculiar allegory about the inflationary debasement of coinage (a theme that Shakespeare never directly mentions in “Measure for Measure”), referring to a Spanish academic in another country who had not yet published anything to do with inflationary debasement of coinage, but would do so *AFTER* Shakespeare wrote his play (at which time Mariana’s book would begin to circulate in Spain), and despite the fact that we have no record of anybody in the world at this time associating the name “Juan de Mariana” with the topic of debasement of currency, let alone anybody suggesting that he was so famous as an exponent of the subject that his surname alone would be understood as a reference to this subject in foreign countries, we must assume that he was a major advocate of this subject before he wrote his book (and before Shakespeare wrote his play) and that by some imaginary invisible system [hyperbole] Mariana’s Spanish views were carried to Shakespeare in London without leaving any trace, printed or written, in the historical record. [distortion]
*** OR ***
2) Shakespeare borrowed the name from “Fair Em”, an English play that was written and performed in London at a time that Shakespeare was quite probably a member of the very company for which that play was written and by whom it was performed, and even if he was not directly present in the company, Shakespeare would certainly have been present in the London theatres and bookshops where the play was performed and sold. Shakespeare probably borrowed the name because the two plays shared a major plot device, in which the character “Mariana” was involved in both plays.
So which theory do you prefer, Tom Krause?
Since this has reached enormous length after my unexpected discovery (do you think Kent would print an article about that? or has somebody already pointed out this likely source for Shakespeare’s “Mariana”?), I will leave the rest of Krause’s message to answer at another time. [another empty promise]
Armado.
[3]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 17:55:40 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
“‘First, currency issues and Mariana’s link to them were well known long before he published his book. Second, you seem to think that Shakespeare does not put little allegories in his plays. You are dead wrong. Look at the correspondences between the main plot of TN and the famous Anjou affair.’ As there are no “correspondences between the main plot of TN and the famous Anjou affair”, this is not the crushing rejoinder that Kent must imagine it to be. Dame Frances Yates once compared Henri III to Hamlet, but did not – as far as I am aware – compare his brother Alencon/Anjou to Sir Andrew Aguecheek.”
I might add, furthermore, that not only would hardly anybody accept Kent’s belief that “Twelfth Night” is an allegorical representation of the Anjou affair (if Holofernes is right to suspect that this is what Kent is referring to), but also that even if this was a genuine allegorical reference it is still nothing like the “allegory” produced by Tom Krause.
[He’s right – the strength or weakness of an unrelated argument has nothing to do with the strength or weakness of mine. Unless, of course, it’s the anti-Stratfordian argument. Or the George Blaurock argument. Or the Fair Em argument]
If Tom Krause had created the “allegory” that Kent sees in “Twelfth Night”, then we could rest assured that virtually nothing in the play would have anything to do with the actual people or the events in which they were involved, instead we would simply see a few one-word long “coincidences”, particularly in names. [distortion] So that Olivia would have been called some variant on the name Elizabeth (Betty? Isabella?), and Andrew Aguecheek would have had some variant of Anjou’s name or title. Now I wouldn’t put it past Tom Krause in his more idiotic moments to claim that just such a “coincidence” occurs (after all Andrew, Aguecheek, Allencon and Anjou all start with ‘A’ – just as Nero and Claudio both end with ‘o’: Krause seeing mystical significance in the latter event) [distortion], but for any sensible person it is fairly obvious that no such “coincidences” occur. [stumbling over the word again, and seeming to redefine it as its opposite – a meaningful connection] Nor do they occur in “Game at Chess”, despite the fact that we know that it is an allegory, and know in many instances who it was about (as did the audiences at the time).
In short, even if some Renaissance plays were allegories, it seems most unlikely that – in the Renaissance or at any other time – these allegories took the form of the “allegory” that Tom Krause claims to see in “Measure for Measure”. Instead, Tom Krause’s “allegory” is a peculiar literary critical invention, designed to allow a literary critic to look clever without actually requiring any real action on the part of the playwright (you can play the Krause game with just about any set of names, and any subject or theme, in just about every work of Literature). [this statement shows that he has not absorbed my explanation of the differences between the anti-Stratfordian arguments and mine – the critical variables are the scope of the “subject or theme” and the size of the “work of Literature.” The bigger your hunting ground (e.g. the works versus one play) and the more things that qualify as “game” (e.g. all the possible allusions in a theme having to do with religion vs. the relatively small number of allusions that can be squeezed out of debasement) the more likely you are to bag a lot of it] Of course Krause did not personally invent this method, a variety of would-be literary critical nutcases have been there before him, including simply thousands of mutually contradictory anti-Stratfordians. [not to mention the thousands of Stratfordians who over the years have proposed the interpretations and meanings that we accept today]
Armado.
[4]————————————————————-
From: Nathaniel
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 18:28:37 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1670 Question on Measure for Measure
Tom Krause asks …
“I’m still curious as to where you get 1603, instead of 1604 (I asked you once before).”
“MISTRESS OVERDONE: Thus, what with the war, what with the sweat, what with the gallows and what with poverty, I am custom-shrunk”.
In 1604, England signed a peace treaty with Spain. If there was a war on, the play must have been written before the peace treaty. Also 1603 was a plague year (“the sweat”), while 1604 was not.
“POMPEY: You have not heard of the proclamation, have you?
MISTRESS OVERDONE: What proclamation, man?
POMPEY: All houses in the suburbs of Vienna must be plucked down”.
On 16 September 1603 there was a proclamation calling for the pulling down of brothels and gaming houses in London’s suburbs. This included the area around the Globe. [sounds like a one-word coincidence to me]
Nathaniel
[5]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Tuesday, 7 Sep 2004 23:57:27 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1670: Question on Measure for Measure
For Armado: I realize that when you wrote the post that I respond to below you did not have the benefit of my most recent post, in which I anticipated and addressed (well, refuted) most if not all of your arguments. On the theory that you might have already changed your views based on that post, I am going to limit my replies in this post to just a few points. If your next post shows that you still haven’t seen the error of your ways, I’ll try to come up with another way of explaining it all to you.
Armado writes:
“I do believe that new things can be argued about Shakespeare, I simply hold all such arguments to the same standard of evidence to which I hold all other arguments.”
You need to give us examples of what kinds of arguments you accept. At this point, you do not appear to have any intuitive grasp on the difference between cases where the “coincidence” explanation is satisfactory (e.g. the authorship question and your St. George example) and where it isn’t. [and now as also demonstrated by his Fair Em “bedtrick” example, which of course I hadn’t seen when I wrote this post] Nor do you seem to be able to distinguish between an argument that yields a conclusion that requires rejection of much more probable theories (e.g. the authorship question and your St. George example) and one that doesn’t.
There is a spectrum from “impossible” to “highly plausible”: I rate your St. George argument “impossible,” the anti-Stratfordian theories “highly implausible,” the Shakeshaftian theories “somewhat plausible,” the identification of the “Dark Lady” as Emilia Lanier “plausible,” and the theory that MFM’s Mariana is named for Juan de Mariana “highly plausible.” For you, are they all simply “impossible”? Give us an example of Shakespearean scholarship or interpretation based on circumstantial evidence that you find plausible.
Armado writes:
“The argument about Horatio is identical in form to Krause’s method of working at many points in the essay that Kent acclaims so”
Reread and try to understand my last post if you still believe this.
Armado goes on to argue that anyone who believes that St. Luke might be a reference to Luke Kirby is intellectually obligated to believe “that any reference to a Saint in a Renaissance play is actually likely to refer to any martyr of the same name . . .”
Read closely Thomas: Neither Kent nor I are saying that “St. Luke’s” definitely refers to Luke Kirby. In fact, I added the Luke Kirby point long after Ed first read and accepted the essay – it is hardly the essential point that you make it out to be. As I have said throughout this thread, there are other plausible explanations, including that St. Luke’s was randomly selected.
On the other hand, Luke Kirby does fit fairly well with everything else that I have proposed about the play. If I am right that Mariana is Juan de Mariana – as indicated both by the role Mariana plays in the debasement allegory and the fact that Mariana’s brother can only correspond to Federigo Spinola – then the moated grange probably points to Juan de Mariana as well. And a notorious moated grange that points to the Jesuit Mariana is Lyford Grange, where the Jesuit Edmund Campion was captured. Was this an intentional reference to Campion? I don’t know for sure. Maybe Shakespeare had Baddesley Clinton in mind (assuming Nathaniel is correct that Baddesley Clinton was a “grange,” and that Shakespeare’s audience would have recognized it as such), and was pointing to the Jesuit Mariana through the Jesuit Henry Garnet. Or maybe – although I think this is less likely – he felt that he had sufficiently identified Mariana and just thought that a “moated grange” was a romantic setting for the abandoned Mariana.
But let me add that IF the Shakeshaftians are right – i.e. that Shakespeare had a connection to both Thomas Cottam and Edmund Campion – then Shakespeare most certainly knew of Luke Kirby (who stood trial with Campion and was executed along with Cottam) and quite possibly was sympathetic to him. For me, that makes it all the more likely that the moated grange is Lyford Grange and St. Luke’s refers to Luke Kirby. Given that there are some prominent scholars who believe the Shakeshaftian theory, and who continue to come up with new evidence and arguments to support their claim, I think it makes sense to keep Luke Kirby in the essay, don’t you? Or are they all wrong too? If so, will they still be wrong if they come up with more evidence in the future?
[he never answers this question, except to say he has doubts about the Shakeshafte theory]
Speaking of his “demonstration” that a reference to St. George could be a reference to George Blaurock, Armado writes:
“OK. It’s all garbage, of course, and produced with much less time and effort than Krause is likely to have put into his own similarly nonsensical claims (and I’m sure I could do much better if I used all of my reference books and spent days or weeks rather than minutes working on my deliberately false “theories”), but it is Krause-style garbage, and this is effectively all that most of Krause’s arguments consist of.”
Why do you say “most” of my arguments are garbage? Which ones do you think have merit?
Seriously, you have not come close to duplicating my methods, which makes it clear that when you wrote that, you did not understand them. If you want to duplicate my methods, here is what you need to do:
(1) show me where Anabaptist references – metaphorical or otherwise – appear in several of Shakespeare’s plays, as recognized by scholars other than yourself.
(2) show me ten or more express references in Henry VI that scholars other than you recognize are to an Anabaptist theme.
(3) show me an allegory in which the characters of Henry VI interact in some fashion that would convey a message about Anabaptists.
(4) show me how the Anabaptist explanation in fact explains some of the behavior of the characters that other scholars have found difficult to understand.
(5) show me independent evidence that Shakespeare had Anabaptist leanings.
(6) show me how the Anabaptist theory explains a number of other references for which no satisfactory explanation has been proposed.
If you can do all that (and that’s somewhat less than I have done for debasement in MFM), I’ll acknowledge that you have essentially duplicated my methods. In fact, if you can do that, I’ll probably say that you have identified a possible “Anabaptist theme” in Henry VI. But you can’t, because there isn’t. And that’s the difference. The bottom line is that the George-George coincidences you have identified have no probative value absent some support along the lines of steps (1)-(6). As of course you know, they are the sort of trivial coincidences that one can expect to find in a large body of data. [make note of the context in which these criteria were proposed – as a simple refutation of his “George-George” coincidence. Armado later shows how he can meet this criteria for a theme of his choosing – the vast, fact-ridden theme of the Catholic-Protestant schism – a feat that has proved quite easy for other scholars, given the large amount of information – people, events, dates – about the schism in which to find coincidences]
Tom Krause
_________________________________
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1688 Thursday, 9 September 2004
[1]
From: Kent
Date: Wednesday, 08 Sep 2004 11:44:26 -0400
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Polonius
Date: Wednesday, 08 Sep 2004 15:56:51 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Armado
Date: Wednesday, 8 Sep 2004 21:14:40 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 01:04:20 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 03:06:40 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
[6]
From: Maria
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 03:11:16 -0700
Subj: Re: Question on Measure for Measure
[7]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 0:14:04 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Kent
Date: Wednesday, 08 Sep 2004 11:44:26 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
Armado has spewed forth a lot of words and a lot of abuse, most of it uncalled for, a lot of it simply proof of the venom with which he reads the essays of his betters (and Tom Krause is a much better, clearer writer than Armado – and more to the point as well.) I will limit my response (and thus control my temper) to two points: [Although Armado “spewed” plenty before this post, he soon takes the position that his anger only started after Kent became abusive. It’s therefore important to note the timing – Armado’s extremely abusive Sept. 9 posts below were submitted BEFORE Armado read and had his feelings hurt by this post]
1. Read chapter 4 of Eric Mallin’s _Inscribing the Time: Shakespeare and the End of Elizabethan England_, in which Mallin demonstrates over and over again the similarities between the Anjou affair and the main plot of Twelfth Night. I’m afraid that the problem with Armado is that, while he rails at great length against modern criticism, he hasn’t actually read much of it. That is telling, from my point of view.
2. Mariana was well known long before 1604-1605 as one of the leading intellectuals of his day. His interests were varied and deep, and those who knew of him knew that he had special interests in politics, the nation-state, Catholic theology, and money matters, especially how currency affects a country’s economic welfare. All of this was clear to intellectuals and other smart people as early as 1592, when his collected volumes on Spain came out. So the real truth is that Armado is full of hot air; he doesn’t really know what he’s talking about.
Armado owes Tom Krause an apology; in fact, he owes all SHAKSPER readers an apology for going on at such great length about something he knows nothing about.
Kent
[2]————————————————————-
From: Polonius
Date: Wednesday, 08 Sep 2004 15:56:51 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
Holofernes
“Actually, we don’t know that Shakespeare intentionally named Angelo after the coin. There is only the familiar mettle/metal gag and similar, but not clearly directed at Angelo’s name.”
“Double Falshood” at one point uses “mettal” [sic] in a way that cannot be certainly interpreted as either word, and I seem to recall learning in my investigation of it that Elizabethan language did not clearly distinguish the two as separate words.
[3]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Wednesday, 8 Sep 2004 21:14:40 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
“For Armado: I realize that when you wrote the post that I respond to below you did not have the benefit of my most recent post, in which I anticipated and addressed (well, refuted)”
I’m sorry, but do you really believe that? [yes] Didn’t you notice, for example, that in claiming that your work was nothing like anti-Stratfordian work, you ended up using the classic anti-Stratfordian defence, “The relatively small and self-contained universe of Measure for Measure simply should not give rise to the number of “coincidences” that YOU have to argue it contains (for me, they are not coincidences; most if not all of them are intentional references)”. [That’s not a proprietary Oxfordian method – that’s what anyone who has reached a conclusion on the basis of circumstantial evidence might say. Although some of them might be wrong – having reached a conclusion that is clearly contradicted by known facts – that doesn’t make everyone who relies on circumstantial evidence wrong – you still need to address the case] You might realise that actually the Oxfordians, or any other anti-Stratfordian group you care to mention, can get *more* coincidences out of any single play than you get out of “Measure for Measure” and “Hamlet” combined (you have written an essay, they have written a library of books). [missing the point about the sizes of the different datasets – Oxford’s life, Shakespeare’s entire works vs. debasement in Measure for Measure] You claim, quite correctly, that anti-Stratfordian “coincidences” are obviously false since they are both mutually contradictory (if the Oxfordians are right the Baconians are wrong, and vice versa, and since they can both produce identical “proofs” of their beliefs using identical methods, then clearly the methods they are using are worthless and they are fairly obviously both wrong) and because the main claim on which they are based is simply so much historical bunkum, but you apparently do not ask yourself why your own claims, based on an identical method, are any better. [His willful obtuseness and refusal to address my last point is annoying – it’s a question of evidence, not method. You can’t reject the Oxfordian argument based on their method, you need to weigh their evidence, against evidence to the contrary]
Let me try to illustrate this point. I would assume that you are rational enough to know that the “Bible Code” is false. Despite the fact that, using the “Bible Code”, people can find groups of words that relate to real events along the lines of “Rabin” “murdered” “gun” and the like, hidden in the Bible text, the code itself is bunkum. [this is very unclear sentence but it may provide a window into the inner workings of Armado’s brain. He seems to be saying that “DESPITE the fact that you can prove ridiculous things with the Bible Code, the Bible Code is wrong.” That’s a curious statement – it should be BECAUSE you can prove ridiculous things with the Bible Code, the Bible Code is wrong.” If he realized this, he would at last understand the difference between things like the Bible Code and my paper.] You can find identical groups of words that relate to real events in Moby Dick, so the claim that this is something special about the Bible is clearly untrue. [But you can find relationships to real events in “American Pie” and “Animal Farm” as well – have you proved that these relationships don’t exist either?!] You can find groups of words that are obviously untrue along the lines of “Reagan” “murdered” “knife” in the Bible, so the claim that it only shows actual events is clearly untrue. In short, the whole theory is a load of rubbish because given enough time and a willingness to look for enough events, you are *always* going to find *something* confirmed in the Bible code. The problem is that this method is so open and flexible that there is no chance at all that you will not find real events in the Bible, or in any other Hebrew text that you examine using this method. [what method? If you can find anything you want in any text, then find a similarly persuasive debasement allegory in another Shakespeare play]
Now the problem with the Bible Code is the method. The method is corrupt. It is not that the answers that were being turned up were wrong. [I see what he is saying, but all he is correct about is that the “method” of the Bible code – searching the Bible for information about current events – is wrong. That does not make every circumstantial argument wrong. Although I haven’t studied the subject, part of the reason that the Bible Code yields “results” is that searchers cast a broad net, and the Bible is a voluminous document. What you are looking for, and the size of the text in which you are looking, are critical to determining whether a “find” event is meaningful. The narrower the topic that you are looking for, and the smaller the text in which you are looking, the more likely a “find” event will mean something. In any event, it’s ridiculous to dismiss all such “finds” as meaningless without considering the breadth of the topic and the size of the text, especially when external evidence suggests that the “find” is plausible] So it makes no difference whether the person who is searching the Bible Code is turning up codes that say possible or true things (such as a list of assassinated presidents, who really were assassinated) or whether the person who is searching the Bible Code is an obvious lunatic nut following his own obviously false agenda (turning up codes saying that presidents who died naturally were actually assassinated by Adolf Hitler’s secret cell of Marxist revolutionaries). The method is worthless, so the results are worthless, whatever the results say, however they say it. I shall pause until a later stage in this post before trying to demonstrate (yet again) that your method is worthless and produces results every bit as mutually contradictory and valueless as those produced by anti-Stratfordians who seek to use the same methods for their own purposes. [This paragraph seems to demonstrate that Armado will never accept anything other than the surface meaning of any text.]
You also promptly offer an ideal refutation to the small number of your own arguments that are not based on infantile wordgames that can be played with equal efficiency on any and all English texts, by stating “Another difference between the anti-Stratfordian arguments and mine is that in the case of authorship, there is already a perfectly suitable and well-supported answer”. Of course, there is also a “perfectly suitable and well-supported answer” as to why the players in Hamlet are travelling (the child actors have become more popular than them) [here Armado displays his ignorance of the scholarship, and his failure even to carefully read the article, which cites the scholarship. For reasons explained in the paper and my response to this comment, the idea that the actors are traveling because of the child actors is actually a minority view on a question where scholars have proposed at least eight mutually exclusive answers. Beyond that, there’s a big difference between proposing a plausible alternative to an accepted interpretation, and proposing an interpretation that is at odds with known facts], and to what Claudius’s “picture in little” is (it is a miniature portrait) [but why not a coin?], and to why Claudius is “like a mildew’d ear blasting his brother” (this is known as metaphor, anybody who actually reads Shakespeare’s plays will know that he uses metaphors like this every few lines) [a rather surprising admission, from someone who typically only sees one meaning in any given line], but because you do not like what Shakespeare wrote, you wish to push aside all these obvious meanings and replace them with your own meanings, and you might notice that your own meanings routinely turn the lines from clear easy to understand statements into convoluted, improbable nonsense. [No, I find that “mildewed ear” as a debased coin resonates with the previous “counterfeit presentment” and the subsequent “coinage of your brain” in the same scene. That’s not convoluted, improbable nonsense – that’s a way of making this scene better. But Armado would rather not address the argument in the paper, and would rather see each proposed interpretation as independent of all the others] If I have the patience to go on debating secondtheories, then I’ll probably eventually get around to showing in detail why your theories are nonsense, but your arguments are so full of holes, false statements, [please elaborate] and self-contradictory double-think (whereby you change your argument to say the opposite of what you said sentences before whenever you think it would suit your current argument to do so), [please elaborate] that taking them to pieces is extremely easy, [really?] and only requires the time to be able to do it. [Interestingly, all he’s demonstrated to this point is how “easy” it is to take apart arguments like “The Bible Code” and his St. George = George Blaurock example – and I’d guess he spent quite a long time doing all that]
“ . . . most if not all of your arguments. On the theory that you might have already changed your views based on that post”
I haven’t. Your arguments are garbage. Your refutations are also garbage. [yet he doesn’t address them]
“I am going to limit my replies in this post to just a few points. If your next post shows that you still haven’t seen the error of your ways, I’ll try to come up with another way of explaining it all to you.”
Please don’t expect me to go on discussing your nonsensical [3] theories with you forever, as you spin in ever-decreasing circles trying to prove that black is white. [he seems to believe my argument changes throughout the posts. It doesn’t] I simply don’t have that much time to waste. [as will become clearer, he obviously has a lot of time to waste]
“Armado writes: “I do believe that new things can be argued about Shakespeare, I simply hold all such arguments to the same standard of evidence to which I hold all other arguments.” You need to give us examples of what kinds of arguments you accept.”
I’m not going to waste my time. Do a Google search for “Armado” and “SHAKSPER”. You will probably be able to spend most of the next year reading about the kind of arguments that I believe on the basis of my SHAKSPER postings alone (I think they started in 1996). [I actually did this, and found next to nothing. It turns out the best way to search for someone’s Shaksper posts is to put in their email address and Shaksper. I never spent much time on this, but at one point, while browsing the archives for a different reason, ran across a post by Armado that reminded me of his behavior in this thread. The question of another listmember’s (let’s call him Proteus) qualifications as a Shakespearean actor came up, and Armado managed to dredge up a few negative reviews. Proteus in response put forward a number of positive reviews. In other words, Armado exercised the same misleading and dishonest selectivity that he does in this thread. More recently, when I finally got around to reviewing the Kent-Armado dispute that Armado blames in part for his attitude in these threads, I saw some very familiar reasoning and argumentation. Armado mischaracterized Kent’s defense of modern criticism as a stance that all modern criticism is the absolute and only truth, and promptly proved how ridiculous this (and thus, to Armado’s mind, Kent) was by producing several examples of modern extremism (e.g., articles contending that Ophelia was promiscuous)]
“At this point, you do not appear to have any intuitive grasp on the difference between cases where the “coincidence” explanation is satisfactory (e.g. the authorship question and your St. George example) and where it isn’t. Nor do you seem to be able to distinguish between an argument that yields a conclusion that requires rejection of much more probable theories (e.g. the authorship question and your St. George example) and one that doesn’t.”
I understand the difference, although I also understand that a worthless method is a worthless method whether you use it to try to support claims that are likely or whether you use it to support claims that are obviously untrue (if your method will say that Chaucer wrote Shakespeare OR that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare, then its “evidence” is just as worthless in the latter case as it is in the former). [He says he understands the difference, but goes on to show that he doesn’t. A method that produces evidence that helps establish that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare would be a useful method. Thus, although I don’t think it’s particularly persuasive, some have argued that Shakespeare’s many references to gloves may derive from his past work in his father’s glove shop. This is evidence that supports, however slightly, the idea that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare. Is it absolutely worthless? Tell it to Stephen Greenblatt] You apparently do not understand either of these things, since you think that as long as your arguments are not instantly disproved by something else they must have value even if the method is worthless, [this misguided focus on the “method” is tedious] and you simultaneously reject many obvious explanations of passages in “Hamlet” and “Measure for Measure” (i.e. – “Saint Luke’s” means a religious building called “Saint Luke’s” named after the real Saint Luke after whom many real churches were named) [Mischaracterization alert: I don’t reject this, indeed in at least two or three previous posts and in the paper itself, I specifically pointed out that there were other plausible explanations for St. Luke’s, any of which would be preferable to Luke Kirby if it turns out that Shakespeare was NOT Shakeshafte (and I’ve gone out of my way to neither stay agnostic on the Shakeshafte theory)] and replace them with your own nonsensical garbage(i.e. “Saint Luke’s” refers to a building named after Luke Kirby, who – in Shakespeare’s time – was not a Saint and would never have had religious buildings named after him, and who also happens to have had nothing to do with this play, nor directly with William Shakespeare who wrote it). [again, if moated grange refers to Campion, and if Shakeshafte was Shakespeare, Luke Kirby is looking pretty good. By assuming that Luke Kirby has nothing to do with Shakespeare, Armado, in typical fashion, answers his own question]
You do this sort of thing again and again, often rolling out blatantly false justifications for doing so, such as “Nevertheless, there is no good reason for Shakespeare to import this particular Elizabethan artefact (miniature portraits) into medieval Denmark”. Now I know, and you must know, that this is a false argument. So you’re either lying to yourself or deliberately lying to us. [talk about paranoia] I prefer to think of you as an amiable idiot rather than a cheat, so I’m guessing that you’re deludingyourself. There are two reasons why this statement is a falsehood, and the first is that everybody knows Shakespeare *routinely* imports Elizabethan artefacts into “medieval Denmark” (and every other time and place that he portrays). Shakespeare puts guns and chiming clocks and books with pages in ancient Rome. [but usually there is a reason] In “Hamlet” there are a whole raft of them, including the University at Wittenberg (opened in the sixteenth century), the travelling players with boy actors playing women (English Renaissance habits, not Medieval Danish), the theatre company made up entirely of boy actors that has displaced them, the rapier and dagger with which Laertes and Hamlet fight their duel, Hamlet’s black mourning clothes (the wrong colour for Medieval Denmark, as 19th century actors keenly discovered), and I somehow doubt that Medieval Denmark would have used ducats as their main currency (although I may be wrong about that as they were using them by the Renaissance). In fact there are so many Elizabethan objects present in this play (for “no good reason” by Krause’s standards) that I would challenge Krause to find a single object mentioned anywhere in the entire play which would really have been found in Medieval Denmark, but not in Shakespeare’s England. I don’t think he will be able to name a single one. [he took one minor transitional phrase, out of context – which had no substantive bearing on the strength or weakness of my argument – and spent the foregoing paragraph on it, in a mad effort to “prove” me a liar, apparently. As indicated in my response, I considered his comment carefully – and indeed have always been well aware of all the prochronisms in Hamlet and Shakespeare’s other plays – but ended up leaving the line in as it stood]
But the second reason for dismissing Krause’s argument is that Krause himself clearly does not believe in it. Oh, he states it when it suits him, but seconds later when it suddenly suits him to say something else, he quite happily shifts to saying the exact opposite. [his support for this statement is lacking] Now as far as I’m concerned this is either a major blunder or blatant intellectual dishonesty, and it illustrates Krause’s hypocritically opportunist methods wonderfully. It is, in fact, still part of the very same argument (about coins in Hamlet), and suddenly Krause is not at all concerned about things being “import[ed] … into medieval Denmark” for no good reason, [again, harping on this little snippet] since he wants Hamlet to be talking about an obscure ancient British coin (minted only in 25 AD), with an ear of corn on the back, when he talks about Claudius as “a mildew’d ear blasting his wholesome brother”. [the difference is, if you read the paper, Shakespeare DID have a good reason for bringing in the obscure coinage references, and did not have a similarly good reason for bringing miniature portraits into the play. Again, the pointlessness of this argument is demonstrated by the fact that I could simply remove the “no good reason” transitional phrase without affecting my argument] Of course everybody in Shakespeare’s audience would have known what a miniature portrait was (a good number of them might well have been wearing one as they watched the play), [as I was careful to explain in the paper] but I doubt whether any of them was likely to know what Cunobelinus had printed on the back of a particular denomination of coin in 25 AD, and any who did would most certainly not be thinking about that coin at that moment in that play (just as I today do not think of coins every time I hear somebody say the word “crown” in a play, although many more people know that there was a British coin with a crown on the back than could ever have known that there was an obscure Ancient British coin with a ear of corn on). [the ears on Claudius and Cunobelinus coins are simply one way of recognizing that an “ear” might refer to a coin. If Shakespeare knew that Emperor Claudius’s coins were debased, he probably also knew they had ears on them. I brought in the Cunobelin coin just to be sure that eventually I am given credit if someone extends my argument to Cymbeline. Another way to understand the reference to “mildewed ear” is to recognize that coins, like corn, were commodities whose value could be destroyed. But the larger point is that he uses the term “mildewed ear” metaphorically to describe something, and it’s at least as likely considering just the metaphor alone that he is referring to a debased coin, as to a painted portrait of Claudius – who, others have suggested, may not have been ugly at all, if he was able to charm Gertrude]
“There is a spectrum from “impossible” to “highly plausible”: I rate your St. George argument “impossible,” the anti-Stratfordian theories “highly implausible,” the Shakeshaftian theories “somewhat plausible,” the identification of the “Dark Lady” as Emilia Lanier “plausible,” and the theory that MFM’s Mariana is named for Juan de Mariana “highly plausible.” For you, are they all simply “impossible”?”
Well, in the first place I would not flatter your arguments by placing them where you do. Rather obviously to anybody not riding your particular hobbyhorse, [I suppose the hobby-horse riders are those who think Shakespeare might have included economic references in his work, as opposed to the hobby-horse riders who believe that each line in Shakespeare had exactly one meaning] your claims have much less to recommend them than any vaguely rational biographical theory about Shakespeare. For a start, your theory requires time-travel [distortion: if time travel were recquired, I wouldn’t have written the paper. And this has nothing to do with the Hamlet argument] (so that Mariana becomes a famous opponent of debasement *before* he ever writes anything significant about the subject). On that basis, yes. I consider your “Mariana” theory to be so near impossible as to make no difference. [obviously, if he cannot see any other possible explanation than time travel – such as the ones I have proposed in these posts and in the paper – then he cannot consistently accord my argument any merit] After discovering another “Mariana” in a play that has nothing whatever to do with coinage or debasement, and which Shakespeare must have known about, which just happens to have an extremely similar bed-trick [well, the only thing missing from the Fair Em “bed-trick” was an actual “bed-trick”] (in which both Marianas are involved) [in opposite roles], I would say that your time-travelling argument becomes almost valueless. [again, attributing significance to this “find” shows how degenerate Armado’s thought processes are. He accepts the most tenuous circumstantial arguments when it suits him, and rejects serious circumstantial arguments as circular, and sees no need to even consider the supporting evidence]
The anti-Stratfordians are also wrong. [back to the arguments he knows how to handle] Because, like you, all of their claims are based on worthless methods [unteachable] which could be used to prove just about anything in just about any work of literature, including the exact opposite of whatever they happen to be trying to argue at the time. [to translate: he is referring to the fact that my “methods” “proved” that Shakespeare would not have brought a picture in little back to medieval Denmark, while also “proving” that he would have brought a Roman coin there, or something like that. This is a far cry from what the text says] Add to that the firm evidence for William Shakespeare of Stratford’s authorship, [as I have been telling you, THIS is the reason to reject the anti-Stratfordians’ conclusion, not their method] and the fact that no two anti-Stratfordians can “decode” the plays closely enough to even come up with the same story (unless they are deliberately copying each other not even two Oxfordians can agree with each other about what their “codes” reveal) and anti-Stratfordianism is also so near impossible as makes no difference. [completely repetitive of foregoing posts, and still not addressing my responses to those posts]
As for Shakeshafte and Emilia Lanier. I’m deeply sceptical. They might be right, but it seems much much more likely that they are not. [I don’t necessarily disagree] Although the Lanier and Shakeshafte theories are not based on quite such worthless methods as anti-Stratfordianism or Krausism (you can’t turn similar things up in every literary text in existence), [I failed to see this little nugget the first time around, perhaps because it only becomes truly relevant later. He is right that that’s a test that causes us to take the Lanier and Shakeshafte hypotheses a little more seriously – although of course those hypotheses don’t have much if anything to do with literary texts – and he is therefore also correct that one way to “disprove” my hypothesis is to show that he can come up with an equally persuasive debasement allegory for any text he finds. His ultimate attempt to “prove” me wrong does not do this] they are not based on very reliable methods, and similar methods prove too many contradictory things for us to rely on any one set of results. My guess is that if there is some truth in either of these theories, then we will never know unless some major new document appears, and until that time it is nice to have the theories, but anybody who tries to treat them as firmly established facts is deluding themselves. [his admission that it is “nice” to have these theories pending receipt of further evidence could apply equally to my case – wouldn’t it be nice if we found out that, as at least two authors have said in print [aside from Soons, somebody has character, that Mariana’s views on debasement were published as early as 1599 – except he somehow thinks that my case is necessarily wrong]
“Give us an example of Shakespearean scholarship or interpretation based on circumstantial evidence that you find plausible.”
As I say, if you want to know what I think is plausible, search SHAKSPER’s archives. [as indicated above, all I found was a similar example of ripping things out of context, and building a disparaging and erroneous theory around them]
“Armado writes: “The argument about Horatio is identical in form to Krause’s method of working at many points in the essay that Kent acclaims so” Reread and try to understand my last post if you still believe this.”
Sorry, Krause, but you really are deluding yourself. Your arguments are exactly like the anti-Stratfordian ones, only there are many more of them (the anti-Strats) and they have spent much more time on the subject, and frankly they can knock spots off your essay. They’re all talking rubbish, of course, but collectively they are much better at doing it than you are. [we’ve heard this conclusory argument again and again, but he never addresses what I say are the differences. His belief that those “false” arguments “knock spots” off of my argument shows that he still has not even attempted to understand my argument]
“Armado goes on to argue that anyone who believes that St. Luke might be a reference to Luke Kirby is intellectually obligated to believe “that any reference to a Saint in a Renaissance play is actually likely to refer to any martyr of the same name . . .” Read closely Mal: Neither Kent nor I are saying that “St. Luke’s” definitely refers to Luke Kirby.”
Actually, you come pretty close. In your essay you say that it is “most likely” that “Shakespeare … renamed the local church … in honor of catholic missionary and martyr Luke Kirby”, if we happen to believe your explanation of the moated grange. [which includes the idea that Shakespeare was Shakeshafte; again, I’ve repeatedly explained – as I attempted to do again in the text he quotes – that Luke Kirby is hardly a cornerstone of the argument] Now it seems to me that it is “most likely” that Shakespeare named “St. Luke’s” after Saint Luke, who really was a Saint, who really did have churches and other religious buildings named after him, rather than any randomly selected Luke, even if Shakespeare had a particular Catholic moated grange in mind. Simply put, Luke Kirby was not a Saint, therefore it is most unlikely that any reference to “Saint Luke” (before his canonisation centuries later) was to Luke Kirby. Of course you much prefer your own fantasies and wordgames to the overt meaning of a text, but that’s up to you. [misstating and mischaracterizing my statements about Luke Kirby, and continuing to harp on them as though they are the key to my theory, while failing to even admit, for the sake of argument, that Luke Kirby might not be important to the theory. Really, I’m happy to admit that if the moated grange is not Lyford, and Mariana is not Juan de Mariana, then St. Luke’s is not Luke Kirby. But you need to address those premises before concluding that it isn’t.]
Of course you aren’t nearly so careful with some of your other equally ridiculous arguments. I gave a particularly hearty chuckle when I came across your claim that “Understanding ‘picture in little’ as a reference to coinage bearing Claudius’s image solves these problems, and makes for a better line. Even without props, this is likely the first meaning that would have occurred to Shakespeare’s audience. ‘Picture’ was slang for coin – as in ‘whose purse was best in picture’ (WT 4.4.603) – and ‘picture in *little*’ helps to drive the point home”.
Oh, how I chuckled. There are a couple of reasons for chortling merrily [I can almost hear the demented cackling from here – read on] at your self-satisfied delusions here. Firstly, because it should be rather obvious to everybody – including yourself – that when Renaissance writers or readers saw reference to a “picture in little” they were most likely to assume that it referred to a miniature portrait. Do you want some evidence for that statement? You seem to accept this earlier in your essay where you describe the extensive popularity of the miniature portraits themselves in Shakespeare’s time, but let’s give you some additional evidence. [why is he belaboring something that I “seem to accept”?? I accept it! It’s a double entendre!! And I got the “picture” is slang for coin from Sandra Fischer’s Econolingua – as cited in the text – so this isn’t my “self-satisfied delusion” – it’s the view of a scholar who has studied these issues a lot more closely than Armado has.]
Here’s a clear reference to a “picture in little” from the Renaissance in a context where it cannot possibly mean coin. From Philip Massinger’s “A New Way to Pay Old Debts” (which came after Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” and may have borrowed the phrase from it).
“[Alworth knocks and enters]
Order: Our late young master. Amble: Welcome, Sir. Furnace: Your hand, If you have a stomake, a cold bake-meate’s ready. Order: His father’s picture in little. Furnace: We are all your servants. Amble: In you he lives”.
So here a young man who looks like his dead father is described metaphorically as his “picture in little”. By substituting Krause’s and the more sensible interpretation of this phrase, we can see clearly that only one works.
“Order: His father’s image on a coin … Amble: In you he lives”
“Order: His father’s portrait in miniature … Amble: In you he lives”.
In one instance the young man is his father’s portrait in miniature because he looks exactly like his father, but has yet to grow to his full size. In the other, we have arrant nonsense. [his slow decline from dementia to stupidity has been interesting to watch. It’s a double-entendre in Hamlet, it means portrait in Massinger. Where is the nonsense?] Since this play was written and performed only a decade or two after “Hamlet”, it seems fairly obvious that it is either using a phrase that was being used widely in conversation, or was based on Shakespeare’s use of the phrase, in either case it makes it clear that Massinger and therefore the ordinary audience member would have thought of miniature portraits not coins on hearing the phrase. [I hesitate to engage him on this idiotic argument – see comment above – especially when I am perfectly willing to concede – and did in fact acknowledge in the paper – that “picture in little” might have meant portrait in Shakespeare’s day, but I can’t help but mention that because Shakespeare’s was the apparently the first recorded use of it, it may well be that Shakespeare was talking about coins in the single meaning, and not even thinking about pictures. The phrase may well have been independently adopted later, or used by someone reading Hamlet and thinking that Shakespeare indeed was referring to a miniature portrait, as many scholars have done since. But again, the last couple of sentences are a dangerous digression, when dealing with someone like Armado.] There are numerous 17th century examples of this phrase (in the decades following Shakespeare’s play), and all of them clearly refer to miniature portraits or other small pictures. Again, this either proves that this phrase was in general conversational use, or shows that they were imitating Shakespeare, and that when they read or saw his play they assumed that he was referring to miniature portraits not coins.
“To govern well a family, and a kingdome, are not different degrees of Prudence; but different sorts of businesse; no more then to draw a picture in little, or as great, or greater then the life, are different degrees of Art.” – “Leviathan” by Thomas Hobbes, 1651.
“After dinner he and I to look upon the instructions of my Lord Northumberland’s, but we were interrupted by Mr. Salisbury’s coming in, who came to see me and to show me my Lord’s picture in little, of his doing.” – Samuel Pepys, from his diary, 25 January 1661.
“I have written to our Royal Mistress, upon a touch in your last, (which found me at Bocton) that I had now sent her my Niece Stanhop’s Picture in little, if an express Messenger sent for it, the very night before I cam away, by my Lord of Chesterfield (to whom it was promised) had not ravished it out of my Pocket.” – “Reliquiae Wottonianae” by Sir Henry Wotton, 1672.
“The Queen-Dauphin ask’d Monsieur de Cleve for a Picture in little he had of his Wife, to compare it with that which was newly drawn of her” – “The Princess of Cleves” by Madame La Fayette, 1679.
“What Faculty is it which takes the Model of the largest Objects, and draws the Picture in Little?” – “Miscellanies upon moral subjects” by Jeremy Collier, 1695.
So it is clear that “picture in little”, during the lifetime of Shakespeare’s audience members and in the lifetimes of their children, was considered to be a reference to miniature portraits, but what about Krause’s theory? Krause tells us:
“Even without props, this is likely the first meaning that would have occurred to Shakespeare’s audience. ‘Picture’ was slang for coin – as in ‘whose purse was best in picture’ (WT 4.4.603) – and ‘picture in *little*’ helps to drive the point home”.
The problem with this, of course, is that Krause is quite simply wrong. [As is Sandra Fischer (Ellston)?] Picture was never slang for coin, and if he thinks it was I would ask him to find us a clear example of this word used in this way. The example that he thinks he has found in “Winter’s Tale” simply won’t do [I plainly cited Fischer for this and her reference to other contemporaneous examples], and here’s why.
In the Arden 2 “Winter’s Tale”, the editor – J.H.P. Pafford – wonders about the meaning of Autolycus’s phrase. He writes “No parallel usage has been traced but the phrase apparently means ‘fittest for picking’, i.e. best stocked and positioned for the thief”. You will note that in Pafford’s reading of the phrase the word “coins” does not appear. For Pafford “picture” is not a clear synonym for “coins” in this phrase, as it must be for Krause to project this reading at “Hamlet”, but instead “best in picture” means “best stocked and positioned for the thief”.
[He totally misses the fact that I am not claiming this as my “find” but am quoting Fischer’s find. See also my text a few paragraphs below showing how Fischer and not Pafford is almost certainly right about Winter’s Tale. ]
Having the massive advantage of EEBO (Early English Books Online), and therefore having the ability to search a large proportion of the English books in print pre-1900, I think I can confirm Pafford’s reasonable hypothesis, and what’s more I can give a “parallel usage” to show exactly what “best in picture” means. [Of course, I had access to EEBO too, and the massive advantage of a mind that understood how to make best use of it]
From the “New Epistles of Mounsieur de Balzac”, translated by Sir Richard Baker, 1638:
“I speake Madam, of this exteriour dutie, and this affection in picture, which is oftentimes but a false representation of the soule”.
It is obvious, yet again, that there is no reference to coins here. Balzac is talking about “affection in picture” as opposed to affection in fact. Here “in picture” is clearly a synonym for “in show” or “in appearance”: note especially the fact of the contrast drawn between the “exterior” (that which is outside, and shown to all, but can be “a false representation”) and the interior “soul” (that which is privately kept inside a man’s body, unseen and invisible, but containing the truth).
By this reading “whose purse was best in picture” means “whose purse was best in [appearance / show]” meaning “whose purse looked the best [for stealing]”. [except of course, when one is talking about a purse, one is talking about money, and when one is considering stealing, it’s the money that matters, not the appearance]
So again, we can compare my reading of this phrase with Krause’s in the two instances where it appears.
First, the Krause versions:
“… by which means I saw whose purse was best in coin; and what I saw, to my good use I remembered”.
“I speake Madam, of this exteriour dutie, and this affection in coin, which is oftentimes but a false representation of the soule”. [obviously, the second has nothing to do with coins, and I never said it did. He’s acting as though “picture” either means “picture” or it means “coin” but it can’t sometimes mean both] Now, the versions supported by my reading, which fits in with that of J.H.P. Pafford:
“… by which means I saw whose purse was best in show; and what I saw, to my good use I remembered”.
“I speake Madam, of this exteriour dutie, and this affection in show, which is oftentimes but a false representation of the soule”.
And another possible version of mine and J.H.P.Pafford’s reading (with the same meaning, but a different synonym):
“… by which means I saw whose purse was best in appearance; and what I saw, to my good use I remembered”.
[Although it seems silly to engage at this level, given Armado’s ignorance of Fischer – who also cited contemporary examples from other playwrights – and innocence of the double entendre, the context from Winter’s Tale is probably worth setting forth here:
“Ha, ha! what a fool Honesty is! and Trust, his sworn brother, a very simple gentleman! I have sold all my trumpery; not a counterfeit stone, not a ribbon, glass, pomander, brooch, table-book, ballad, knife, tape, glove, shoe-tie, bracelet, horn-ring, to keep my pack from fasting. They throng who should buy first, as if my trinkets had been hallowed and brought a benediction to the buyer; by which means I saw whose purse was best in picture; and what I saw, to my good use I rememb’red. My clown, who wants but something to be a reasonable man, grew so in love with the wenches’ song that he would not stir his pettitoes till he had both tune and words, which so drew the rest of the herd to me that all their other senses stuck in ears. You might have pinch’d a placket, it was senseless; ’twas nothing to geld a codpiece of a purse; I would have fil’d keys off that hung in chains. No hearing, no feeling, but my sir’s song, and admiring the nothing of it. So that in this time of lethargy I pick’d and cut most of their festival purses; and had not the old man come in with whoobub against his daughter and the King’s son and scar’d my choughs from the chaff, I had not left a purse alive in the whole army.”
In other words, Autolycus tells us that by the expedient of selling all of his worthless trinkets to the thronging buyers, he was able to discern whose purse was “best in picture,” and thus which ones were most worth stealing later on.]
“I speake Madam, of this exteriour dutie, and this affection in appearance, which is oftentimes but a false representation of the soule”. [Again, I never said this meant coin. Why would I?] Again, we can ask Tom Krause, which sounds more likely? [So if the word “booty” is slang for “rear end”, this means that every reference in the literature to “booty” must be a reference to a rear end? And if it isn’t, have we proven that “booty” is not slang for rear end after all?]
1) “Picture” in both “Hamlet”s “picture in little” and “Winter’s Tale”s “best in picture” means “coin” even though there is apparently no example of anybody ever using that word to mean that thing anywhere in the whole of English Literature.
[Read Fischer and the other sources she cites. How Armado can spend so much time and so little logic on an argument that’s already addressed in the paper is simply baffling]
2) “Picture in little” in “Hamlet” means “a miniature painting”, as it does in many seventeenth century sources, starting with a Renaissance play by one of Shakespeare’s contemporaries, and continuing – occasionally – to the present day. Similarly, the word “picture” in the phrase “best in picture” means “in appearance” or “in show”, as it does identically in a seventeenth century book which uses the phrase “in picture” in exactly the same way.
It seems fairly obvious to me that interpretations based on real examples of usage elsewhere in English Literature are far superior to examples that we just dream up for ourselves on the basis of no evidence whatsoever in order to support a theory for which there is no other evidence. Krause, however, seems to prefer his dreams to reality, so will probably continue to hold to his own reading, even though his only example for this reading turns out not to support him in the way that he imagines.
[Let me add that even if it were not for the slang usage of “picture” there’s enough in the play to suggest that “picture in little” was a play on coins. Just read the paper, which was originally almost entirely written before I came across the Fischer definition]
“In fact, I added the Luke Kirby point long after Ed first read and accepted the essay – it is hardly the essential point that you make it out to be.”
It demonstrates your major method, and the faults within it, nicely. [Denied. If he truly thinks his misleading discussion of Luke Kirby demonstrates my method, he is deluding himself. As said ad nauseum, the Luke Kirby point only kicks in if the other surmises are correct – and maybe only if Shakespeare is Shakeshafte. What does this have to do with my “major method”?]
“As I have said throughout this thread, there are other plausible explanations, including that St. Luke’s was randomly selected. On the other hand, Luke Kirby does fit fairly well with everything else that I have proposed about the play. If I am right that Mariana is Juan de Mariana – as indicated both by the role Mariana plays in the debasement allegory and the fact that Mariana’s brother can only correspond to Federigo Spinola – then the moated grange probably points to Juan de Mariana as well. And a notorious moated grange that points to the Jesuit Mariana is Lyford Grange, where the Jesuit Edmund Campion was captured. Was this an intentional reference to Campion? I don’t know for sure.”
OK, so let’s cut this down to what it really represents. Krause’s wildly skipping mind follows the following path. [talk about a wildly skipping mind – what does what follows have to do with the paragraph you just quoted?]
1) There are references to coins containing base metal in “Measure for Measure”.
2) These references must be to deliberate inflationary debasement by governments. [so far, this is not far from accurate, although his phrase “inflationary debasement” is annoying, since it’s essentially tautological – he is trying to make a debasement seem like an overt government policy – as it becomes clear he believes it is – which it wasn’t]
3) Since “Measure for Measure” contains references to what I claim is inflationary debasement by governments, the name “Mariana” *must* have been chosen because of Juan de Mariana who wrote a book on this subject (*AFTER* Shakespeare wrote his play). THIS CANNOT BE A COINCIDENCE! [It is true that I reached something like step 3 after steps 1-2, except that my initial reaction was the opposite – that it most likely was a merely a coincidence. It was only after using the hypothesis that “Mariana” = Juan de Mariana to attempt to derive the two identifiers – the Great Soldier Frederick and the moated grange – that I started to question the “coincidence” theory. Based on the idea that Mariana was Spanish, I posited a Spanish Frederick, and thus went searching for a “Federigo.” I was quickly rewarded with Spinola. Now this could of course also be a coincidence, but it’s much less likely. Similarly, I looked for a moated grange that might be known to Elizabethans and have a connection to Jesuits. I found Lyford Grange, but it was not easy to tell that it had a moat. The Mariana theory predicted that it did; and sure enough, when I finally tracked down Waugh’s book, I found that it did. So the Mariana theory “predicted” two more connections. Those might have been coincidences as well, but as one piles coincidence on top of coincidence, the likelihood that it’s all coincidence gets much smaller]
4) Since Mariana’s name comes from a real person, then I must be allowed to look for a real person behind every name. This means that Mariana’s brother, the great soldier Frederick who drowned in a shipwreck, must be a real person, the only famous soldier with a name something like Frederick who I can find in a doubtless fairly arbitrary search through the historical record is Federico de Spinola, who has nothing to do with Mariana whatsoever.
[As above, this is hardly what happened. It was a very targeted search of the historical record, and it found exactly what was predicted by the hypothesis that Mariana = Juan de Mariana.]
5) Hang on a second, I’ve thought up an explanation that ties Federico de Spinola up with Mariana in a rather loose and random sort of way. Mariana was Spanish, and Federico wasn’t! [They called him Federigo, and he was leader in the Spanish cause for a decade, and he operated Spanish galleys in the English channel. The fact that he came from Genoa does not defeat the hypothesis.] No, I mean Mariana was Spanish and Federico worked for the Spanish. [this is more or less what I mean – what’s the first sentence of the paragraph have to do with anything?] And somewhere else I’m suggesting that Queen Elizabeth (who also has nothing to do with Mariana) is represented by Isabella, which is Elizabeth in Spanish! So Federico is a way of showing that you should read Isabella’s name from Spanish into English! [Doesn’t seem much of a logical trail there!] [I’m not the first to notice that Elizabeth is Isabella in Spanish or the parallels between Elizabeth and the play’s Isabella. But given the Spanish elements I have proposed (Mariana and Spinola) it finally makes sense that Shakespeare named Isabella this way.]
6) I can’t find any more links by nationality, so let’s do one by profession! Since all the people in the play are real people, then all the buildings must be real buildings! I’ve heard of a “moated grange” that was used by Jesuits, and Mariana was a Jesuit, so obviously that must be the moated grange that Shakespeare was talking about!
Once again, this is a blatantly worthless way of proceeding. There are so many characteristics about any person, or type of building, or place, that we can – using the Krause method – very easily create a chain between just about any of them and just about any that we first thought of, especially if we don’t have any rules about which people or places that we use, or what the connections might be between them. [Shakespeare identified a “moated grange.” How many “moated granges” would this have called to the minds of his audience?] Using Krause’s rules it doesn’t matter if two people have brown hair, or work as teachers, or both appear in a biography of the author of the play (however vaguely and without any direct connection to the subject of that biography), let’s just link them up! [No – I identified Mariana as a key to the play. She had two identifying characteristics – Frederick and the moated grange. I took two major characteristics that I knew about Juan de Mariana – that he was Spanish and Jesuit (I didn’t know his hair color). And both of them panned out very rapidly in ways that would have been readily apparent to Shakespeare’s audience. Federigo is almost a certainty, even if Mariana is wrong. And the moated grange is a good bet – almost a sure bet if Shakespeare was Shakeshafte, and certainly a sure bet if Mariana is Juan de Mariana.] The possibility that Shakespeare might actually have been making up all of these names and people or borrowing them from other fiction apparently does not even occur to him. [distortion alert: of course it does – I mention it repeatedly] Neither does the possibility that – since it is so easy to make these connections and build this sort of chain of worthless assumption upon worthless assumption – he might simply be wasting his own time, and that of everybody who reads his work. [I will acknowledge that reading the work will be a waste of time for anyone with Armado’s prejudices. While Armado’s eloquence tends to undermine the hypothesis that he is stupid, something has so blinded him that he has to willfully mischaracterize the argument at every turn, and seems unaware of just how bad his own arguments are]
“Maybe Shakespeare had Baddesley Clinton in mind (assuming Nathaniel is correct that Baddesley Clinton was a “grange,” and that Shakespeare’s audience would have recognized it as such), and was pointing to the Jesuit Mariana through the Jesuit Henry Garnet.”
Or maybe Shakespeare had no particular place in mind. Do you think that every castle in every Arthurian story is based on a real castle? I think not. Notice, by the way, that Krause’s methodology is *SO* meaningless and flexible, that it doesn’t even matter whether we decide that the building is a moated grange at one end of the country or a moated grange at entirely the other end of the country, because we can tie Jesuits to both they both count in exactly the same way in the Krause game. [Again, chewing tenaciously on a red herring. Baddesly Clinton came from Bridgman, but someone else says it wasn’t a grange, and I myself have no way of telling whether it had a moat. If there were a lot of moated granges with Jesuit connections, then this would presumably just strengthen the connection of moated grange to Jesuits. And I find it significant that Lyford has the word “Grange” in it – it makes it very easy for the audience to tell what Grange is being discussed.] This is exactly the problem with the anti-Stratfordians (if you follow their methods, they will lead you triumphantly to Oxford! … but they will also lead you triumphantly to Bacon! … and to Marlowe! … and to just about everybody and his [or her] kid brother!), but again Krause has no understanding of the faults in his method, and so thinks it is actually a good thing that you can slot a wide range of moated granges into his theory and it still works perfectly well. All this really tells you is that Krause’s theory – even if we believe every word of it – is not very good at reaching a firm or fixed conclusion. [again, the “moated grange” was only used as confirmation that Mariana was “Juan de Mariana.”]
“Or maybe – although I think this is less likely – he felt that he had sufficiently identified Mariana and just thought that a “moated grange” was a romantic setting for the abandoned Mariana.”
Since the entire point is that she is cutting herself off from everybody, and is a non-noble person who was wealthy but is now in poverty, a moated grange seems to fit all of the demands of the story. [as I just said, and as many of Shakespeare’s double-entendres did] It has a moat (so she is cut off) and it is not so extravagant as to suggest that she is a noble or should have important family to rescue her (let’s face it, if she was living in an abandoned castle or palace it would have been overkill). [but then again, a grange with a moat would have been a rather expensive proposition, especially for someone whose dowry was lost at sea] Of course, neither Kent nor Krause is likely to accept that Shakespeare made his decisions on the basis of boring things like the storyline of his play! [read what you just quoted from me – I said it was possible, but unlikely, given points you haven’t addressed] That would be awful! I mean that’s the sort of thing that everybody understands, you know, all those dirty ordinary people who go to the theatre, that isn’t a great big secret that can make us look really clever for working it out! [It turns out Armado is a theater reviewer, with a strong interest in being able to understand any play he sees at first glance]
“But let me add that IF the Shakeshaftians are right – i.e. that Shakespeare had a connection to both Thomas Cottam and Edmund Campion – then Shakespeare most certainly knew of Luke Kirby (who stood trial with Campion and was executed along with Cottam) and quite possibly was sympathetic to him.”
But then the Shakeshafte theory is on pretty dubious ground itself. You certainly can’t assume that it is factually accurate. [of course not, but you need to play along with the assumptions that underlie what I’ve said about Luke Kirby in order to criticize it] Therefore to add yet another set of conjectures (albeit more sensible ones) to your long string of random association is only to make your argument even more weak and unconvincing. [This has it completely backward. All I’m saying is that if Shakespeare was Shakeshafte – as many believe – and that Shakeshafte knew and cared about Campion – as many also believe – then it’s a near certainty to think that a “moated grange” referred to Lyford Grange. This implicitly acknowledges what I thought was obvious about my meaning – we don’t know for sure that the moated grange is Lyford. All we can do is point out Federigo, Mariana, and Lyford, and note how they all converge on the same theme.]
“For me, that makes it all the more likely that the moated grange is Lyford Grange and St. Luke’s refers to Luke Kirby.”
Of course it’s a whole lot easier if we think that when somebody writes “Saint Luke’s” they’re talking about a religious building which was dedicated to a Saint called Luke, but of course the easy options don’t get us publication credits! [missing the point. The point is to assume Shakespeare was Shakeshafte, and then ask yourself the question]
“Given that there are some prominent scholars who believe the Shakeshaftian theory, and who continue to come up with new evidence and arguments to support their claim, I think it makes sense to keep Luke Kirby in the essay, don’t you?”
Does it occur to you that almost all of these people would think that you are barking, and that your argument is ridiculous? [We’ll have to ask them] How does that help you?
“Or are they all wrong too? If so, will they still be wrong if they come up with more evidence in the future?”
They certainly will if the evidence is anything like the sort of thing that you produce above. [nonresponsive]
“Speaking of his “demonstration” that a reference to St. George could be a reference to George Blaurock, Armado writes: “OK. It’s all garbage, of course, and produced with much less time and effort than Krause is likely to have put into his own similarly nonsensical claims (and I’m sure I could do much better if I used all of my reference books and spent days or weeks rather than minutes working on my deliberately false “theories”), but it is Krause-style garbage, and this is effectively all that most of Krause’s arguments consist of.” Why do you say “most” of my arguments are garbage? Which ones do you think have merit?”
No. All your arguments seem to be garbage, except for those you steal from other people. Just most of them are based on your trivia wordgames. The others are equally poor for different reasons (see some of them treated elsewhere in this E-Mail).
“Seriously, you have not come close to duplicating my methods, which makes it clear that when you wrote that, you did not understand them.”
Aha! So here we come to yet another anti-Stratfordian argument. What’s it doing in Krause’s mouth? Oh, yes, that’s right. They both use the same methods, so of course they come up with the same arguments, but Krause keeps claiming that he is so completely different so why does he keep stealing the anti-Stratfordians clothes? Who knows. [I am not stealing anybody’s clothes. I’m just pointing out that to date, your posts made it clear that you don’t understand the distinction that I have repeatedly drawn between the anti-Stratfordian theories and mine.]
The best answer to this is another question. [bizarre mean-spirited irrelevancy alert] How much of your life did you spend creating your theory? I’m guessing that even if you did this on and off, a flick here and a flick there, you actually spent tens if not hundreds of hours poring over books and the internet constructing your theory. The methods that you used were worthless, unfortunately, so all you came up with was garbage, but here’s the funny thing. As far as *you* are concerned, what you were doing was serious academic research! [you have yet to distinguish it from serious research] *You* think that what you have done has opened a window to the mind of the great artist Shakespeare that has never been opened before (or at least, if it has, all records of that event have been lost to history). As a result *you* thought that spending hundreds of hours writing garbage was a great way to spend your time. [I think I might be right. Many others who have read the article think I might be right. You and perhaps one or two of your acolytes are the only ones who *know* I am wrong. You apparently really don’t realize how ridiculous the position – that I must be wrong – you have taken is] Then there’s me. I know your method is garbage. I’ve seen it before. I’ve seen it used by a whole lot of people to “prove” a whole lot of obviously untrue things, and – this is the best bit – I’ve even seen a good number of these people using exactly the same method to prove exactly opposite and contradictory things to each other. [interestingly, this is more or less what you’ve done with your “Fair Em” bed-trick argument] As far as I’m concerned, people who use these methods and think they’ve proved something are not very talented. Anybody who reads their work is wasting their time.
As it happens, I have a little time to waste, so I’ve read your work, and I’ve spent a few evenings showing exactly where and why you are incorrect and incorrect and incorrect again. [Hardly. He hasn’t made one sensible remark about the Hamlet argument, and apart from harping on side issues in the Measure for Measure argument, has only identified the obvious fact that I need to rely on circumstantial evidence to establish that Shakespeare had heard of Mariana] But now you say “That’s not good enough. You’ve given me a better source for Mariana than the one that I suggested (since yours does not involve time-travel or ideas crossing continents on the wings of a dove, and you can actually connect Shakespeare directly to the source that you found and show – just short of certainty – that he must have sat in the audience or turned the pages of the book, or even acted on the stage, when it was printed and performed). [see above and below] You’ve given me a better martyr disguised as a Saint than mine (because yours actually has something to do with the Shakespearean quote, while mine has nothing much to do with anything unless you follow a long string of random association on my part). [he apparently believes that the Blaurock connection is as useful as the Mariana hypothesis] But while you say that my coincidences are worthless – and have proved it by showing equally good individual coincidences [distortion alert]– you have not got so many coincidences as I have! [again, labeling them “coincidences” is part of his problem] Look, I’ve found lots of them! Until you find exactly as many coincidences as I have found, in exactly the same way, then you haven’t disproved anything!” [I’ve found a coherent thread to the play that explains a lot of the action and circumstances that have not been explained before. The answers to previously-difficult-to-answer questions become obvious when my theory is considered. It’s more than a collection of coincidences; it’s a theory that yields answers]
Of the course the problem here is that 0 times 0 times 0 times 0 = 0. It doesn’t matter how many coincidences you’ve got. I can show you that individually they’re not worth a tuppenny damn, and if they’re not worth a thing individually, then it doesn’t matter how many of them you put together, they’re still completely worthless. [again, why engage on this irrelevancy, except for the reason that it’s so ridiculously false. The more “coincidences” you have – especially when they are predicted by each other – the more likely they are not coincidences. That’s elementary.] Despite this, I probably would spend some time just to rub your nose in it (despite the fact that you and Kent – just like those old anti-Stratfordians – would just keep sobbing “I’m right … I’m right …. I’m right … I don’t care what you say, I’m still right!”), [no, we’d probably just keep refuting your arguments and correcting your distortions with explanations that you never address] but here’s the rub. I don’t have that amount of time to waste on something quite so inherently pointless. If I could be bothered to spend as long as you spent writing your essay writing a fantasy counter, then I’m sure I could knock spots off it. I’ve knocked spots off two of your examples already, [which two again? Luke Kirby and the moated grange? Explain yourself] and that didn’t take me very long – but there are two problems. 1) I can’t be bothered, your arguments are not worth it and 2) you would then fall back to the final refuge of the anti-Stratfordian, the one that they use when their theories have been pummelled to pieces and haven’t got a bone left to stand on. Here it comes (I’ll have to bring it forward through all your lecturing):
“If you can do all that (and that’s somewhat less than I have done for debasement in MFM), I’ll acknowledge that you have essentially duplicated my methods. In fact, if you can do that, I’ll probably say that you have identified a possible “Anabaptist theme” in Henry VI.”
Yep, that’s right. If – after all that – I prove beyond all doubt to be able to exactly reproduce your essay you will respond in one of two ways.
1) “But your claims are false. Therefore they aren’t nearly as good as my claims. My claims are based on real things. That’s why I’m right and you’re wrong.” [oddly, this is exactly how Armado sounds most of the time. How can he be so oblivious?] Or to quote Krause trying to use this argument against the anti-Stratfordians who use Krause’s methods much better than Krause and much more extensively [now the anti-Strats are better than me], and have come up with thousands more coincidences [again, wrong word] than Krause ever could, but who Krause happens to know (in an uncharacteristic moment of rationality) are completely wrong:
“At this point, you do not appear to have any intuitive grasp on the difference between cases where the “coincidence” explanation is satisfactory (e.g. the authorship question and your St. George example) and where it isn’t. Nor do you seem to be able to distinguish between an argument that yields a conclusion that requires rejection of much more probable theories (e.g. the authorship question and your St. George example) and one that doesn’t.” [quoting me, but learning nothing from it]
And if Krause doesn’t dismiss us for being too unconvincing to matter, [which is a perfectly sound basis for dismissing St. George = George Blaurock) then he’ll dismiss us for another reason. And this one’s worse. Here it comes again, in case you missed it [distortion alert]:
2) “Hah! You’re right. That’s exactly the same as my argument if not better. All the same coincidences, and the same thematic pattern, yes, that fulfils all of my criteria! But my theories are right and if your deliberately false theories are wrong, then that would mean that my theories too were almost certainly wrong! So the only possible conclusion is that … ha, ha … we’re both right! Entirely by accident while trying to construct a false theory you have accidentally stumbled across THE TRUTH! If you write it up, I’ll get Kent to publish it, he likes essays like this!”. Or to quote Krause: “In fact, if you can do that, I’ll probably say that you have identified a possible “Anabaptist theme” in Henry VI”.
[as it happens, Armado failed miserably to produce a meaningful allegory, so we’ll never know what my reaction would have been. ]
So what Krause has managed to do, by still more of his opportunistic philosophical flip-flopping (believing whatever suits him at any one time, even if it is the opposite of the argument he was holding just moments ago) [his sole example of this seems to be his quibble with that transitional phrase in the Hamlet argument about what fit in medieval Denmark], is make his own argument completely watertight and undefeatable. You can’t prove him wrong, because any attempt that you make to do so, he will simply squirm away from you in one direction or the other. [It’s not squirming – if he could find as much debasement in another play as I’ve found in MFM, it probably is about debasement; and anyway, Armado is here predicting my reaction to some hypothetical example he intends to produce in the future, rather than actually addressing any of my arguments, or attempting to shore up his own]
Of course this is the point at which Krause’s arguments stop being pseudo-scholarly and show their true colours. Krause has faith! He has the sort of faith that has Moonies and Scientologists ignoring the gaping holes in their beliefs despite all evidence to the contrary. He has the faith of the anti-Stratfordians. Real evidence doesn’t matter when faith of this kind is around. All that matters is belief. It’s rather amusing and a bit sad, but that’s the truth. [Nothing I’ve said indicates anything about “faith.” Apparently all of this comes from my simple statement that if he can produce a reasonable allegory on the Anabaptist theme (as opposed to a one-word “George” coincidence), he’s probably identified something. What’s amusing, and a bit sad, is how Armado distorts everything I say, and then calls me the liar and the flip-flopper]
“If you want to duplicate my methods, here is what you need to do: (1) show me where Anabaptist references – metaphorical or otherwise – appear in several of Shakespeare’s plays, as recognized by scholars other than yourself. (2) show me ten or more express references in Henry VI that scholars other than you recognize are to an Anabaptist theme. (3) show me an allegory in which the characters of Henry VI interact in some fashion that would convey a message about Anabaptists. (4) show me how the Anabaptist explanation in fact explains some of the behavior of the characters that other scholars have found difficult to understand. (5) show me independent evidence that Shakespeare had Anabaptist leanings. (6) show me how the Anabaptist theory explains a number of other references for which no satisfactory explanation has been proposed. But you can’t, because there isn’t. And that’s the difference. The bottom line is that the George-George coincidences you have identified have no probative value absent some support along the lines of steps (1)-(6). As of course you know, they are the sort of trivial coincidences that one can expect to find in a large body of data.”
And, of course, the problem with the “Bible Code” and sprit-mediums who talk to the dead, and all the rest of the pseudo-scholarly and pseudo-scientific nonsense that gets spouted in this unhappy world is that “trivial coincidences that one can expect to find in a large body of data” can look awfully impressive to the gullible and credulous. [Armado is so scared of being labeled “gullible and credulous” that he refuses to consider anything. But his unshakeable belief in disbelief is a kind of gullibility in itself] And there are an awful lot of gullible and credulous people out there. You’d be surprised, Tom, you really would! [you’ve worked so hard to make sure that you’re not one of them, that you’ve completely lost sight of logic]
I’m not going to waste weeks or months of my life on this caper, but I will spend a little more time constructing a Krause-alike combined theory of several elements linked together that will pass several (if not all) of your criteria. I have the stirrings of one for “Measure for Measure” in which “Mariana” is a representation of the Virgin Mary (better than ‘o’ = Nero, I’m sure you’ll admit) [sure I’ll admit it, I mentioned the possibility that Mariana derives from the Virgin Mary in my paper which you claim to have read], but I’ll see how that works out.
Of course, I already know in advance exactly how you’ll react. [how he can claim to know me so well based on my posts is beyond me. Then again, I feel at this point that I know him quite well] It will be one of two ways:
1) “No. That’s not quite as convincing as my argument. After all, look, my argument has convinced the great Tom Krause and yours hasn’t because obviously I disagree with you, therefore your coincidences are obviously just coincidences and mine are obviously deeply seated references that only Shakespeare could possibly have put into the play.” [this seems redundant with his last prediction of my reaction] *** OR ***
2) “No. You’re right. That’s so convincing, it must be true (or at least it very well could be). Therefore my argument is still true, and you’re wrong to think that your argument was a lot of garbage that you made up to win a bet. I’ll just get Kent on the phone.” [ditto]
Of course you could try option 3) “Oh, damn. You’re right! My methods are worthless, that means that I haven’t proved anything. I’ll get Kent to cancel that publication”.
But what are the chances of that? [very slim]
Armado.
[4]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 01:04:20 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
Looking more closely at Krause’s list of demands, I’m quite amused to see quite how much he has biased the list in his attempt to make it impossible to show that Krause’s method is at fault (even – or perhaps especially – if it is). [what is this supposed to mean? The “list” – which I didn’t put a whole lot of thought into – was just meant to describe the elements of a reasonable circumstantial case in this area. Again, Armado’s problem is that he is fixated on his undefined concept of “method”] This makes this a bad experiment in the scholarly sense, since arguments that are not disprovable are immediately worthless, as they are in science. Krause has tried to make his claims unfalsifiable (a word that he should look up in a scientific handbook if he has not heard it before), and that is automatically evidence of a bad argument. [I have reserved use of the word “idiotic” for statements like this. What literary theory involving a dead writer is NOT “unfalsifiable”? I’ve just come up with a set of tests that my theory seems to pass. The point is, I believe that a theory that passes these tests is probably correct. If he believes that what I did can be done with any text, for any topic, at any time, then he should have no trouble achieving the same results]
Krause has deliberately set up these tests in such a way that at least half of them are impassable (Krause will simply say “not good enough” to anything that would prove his own argument to be rubbish). [of course, their impassability is a testament to the correctness of my argument]
Unfortunately for Krause, his own essay fails all of these tests, [as administered by you and your distortions, factual mistakes, and conclusory counterstatements] including the ones that should be relatively easy to pass.
(1) show me where Anabaptist references – metaphorical or otherwise – appear in several of Shakespeare’s plays, as recognized by scholars other than yourself.
Fair enough. This one’s easy for me. I might point out, however, that Krause doesn’t actually fulfill it himself. He doesn’t actually find images related to deliberate inflationary debasement by governments, he simply finds a lot of images related to coins, and some to coins containing false metal or being tested for their metal content. The vast majority of these references depend on the idea that a “true” coin is one that has a suitable level of gold. [yes, and this is the core issue of debasement] Of course this makes it absolutely clear that in every one of the images in which this is true, Shakespeare is not referring to deliberate inflationary debasement by governments, because if your Henry VIII official shilling contains 80% of silver and your Henry VII official shilling contains 90% of silver, then however much testing you do of that Henry VIII coin, it won’t make it a false coin. [but if it’s the same denomination, it will be worth less. That’s what people had to contend with in a debasement] On the other hand if your Henry VIII official shilling contains 80% of silver, and you test a coin and find that it contains 60% of silver and 40% of base metals, then you have a false coin. [displaying a misunderstanding of debasement and contemporary concerns about debasement. The English also had to contend with foreign coins, which circulated alongside English coins, but which had to be constantly checked for purity. Over the years, as Henry VIII debased the coinage, the silver content of a groat decreased. And thus a groat issued in 1540 would be more valuable to you than a groat issued in 1548, having a fraction of the silver. That was the problem caused by debasement.] This means that references like “truepenny” and Angelo’s:
“Now, good my lord, Let there be some more test made of my metal, Before so noble and so great a figure Be stamp’d upon it” (1.1.47-50).”
… are clearly not references to deliberate inflationary debasement by governments. The debased Henry VIII penny *was* a true-penny, it just wasn’t a very valuable one. [But if you had a debased one, and a pure one, it would only make sense to call the pure one true.] And if somebody tested a coin to make sure that it contained the right amount of metal before stamping the King’s head on it [what somebody? Is it really a “coin” before the King’s head is stamped on it? Is Armado talking about mint operations?], then he would still have stamped the King’s head on it if it was a debased coin (all those debased Henry VIII pennies had the King’s head on), he would only have not done so if – to his surprise – the tested metal turned out to be less pure than he was expecting, that is less pure than the official coin was supposed to be. [he seems to be losing his train of thought here. Yes, if the mint was tasked to mint coins having only a certain silver content, they would not mint coins that deviated from that silver content. So what?]
On this level, every reference that Krause gives to “debasement” of coins, in “Measure for Measure” and in other plays are nothing to do with deliberate inflationary debasement by governments at all, and therefore do not have anything to do with the “theme” and “allegory” that Krause tries to force into the play. [again, as clearly set forth in the paper, one of the most obviously debased currencies that the English would have come into contact with was the Scottish currency, which, as a result of debasement, used denominations of pounds and shillings that contained 1/12th the precious metal of their English counterparts. An Englishman would refer to that currency as debased (which it was), especially in comparison with the English currency)].
In fact, let’s run through every single supposed “debasement” reference first suggested by other scholars [interesting that he notices that these were suggested by other scholars. Is he going to prove that they are all wrong?] that Krause mentions in his essay. Unless I’m very much mistaken (and if I am, I may have missed one or two references), Krause gathers all of these references on his pages 2 to 4.
Here we go:
“In the First Act, Polonius chastises Ophelia for having taken Hamlet’s ‘tenders for true pay / Which are not sterling”.
Debasement? NO. Henry VIII’s pound coins, on the other hand, *were* sterling, however debased they were, because they remained the official coin of the realm. Arden footnote: “sterling] genuine money Cf. Mamillia ‘It is … hard to descry the true sterling from the counterfeit coin'”. This is an allusion to forgery, not to inflationary debasement. [The distinction between forgery and debasement is a very slim one. As indicated in a footnote added after the draft Armado read, Dante saw them as indistinguishable, naming Philip IV of France (the Fair) –a debaser – a counterfeiter (“falseggiando”).]
“unmix’d with baser matter”
Debasement? NO. Pure gold, unmixed with baser matter, was considered the perfect metal. Ideal for alchemy and other such experiments, and very nice if you owned it, but standard English coins were never *EVER* cast in pure gold during Shakespeare’s lifetime, or even during the lifetime of his father. There was always some base matter in a coin, it was just a question as to how much in order to decide the value of the coin on the open market. This is therefore not a reference to coins at all, but to precious metals outside the coinage system.
[Give me a break – ok, so trace alloys might qualify as “baser matter” in the coinage. But that’s not what Hamlet was talking about – he was talking about significant impurities, not some strengthening alloy. If you’re specifically talking about base matter as something to be avoided, you are talking about base matter that decreases the value of what you are holding. If you are talking about coins, the coins are debased]
“calls the ghost ‘truepenny’ “
Debasement? NO. Henry VIII’s debased pennies *were* true pennies – they were the official coin of the realm. They just weren’t as valuable as older pennies had been. A ‘false penny’ on the other hand, is rather obviously a forgery. This is another reference to forgery, not debasement. [we’ve been here before. Fine line between forgery and debasement]
“hopes that the boy actor’s voice ‘like a piece of uncurrent gold, be not crack’d within the ring’ “.
Debasement? NO. All of Henry VIII’s debased coins were “current” gold, that is legal tender. As the Arden notes, however, this was not true of coins that had been illegally clipped and had precious metal removed. “cracked within the ring] Before milled coins became general in 1662 coins were liable to be clipped (cracked) for the metal thus obtained; and if the clipping invaded the ring around the sovereign’s head, the coin was no longer legal tender (hence ‘uncurrent’). This is again not about legal debasement of coinage by the government, but about illegal misuse of coinage by thieves and forgers. Not about debasement at all. [Here it’s worth explaining that I introduced these examples after saying that Shakespeare used impure coins metaphorically or something like that. I did not insist that all of these references necessarily had to do with government-caused debasement; this one’s relevant because it has to do with tampered coinage]
“dull and muddy-mettled rascal”.
Debasement? NO. There is nothing to suggest that this is about coins at all. More likely it is about things like swords which became dull (unable to cut: see “the murderous knife was dull and blunt / Till it was whetted on they stone-hard heart” – Richard III, 4.4.226; and the rather obvious sword-reference, since the weapons have also grown dull and rusty in this truce from lack of use “We have, great Agamemnon, here in Troy / A prince call’d Hector, Priam is his father, / Who in this dull and long-continued truce / Is rusty grown”, since Hamlet is talking about his inability to take revenge it is fairly clear that he is also making a sword reference here) and muddy-metalled when they had not been kept clean. The Arden agrees that muddy-metalled carries “the suggestion of metal which has lost its brightness”, but makes no mention of coins. We have every reason to believe that this has nothing to do with debasement.
[But it might. Muddy-mettled is a very apt metaphor for debasement. And in any event, Hamlet is clearly talking about his “mettle” as a man – which bears a close analogy to the “metal” of a coin – and not about the brightness of his sword]
“metal more attractive”
Debasement? NO. See “Merchant of Venice”, for example, where gold is considered more attractive than silver which is considered more attractive than lead. The entire problem with forged coins was that they looked exactly like the unforged coins, and debased coins were not usually obviously different in appearance either. [not true – vide the bloody noses of Henry VIII’s coinage] If you wanted to spot a coin’s metal content you either had it tested (note all the references coming up) or – if it was really heavily debased – you could hit it on the table and it made a different sound. Sight was not a good way of distinguishing a forged or debased coin. On the other hand, you can tell gold from lead with a glance. This is a reference to metals not coins. [It could also be a reference to magnetism. But this is the reference that was specifically identified by Margaret Ferguson when she said Hamlet’s concern with debased coins was “pervasive.” I’ll stand by it.]
“comparing Hamlet’s madness to a pure ‘ore among a mineral of metals base’ “
Debasement? NO. “Ore” is, of course, a mining term and “minerals” are the rocks in which the ore would be found, and from which it would be extracted. This is a mining reference. It does not mention coins at all. See the Oxford English Dictionary: “ORE. 1. a. A native mineral containing a precious or useful metal in such quantity and in such chemical combination as to make its extraction profitable. Also applied to minerals mined for their content of non-metals”.
[Again, I never said this was about debasement, and I don’t think it is. But it is about impure metals.]
So we can safely say, having just worked through every reference from other scholars that Krause cites, that Krause has not found one single reference to the deliberate inflationary debasement of coinage by governments in “Hamlet” (as previously suggested by other scholars). This leaves his major argument looking particularly stupid. [No, we have Armado simply mischaracterizing and then disagreeing with what I said, or, more accurately what he said I said. And actually, my “major” argument in Hamlet is simply that the lines are better under my interpretation, and that does not depend greatly on the references to debasement and/or impure metals that others have identified] But let’s go on to “Measure for Measure”.
“punning ‘peace’ with ‘piece’ in referring to impure Hungarian coinage”
Debasement? VERY UNLIKELY. It doesn’t look like Krause got this from another scholar. He seems to have invented it himself on the basis of a reference in a book called “Coins in history” which comments “in the days when most gold coins had been of pure metal, the Hungarian florin exceptionally had been alloyed”. This would have been Ancient History and exotic Foreign Ancient History at that, to Shakespeare. See the definition of “Crown Gold” on http://www.tclayton.demon.co.uk/metal.html#CG . ” Gold with 2 carats of alloy and 22 carats of gold so called from the gold crown of 1526 which used this alloy. Previously gold coins were made from almost pure gold. Crown gold is the standard used in the British sovereign which is still minted. The alloying metal is usually copper, although silver has been used”. Since John Shakespeare was born in 1529, only Shakespeare’s grandfather would have known a time when English coins were made without alloy, and he (in a parochial, non-Globe-trotting society, and in a small rural village in the middle of England) is unlikely to have seen, or probably even heard of, a Hungarian Florin in his entire life. Actually this line is part of the play, in which the characters are seeking a peace treaty with the King of Hungary, and the Arden offers a completely different pun which was connected with Shakespeare’s own time and not with Ancient History. “‘The King of Hungary’s peace’ quibbles on ‘hungry peace’, a topical pun when English volunteers in Hungary were serving against the Turks. Down-at-heels ex-soldiers were sometimes nicknamed ‘Hungarians’ ” [a term used by Shakespeare in “Merry Wives”]. In any case, since this fails to have been suggested by another scholar and seems to be Krause’s invention, and since it also seems almost certain to be wrong, this is not a debasement reference.
[Actually, the point about alloying is not unreasonable, although Armado’s sources are not consistent with Porteus. This comment by Armado led me to change this one to conform to the theory that “Hungary”=“Spain”, which is what most scholars believe anyway. I like it better this way, because the Spanish coinage was in fact debased at the time of MFM, and it might have been contact with Spanish coinage while serving as a groom of the chamber that led Shakespeare to insert this theme into MFM in the first place. Although it is rarely if ever mentioned, WS’s service as groom during the peace delegation’s stay in August 1604 is good support for the idea that Hungary = Spain.] “the ‘sweat’ that has caused Mistress Overdone to become ‘custom-shrunk’ “
Debasement? NO. Not only does Krause make it clear in his footnote that no other scholar has ever suggested this reading (he has to refer to a book about John Donne to find a reference about sweating coins), but he’s rather obviously wrong. [I actually thought the John Donne reference was great, since it includes a contemporaneous poem that used “sweat” as I’ve suggested] As the Arden explains “Overdone’s complaint links a number of factors operative in the winter of 1603-1604: the continuance of the war with Spain; the plague in London; the treason trials and executions at Winchester in connection with the plots of Raleigh and others; the slackness of trade in the deserted capital”. Not only is sweating coins (stealing gold from them by rubbing or shaking them) not topical in any way whatsoever, some people were always doing it somewhere, but for your average user of coins, like Mistress Overdone, it would have offered no particular threat. Only the people who eventually melted down the coins to use the metal would find the quantity surprisingly short. I might add that Mistress Overdone refers to “the sweat”, and while this was never used of the process of sweating coins as far as I know (since this would have been called “the sweating”, being a process not a noun) it is the standard name for various diseases. See for example John Caius (any relative of Shakespeare’s Doctor Caius? and no, I’m not suggesting that Krause start another daft allegory hunt) who wrote a book called “A boke, or counseill against the disease commonly called the sweate, or sweatyng sicknesse. Made by Ihon Caius doctour in phisicke. Very necessary for euerye personne, and muche requisite to be had in the handes of al sortes, for their better instruction, preparacion and defence, against the soubdein comyng, and fearful assaultying of the-same [sic] disease, [Imprinted at London : By Richard Grafton printer to the kynges maiestie], 1552”. Once again, therefore, Krause is denying the obvious and replacing it with his own daft [1] random one-word coincidences. [And yet, “custom-shrunk” seems to point to shrunken coins. “The sweat” could be part of a double-entendre] Anyway, this wouldn’t count in any case as Krause suggested it, not any other scholar.
“Isabella’s assertion that she would bribe Angelo not with ‘tested gold’ “
Debasement? NO. Isabella actually says “Not with fond sickles of the tested gold”, which Arden defines as “Hebrew ‘shekel’ through the late Latin form ‘siclus’ “, but points out that the name of the coin was being used in Athens in the 1590s. “tested gold”, the Arden defines as “pure gold, tested by the touchstone”. In Shakespeare’s day *NO* English coins were pure gold, and they had never been since his grandfather’s time. A pure gold shekel was therefore a particularly expensive coin in English eyes, not as a result of debasement, but purely as a result of foreign currency exchange. It is rather like saying to an American “I’ll pay you fifteen hundred” and when he asks “pounds or dollars” replying “pounds!”. Nothing to suggest that this comment has anything to do with debasement at all. [silly. Any time you are talking about testing gold, there’s the possibility you are talking about debasement]
“my false o’erweighs your true”
Debasement? NO. False coins were fakes, not debased ones. Debased coins were real and official true coinage. Arden says: “the phrase as paradox also suggests the lightness of false coin”. No debasement here. [Again, a misunderstanding of debasement, which does, however, shed light on why the theme was incendiary. It’s true that debased coins were the official coinage. It’s also true that to the extent they were debased, they were “false” or “light”– in that they did not have the expected precious metal content. But you wouldn’t have said that to the monarch’s face. In fairness to Armado, the draft he read did not include the cite to Dante, in which Dante likens a debaser (Philip IV) to a counterfeiter (“falseggiando”)]
“pay down for our offence by weight”
Debasement? NO. This seems to be another Krause-only theory. Do you think Krause doesn’t realise that paying by weight meant that you paid more for three kilos of potatoes than you did for two? I pay by weight often enough in shops, whenever I buy loose goods. [again, Armado can see only one possible meaning. In Shakespeare’s time, payment “by weight” instead of “by tale” (i.e. face value) reflected the difference between paying with a pure coin and paying with a debased coin. This is straight out of the Variorum edition and Gibbons, cited in the paper] What Claudius means is that the more he sins, the more he is now having to pay in his punishment: big sins, big price; smaller sins, smaller price. Nothing to do with coins or debasement at all. And just in case Krause doesn’t believe me, here’s a religious text using exactly the same image and citing the sort of Bible texts that it comes from “God threatens Israel, that for the multitude of their rebellions, he will septuple their punishments. Leuit. 26: And if ye will not yet for all this hearken vnto me, I will punish you seauen times more for your sinnes … I will not turne away your punishment, saith the Lord. According to their sinnes, by weight and measure, proportion and number, shall be their sorrowes”. (from Thomas Adams’s “The blacke devil or the apostate Together with the wolfe worrying th lambs”, 1615. Which completely squashes Krause’s false claims for the meaning of this phrase, I would say. No debasement. [Interestingly, even the passage cited by Armado is suggestive of the problem presented by debased coinage. The Lord will punish you seven times more for your sins – by “weight and measure, proportion and number.” In other words, it’s not just enough to say that you’ll be punished seven-fold for your sins – the exact nature of the sins must be ascertained by four different criteria. I.e., like a debased coin, a sin that superficially doesn’t seem that bad may in fact be much worse, as determined by further scrutiny.]
“the Duke-Friar’s assurance that the ‘corrupt deputy’ would be ‘scaled’ “
Debasement? NO. Honestly, Krause, this is getting stupid. The entire point of coins was that you didn’t have to weigh them because the government officials had weighed them when they made them. [no, *this* is getting stupid. See footnote 8 of the published paper. And this is the whole problem with debasement – the people can no longer trust the government, and have to weigh and/or otherwise assay their coins to find out their true worth] The stamp of the King’s head on the coin was a guarantee that the coin was the correct weight and proportion of metal. When coins were debased, the debasement was known by everybody – it wasn’t a secret. [Armado’s fundamental misunderstanding of “debasement” now becomes clear. See fn 142 of published paper. Admittedly, the original draft did not contain this obvious point, but Armado had access to any number of sources that could have told him this. It seems that Armado believes that “inflationary debasement” was simply a choice of economic policy] You could weigh the coins all you liked, you’d just find out that they were exactly the right weight for the coins made at the time that they were made (and they had a date on to tell you that, so weighing them was pointless) [assuming, contrary to all fact and reason, that all the mints would in a given year debase the coinage by exactly the same amount for all the coins issued that year]. Unless the coin had been tampered with, of course, in which case you could tell it was a forgery or a clipped coin by the weight, but that brings us back to forgery and stealing, which have nothing to do with official debasement at all. [again, “no,” not in the minds of the people who were being forced to accept debased coin. I’ve got a great contemporaneous quote from someone from Henry VIII’s reign, explaining the effect of the debasement – famine, shortages, etc.] No debasement here.
“if he had so offended, He would have weigh’d thy brother by himself / And not have cut him off”
Debasement? NO. Honestly, weighing debased coins would have done you no good at all. If you wanted to tell a debased coin from a non-debased one you only had to look at the date and the type of coin. Again, no debasement. [again, flowing from his misunderstandings that (1) the government advertised its debasements and (2) that all mints debased the coinage by exactly the same amount for all issues during a given year. Although it’s a side issue, it might also be worth pointing out that the majority of debased English coins (those from Henry VIII’s reign) did not even have dates, as the first dated English coins issued in 1549].
“Claudio’s plea for Isabella to ‘assay’ Angelo”
Debasement? NO. Assaying was testing a metal for purity. In coins that had already been done officially by the government officials. The entire point of coins was that you did not have to assay them, unless you thought you had a forgery. No debasement here. [still the same problem. Do I need to repeat myself? That was one of the big problems with debasements – the people were forced to assay every coin that came through their hands]
“coin[ing] heaven’s image / In stamps that are forbid”
Debasement? NO. Do you think debased coins were forbidden? By who, exactly? They were made by official governments deliberately and were legal tender. This, once again, is a reference to “coining” that is forgery of money. Nothing to do with debasement. Arden translates “Unlawful procreation of a man, who bears God’s image, is analogous to misusing the King’s stamp on a coin” and shows us what this means by pointing us to Edward III “He that doth clip or counterfeit your stamp / Shall die, my Lord; and will your sacred selfe / Commit high treason against the King of heaven / To stamp his image in forbidden metal”. This is once again a reference to forgery or clipping of coins. As Lear points out the one person who cannot misuse the King’s stamp on coinage is the King “They cannot arrest me for coining, I am the King himself”. The stamp is his own, and he can use whatever metal and stampt that he likes. No debasement.
[Again, as the paper makes clear, I don’t claim that each of these are direct references to debasement. But any line about false coins obviously calls debasement to mind and is relevant to the paper. Armado quotes back the King Lear line that I cite, but completely misses the point. It’s true that a king has the power to debase and can’t be arrested for it – but that doesn’t make it right, certainly not in Juan de Mariana’s view, and probably not in Shakespeare’s view either. It’s not a legitimate economic policy – it’s a way of extracting the precious metal from the coinage for the benefit of the king, and to the detriment of (most of) the people.]
” ‘Tis all as easy / Falsely to take away a life true made / As to put mettle in restrained means / To make a false one”
Debasement? NO. Even if this is a reference to coins, it is referring once again to ‘true’ (official) coins and ‘false’ (forged) ones. Debased coins were still true coins. No debasement. [same problem] “credulous to false prints”
Debasement? NO. The Arden suggests “‘Prints’ for any impress, especially the stamp on a coin. False prints, again, are forgeries. Debased coins were not forgeries, they were true coins. No debasement here. [same problem] “filth within being cast”
Debasement? NO. Oooohh! This one is just dishonest. [3] Talk about coin-clippers, Krause is clipping lines hard here. The full quotation is “His filth within being cast, he would appear a pond as deep as hell”. Rather obviously this is a reference to throwing something into a liquid, or to throwing a liquid. Money looks nothing like a pond. On the other hand if you throw muck into a really deep pond, it will be absorbed and you will see no remnant of it. From the surface appearance it would be as if the pond were perfectly clean and the muck had never existed, but down there underneath it all would be a big pile of muck (Angelo’s concealed sins). “This outward sainted deputy … is yet a devil”. Despite looking like a pond full of clean water on the surface, Angelo’s depths are full of the muck that has been cast within, and of course the depths of a man is his soul or real self, his external parts mere wrappings, as Shakespeare repeatedly tells us. This uses the single most common definition of “cast” as a verb, from the Oxford English Dictionary “CAST. 1. a. trans. To project (anything) with a force of the nature of a jerk, from the hand, the arms, a vessel, or the like; to THROW (which is now the ordinary equivalent); to fling, hurl, pitch, toss”. The OED gives examples which include Shakespeare’s own “King John”, “They found him dead, and cast into the streets”, the King James Bible “Hee that is without sinne among you, let him first cast a stone at her”, and “Dictes” by Earl Rivers (1477) “Certayn men beyng at a wyndow keste water vpon him”. [Armado’s hyper-literal interpretation of the line makes little sense, irrespective of what the line really means] This has nothing to do with adding base metals to coins while casting them, as the whole quotation makes absolutely clear. Good grief, Krause. Have you no intellectual standards at all? No debasement here.
[Actually, as should be obvious, I agree that this line is not expressly talking about debasement. Nevertheless, it’s a line about an impurity of a man named for a coin, and in a play that contains many references to debasement, should not be ignored]
“Like doth quit like, and Measure still for Measure”
Debasement? NO. If Krause had bothered to read just about anything about this play, he would know that it was a Biblical quotation that has nothing to do with money, and nothing whatever to do with debased money. “With what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again”, from Matthew 7.2. That is, bad actions will be repaid with bad consequences. There is, once again, no debasement here.
[Of course, if Armado had bothered to read the paper, he’d realize that I’ve read plenty about the play, and that the paper itself cites the Biblical point, which I’ve addressed it previously in this very thread. Measure for Measure has Biblical AND debasement resonance. If the play has a debasement allegory, then I’m obviously right that Measure for Measure is a reference to that allegory.]
********************************
So having gone through every one of the examples that Krause gives in his essay which are supposed to be debasement references spotted by previous scholars, there is no single example of a real reference to deliberate inflationary debasement by a government in any one of them. In other words, there is no connection of any kind between “Hamlet” or “Measure for Measure” and Juan de Mariana, who wrote about the deliberate inflationary debasement of coins by governments, and not about forgery, not about stealing gold by clipping coins, and certainly not about throwing muck in ponds. In other words, by Krause’s own standards, Krause’s theory is worthless bunk. He fails his own test.
[as shown above, nearly all of Armado’s “refutations” are based on his own flawed understanding of debasement combined with his further distortion that I claimed that each of the above-discussed lines was a direct reference to government-caused debasement. For what it’s worth, in a post below I go through R.J. Kaufmann’s analysis of the early portions of Measure for Measure, in which he detects a clear economic theme]
(2) show me ten or more express references in Henry VI that scholars other than you recognize are to an Anabaptist theme.
Again, I say Krause fails this one himself. He may list a good number of references to coins, but not one of these refers to deliberate inflationary debasement by governments. Since this is the only theme of Krause’s essay, the whole thing is a colossal waste of time and energy. [no, the colossal waste of time and energy is in your commenting on it – and forcing us to read your comments – without having taken the time to learn about debasement. I think when I wrote this, it seemed to me that practically any reference to Angelo was a qualifying reference to a debasement theme, since other scholars have made that connection. But I suppose one can understand Armado’s confusion at this point] And Kent is publishing this thing?
(3) show me an allegory in which the characters of Henry VI interact in some fashion that would convey a message about Anabaptists.
Now this one starts to get funny. While I can almost certainly copy Krause’s level of “allegory”, Krause will – of course – insist that I haven’t, because Krause is convinced that there is a finely formed network of significant connections between each of the “coincidences” that he has dug up, when actually they are only connected by a stream of random association, and most have nothing to do with Krause’s main theme (deliberate inflationary debasement by governments) at all. What has Luke Kirby to do with inflationary debasement? [back to Luke Kirby] What has Federico di Spinola to do with inflationary debasement? What has Lyford Grange and Father Campion to do with inflationary debasement? [read the paper – all of these things point to Mariana, who wrote about debasement. What more needs to be said?] The answer is nothing at all. The fact that all these things are part of Krause’s “allegory” (because they are the names he happens to have turned up in his dredging for coincidences [sigh]) is a good point against Krause’s belief that he has discovered an underlying “allegory” at all. Most of his claims have nothing to do with what he tells us is his main theme.
(4) show me how the Anabaptist explanation in fact explains some of the behavior of the characters that other scholars have found difficult to understand.
And this one is particularly funny. Read Krause’s essay, and you will find him dishonestlycreating things that (according to Krause) are difficult to understand, purely so that he can solve them. [The paper lists all kinds of identified problems, and notes that different explanations have been offered. Amusingly, the example that Armado picks is in fact one of the ones about which there is the most debate] Nobody’s ever had any problem understanding why the players in Hamlet have to travel, for instance, it says in the two reliable texts of the play that it is because child actors have replaced them in the public’s esteem. [Armado seems to overlook a huge chunk of the paper here – notes 57-63 and accompanying text in the draft he saw, notes 61-66 and accompanying text in the published paper – in which I set forth eight different meanings proposed by eight different scholars. Worse, his “two reliable texts” must be the Folio and the First Quarto. While one can debate between the Folio and the Second Quarto, his failure to realize that he just called the First Quarto “reliable” is indicative of how he blinded himself to facts and logic] Instead of solving this problem (when there is no problem) Krause tries to create a problem, by claiming that – because the child actors are not explicitly mentioned in one out of the three “Hamlet” texts – that therefore this cannot be the right explanation, [how much else of the paper haven’t you read?] and then he invents an explanation, which anybody in their right mind would realise was nowhere near as good as the one that he has just deleted, not least because Krause’s explanation only exists in Krause’s mind (there is no explicit reference to coinage of any kind in this section of the script) [it comes right before the “picture in little” line. How do you know that wasn’t a reference to coinage? And if the queen’s reference to the “very coinage of your brain” can’t count as a reference to “coinage”, I guess nothing can], while Shakespeare’s explanation – the child actors – is clearly written into two out of the three surviving scripts, and there is no obvious reason to believe that it being absent in the third one was deliberate rather than the act of somebody cutting the play or missing a few lines in the printhouse. [see all the scholarship on this issue to find out the reasons]
Most of the other questions that Krause “solves” are similarly things that nobody much ever had a problem with [it would be instructive for him to list these before dismissing them this way], and with Krausian solutions that nobody much would ever accept. They satisfy Krause, doubtless, but they sure as heck wouldn’t satisfy many other people. [see the introduction for the paper for a list of 12 questions answered by the theory of Measure for Measure; and read the entire paper for others]
So challenge 4) should really read. “Try and throw out sensible lines and statements in Shakespeare’s plays that do not boost your theory. Instead claim that the original material doesn’t make sense and find some weak excuse for getting rid of it (don’t worry about being convincing – you can even completely contradict your new rules a few lines later if it suits you to do so [harping on that transitional phrase again]), instead invent some rubbish [1], it doesn’t have to make any sort of sense, to explain why the REAL meaning of the play at that point is something vaguely to do with your ‘theme’. Don’t bother trying to produce convincing arguments”. [again, the questions I answer have been asked before, and Armado’s contention that my answers make no sense is his alone, and, as above, he hasn’t not come close to establishing it. One of the impressive things about the debasement theme is its ability to provide a unified theory to answer so many questions]
Of course Krause can’t see this, but I’ve shown several examples of it in my previous posting. There are many more examples in Krause’s essay. [I’ve gone through them all and addressed them above, and in my original responses, I’m sure] (5) show me independent evidence that Shakespeare had Anabaptist leanings.
Now this is just hilarious. Please, now, Mr. Krause, show me independent evidence that William Shakespeare of Stratford was concerned with deliberate inflationary debasement of the coinage by the government. Hang on! That doesn’t seem to appear anywhere in your essay! [of course it is] So what are you talking about? You’re talking about the Shakeshafte and related theories that argue that Shakespeare was Catholic, but your “allegory” wasn’t about Catholicism, according to your essay, it was about “debasement”. So where did the debasement go? Oh, that was right, you got sidetracked because you found that one of your “coincidences” [ugh] was a Jesuit, and then in your random association display, you came up with a few other Catholics. Where is your evidence that Shakespeare was pro-Spanish (otherwise how did a flattering reference to Federigo di Spinola get in there)? You haven’t got any of that either. Frankly, your theory is a mess.
[I’ve explained why the discussion of Spinola and Shakeshafte is relevant to the paper. Armado’s willful refusal to come to grips with my explanations can be painful to watch. In any event, the paper plainly says that as a middle class businessman, WS would have been concerned about debasement, and this is already reflected in scattered references to debasement found in the plays, by other scholars. I told Armado early on to take a look at the sources cited in footnote 19 (now 22), but he obviously never did]
So this should read “5) Let your allegory wonder [sic; “wander”] wherever it will, make random associations based on minor coincidences that take you away from your major theme into any area that you like. At the end claim that your ‘allegory’ is supported by Shakespeare’s biography, even if most of your essay is about a theme that Shakespeare never had any documented connection to in his entire life”.
(6) show me how the Anabaptist theory explains a number of other references for which no satisfactory explanation has been proposed.
And of course this is just a restatement of number 4). [in your mind; although admittedly the two could have been grouped together] Krause’s theory does not in fact give a “satisfactory explanation” for anything, unless – like Kent – you have thrown your critical abilities out with the bathwater. Instead Krause simply pretends that there are problems where there are none, and then pretends to solve them while making majorly flawed and unconvincing arguments. [addressed above]
I am afraid that I am not as credulous as Tom Krause, and could not pretend to be as credulous as Tom Krause, and am therefore unlikely to attempt the bare-faced dishonesty or stupidityof many of his claims. [there, there] Even if I did do so, Tom Krause would then claim that I had not passed his test, because he would say that his claims were entirely convincing and sensible, while mine were obvious rubbish (when of course, mine are *supposed* to be obvious rubbish, in order to prove that Krause’s duff [1] theorising is rubbish). [ironic that Armado of all people is accusing me of intellectual hypocrisy (could a person be less self-aware?), when neither may paper nor my posts suggest this. If he could disprove my theory, I’d be fine with that]
All in all, Krause’s points are just part of his attempt to make his argument watertight. You cannot prove that anything Krause has said is wrong, because he has faith. No real evidence, but buckets of faith, and for Krause that’s all that matters. [again, who said anything about faith?]
With all that faith, Krause hasn’t even noticed that he fails all six of his tests himself. [see above] Especially the two that are not really matters of opinion. Not one of the quotations that Krause lists could even vaguely be considered to be to deliberate governmental debasement of coinage, [as you understand it, because you (1) only see one meaning for any given phrase, and (2) are misled by your incorrect belief that debasement is always publicized by the monarch (it never was)] let alone the two-dozen or more that he demands from me (all of which claims, Krause demands, must be supported by other scholars – unfortunately Krause himself can’t tell the difference between forgery, theft, and debasement). [they were very similar, and that’s a large part of the point that you are missing]
I think I can almost certainly produce a false “allegory” that passes Krause’s standards much better than Krause’s essay, which fails them all. Watch this space. [it’s a shame I put up that list. It gives him another reason for doing something other than actually address my argument.]
Armado.
[5]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 03:06:40 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
Just one final comment tonight. [unstoppable!]
Krause argues:
“Shakespeare tied Mariana to Spain by reference to her brother ‘Frederick the great soldier who miscarried at sea’ (3.1.210). This would have called to mind in Shakespeare’s December 1604 audience the May 1603 death in a naval action against the Dutch in the English Channel of Federigo de Spinola, a wealthy Genoan who had participated in Spain’s war efforts against the English and Dutch”.
Of course, Shakespeare doesn’t just tell us that this Frederick “miscarried at sea”, he tells us that he “was wracked at sea”. [To be clear, Armado is not accusing me of misquoting, he’s pointing out that six lines later, Shakespeare used the word “wracked.” “Wracked” actually makes the whole thing a little better – as Clare Asquith notes, “wracked” was a pun for “racked” – Campion the Catholic was racked on land, Spinola the Catholic was racked at sea] At this point it may be useful to point out that not only did Federigo de Spinola have no connection of any kind with the inflationary debasement of currency (which is what Krause’s essay is supposed to be about), [you’ve pointed this out a dozen times already, without addressing what I say he is there for – to point to Mariana] nor was he Spanish (which wrecks Krause’s attempted explanation of his significance – not that there was much to that explanation in the first place), [the fact that he was a principal leader in the Spanish military for a decade doesn’t count for anything?] and finally he was not “wracked at sea”. The word “wrecked” specifically means an accidental disaster, and when used correctly does not include vessels sunk by enemy action. [see below, this may well finally cross the line between stupidity and dishonesty]
According to the Oxford English Dictionary:
“WRECK. II. 9. a. The disabling or destruction of a vessel by any disaster or accident of navigation; loss of a ship by striking on a rock, stranding, or foundering; an instance of this; = SHIPWRECK”
So this isn’t much of a coincidence either.
[So, definition II.9 of a different word supports your case, and, surprise, surprise, that’s all you cite. The point being so pointless, I didn’t bother checking at the time, but it turns out that both “wreck” and “wrack” have definitions that correspond exactly to what happened to Spinola: “WRACK. 3. To cause the ruin, downfall, or subversion of (a person, etc.).”]
Armado.
[6]————————————————————-
From: Maria
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 03:11:16 -0700
Subject: Re: Question on Measure for Measure
Since my local library lacks EEBO, I searched the English Drama collection in the Chardwyck-Healy literature database (LION).
A major character named Mariana appears in Grim the Collier of Croyden [c. 1600, according to the editors of the Oxford edition of Dream]. Here is the listing from LION:
Haughton, William, d. 1605: Grim the collier of Croyden (1662) GRIM The Collier of Crowden; OR, The Devil and his Dame: WITH The Devil and Saint Dunston
This Mariana, too, participates in a bed trick:
Morg. Now the peevish Doctor
Swears, that his int’rest he will ne’re resign;
Therefore we must by Policy deceive him,
He shall suppose he lyeth this night with thee,
But Mariana shall supply the room
And thou with Musgrave in another Chamber,
Shall secretly be lodg’d; when this is done,
Twill be too late to call that back again,
So shalt thou have thy mind, and he a wife.
The actual bed-trick is quite elaborate, involving 4 people, 3 of whom are pretending to be somebody else, several of whom are double-crossing each other, and 1 of whom is really the devil in disguise (the man Mariana snags, thus becoming “his Dame”). [it is unclear from this description where in the bed-trick Mariana is; I think she would have said if Mariana played anything like the Mariana role, especially since she prefers Fair Em, see below]
To be sure, I find Armado’s idea of “Faire Em” as a source for Shakespeare’s Mariana most attractive, [so sad – as mentioned elsewhere, the gullible Costard went so far as to create a new thread based on this line of reasoning] because of the early probable date (1591 is an estimate, as is the LION database’s figure of 1593, but both comfortably before Measure; “Grim” was written before 1605, certainly, but how long before?), the association with Lord Strange’s Men, and the fact that – unlike Haughton’s Mariana – neither Shakespeare’s Mariana nor the Mariana of “Faire Em” is an ungovernable shrew who poisons people. Nevertheless, I find it interesting that “Grim” presents yet another bed-trickster character named Mariana, appearing on the London stage within a few years of Measure for Measure. [search and ye shall find]
The behavior seems to travel with the name – are there any chaste Marianas out there? [Besides the Mariana from Pericles, who is really a Marina.] [Mariana, the minor character in All’s Well that Ends Well is a fair example, as she advocates chastity]
Maria
I love this list. This is my first post and I am an actor, not a scholar. Please be kind.
[7]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 0:14:04 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1679 Question on Measure for Measure
[note that this is not a response to Armado’s last three posts, but to his post from the previous day]
Holofernes writes:
“Actually, we don’t know that Shakespeare intentionally named Angelo after the coin.”
See Armado’s last post, with the Lever discussion.
Nathaniel writes:
“Tom Krause asks …
I’m still curious as to where you get 1603, instead of 1604 (I asked you once before).
MISTRESS OVERDONE: Thus, what with the war, what with the sweat, what with the gallows and what with poverty, I am custom-shrunk”.
In 1604, England signed a peace treaty with Spain. If there was a war on, the play must have been written before the peace treaty. Also 1603 was a plague year (“the sweat”), while 1604 was not.
“POMPEY: You have not heard of the proclamation, have you?
MISTRESS OVERDONE: What proclamation, man?
POMPEY: All houses in the suburbs of Vienna must be plucked down”.
On 16 September 1603 there was a proclamation calling for the pulling down of brothels and gaming houses in London’s suburbs. This included the area around the Globe.”
Ok, I can see that if we make the assumptions (1) that Shakespeare is deliberately exporting contemporary London events to MFM’s Vienna, and (2) that he would not have referred to a “war” unless England was actually at war, we can assume that the play was written between 16 September 1603 and whenever in 1604 we want to say the war ended.
Given that the three lines you point out above contain contemporary references, whom do you think the “great soldier Frederick” refers to? Why? [never answered by Bridgman]
I’ll just mention here without trying to be argumentative that there were two common meanings for “sweat” in Shakespeare’s day – the plague, and the practice of “sweating coins” by putting large numbers of them in a bag, shaking the bag, and keeping the precious metal residue. Although I don’t object to the plague meaning, Shakespeare certainly knew of the practice of “sweating” coins, and might have had that meaning in mind as well (as reinforced by “custom shrunk”). [this was posted the same day as the foregoing Armado posts, and therefore does not address his “point” about this line]
Armado writes:
“. . .even as Krause is driven to make more and more extreme and ridiculous claims about his “research” (his latest is to claim that a particular character name “might” be partially based on that of Nero because it ends with an ‘o’. More sensible commentators might ask themselves how many letters there are in the English alphabet, and in particular how many Italianate names – particularly those in Shakespeare’s plays – end with the letter ‘o’, before making such a ludicrous assumption, even in passing).”
Armado continues the same theme in a separate post:
“Now I wouldn’t put it past Tom Krause in his more idiotic moments to claim that just such a “coincidence” occurs (after all Andrew, Aguecheek, Allencon and Anjou all start with ‘A’ – just as Nero and Claudio both end with ‘o’: Krause seeing mystical significance in the latter event), but for any sensible person it is fairly obvious that no such “coincidences” occur.”
I see you continue to misapprehend the nature of my argument, and now you have managed to persuade yourself that the fact that Claudio and Nero combine to form “Claudio” is its linchpin. Hopefully other readers are not similarly deceived.
To be clear (was I not before?): In the post to which you were responding I was explaining to you why it makes sense, where three out of three characters in Shakespeare’s plays whose names share the “Claud-” root can be considered debased, to look to the historical record to see if there is a connection between the Roman Claudian emperors and debasement. I shared with you the result of that inquiry, and noted – “in passing”, as you acknowledge when you are not acting as though your brilliant advocacy had “driven” me to make the connection – that Claudius + Nero = Claudio. As is typical of your argument style, you don’t even deign to address the overall argument (in this case, a relatively minor sub-argument in the big scheme of things), but nit-pick at a sub-sub “argument,” and act as though you have made some major point – so much that you return to it twice, and act as though I have given it “mystical” significance. [and then of course, he shambles off to address the arguments of the anti-Stratfordians and the Bible code]
Trying to be helpful, this is the same error you fell into when you went on about the improbability of St. Luke being Luke Kirby. Again, you attacked a non-essential argument (that wasn’t even in the original paper), and had to mischaracterize it (saying that the “only” connection was Thomas Cottam) to make your point. [I wonder if there is a more persuasive way of making this point. Looking back, I fear that a casual reader would say – Aha! Krause is distancing himself from some of his arguments, so they must be bad. Nothing could be further from the truth; the published paper clearly shows why each of these are strong points (for Luke Kirby, assuming Shakespeare was Shakeshafte) – although admittedly, the point about Claudio no longer mentions Nero, since subsequent research showed that Shakespeare’s audience would have considered Emperor Claudius’s coins debased]
Armado goes on:
“. . . in fact the essay that you did write is based almost entirely on trying to claim that “debasement” is the major theme of both “Hamlet” and “Measure for Measure” on the basis of “trivia” and supposed wordplay that you like to imagine that Shakespeare inserted into the play and you are merely ‘rediscovering’. Discussion of this “trivia” takes up at least 95% of your essay, so you can hardly pretend that the main theme of the essay is anything other than the “trivia” which you like to think that you have dug up.”
I’m sure I never claimed that “debasement” is “the” major theme in Hamlet. That would be crazy. Your repeated mischaracterizations and exaggerations concerning my argument make it very hard for anyone out there still reading (who hasn’t read the essay) to understand what the essay is about. You are wasting everybody’s time – including your own – when you do this.
Again, the Hamlet argument is based on a totally different kind of analysis (which you have not yet seen fit to address), but it does conclude that there are more references to debasement in Hamlet than have been previously recognized. [and to the extent he addressed it in this day’s posts, he was singularly unpersuasive]
As for Measure for Measure, the essay describes a possible debasement allegory, and then goes on to demonstrate how much of the play the allegory can explain. Trying to break it down for you (in yet a different way from that of previous posts, in the hope that it will eventually sink in), the support for the claim that there is a debasement allegory in MFM falls into about nine different categories: (1) evidence that Shakespeare was concerned about economic issues (from other scholars) [he never addresses this, yet it’s crucial to assessing the likelihood that everything else I point to is “coincidence”]; (2) evidence that Shakespeare used coinage imagery in MFM (from other scholars); (3) recognition that a character named Mariana saves a character named Angelo from debasement in MFM; (4) pointers that directly support the hypothesis that Mariana is named for Juan de Mariana; (5) a slight broadening of the debasement allegory to include monarch figures Isabella and the Duke; (6) pointers that support the hypothesis that Isabella represents Queen Elizabeth and the Duke represents King James; (7) a recognition that some scholars have considered Measure for Measure a “problem”play, in that (among other things) the actions of some of the characters are difficult to understand; (8) a recognition that the actions of the four different players in the debasement allegory – Mariana, Isabella, the Duke, and Angelo – all are consistent with the debasement allegory, and the debasement allegory thus explains some of these “difficult to understand” actions; (9) observations that the debasement allegory explains some of the puzzling lines in the play. Given that all of the “evidence” that I have assembled falls into one of these nine or so categories, and that each piece of evidence supports the debasement allegory theory to some extent, I’m not sure how you can characterize any of them as “trivia,” or why you are trying to say my argument is about “trivia” as opposed to about a broad debasement theme. [he is so fixated with his own “counter-allegory” that this breakdown goes completely unanswered]
PS: You should remove the quote marks around “trivia” in the future. That’s your word.
Armado asks:
“What, other than the “trivia”, do you have to offer to suggest that Shakespeare’s metaphorical references to coinage, debasement, and forgery (or at least those references which are generally recognised by other critics, and are not entirely personal to you) were not precisely that, artistic metaphors, . . .”
For the proposition that Shakespeare’s use of economic metaphors was not purely “artistic” I rely on other scholars, such as those cited in Footnote 19, several of whom believe that Shakespeare’s references to economic issues reflected a broader concern about economic issues, including debasement. Are you familiar with those works? Are they all “fantasy concoctions” dreamed up by “nutcases” in their more “idiotic moments”? [no response]
For your benefit, and that of anyone reading, I reproduce FN 19 directly below (with full citations):
19 Lever, ed. p. xxxi. A growing literature on the subject attests that Shakespeare’s views on economics worked themselves into his plays. See, e.g., Sandra Fischer, Econolingua: A Glossary of Coins and Economic Language in Renaissance Drama (Newark: U.Del. P. 1985); Jesse M. Lander, “Crack’d Crowns and Counterfeit Sovereigns: The Crisis of Value in 1 Henry IV,” Shakespeare Studies (Annual 2002), 156; Jonathan Gil Harris, Sick Economies: Drama, Mercantilism, and Disease in Shakespeare’s England (U. of Pennsylvania P. 2004); Frederick Turner, Shakespeare’s Twenty-First-Century Economics: The Morality of Love and Money (Oxford U.P. 1999); Douglas Bruster, Drama and the Market in the Age of Shakespeare (Cambridge U.P. 1992); Nina Levine, “Extending Credit in the Henry IV Plays,” Shakespeare Quarterly, 51: 4 (Winter 2000), 403; Sandra K. Fischer, “‘He Means To Pay’: Value and Metaphor in the Lancastrian Tetralogy,” Shakespeare Quarterly, 40:2 (Summer 1989), 163; Stephen X. Mead, “‘Thou Art Changed’: Public Value and Personal Identity in Troilus and Cressida”; Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 22:2 (Spring 1992), 237; R.J. Kaufmann, “Bond Slaves and Counterfeits: Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure,” in Shakespeare Studies III (U. Cinn. 1967), 85.
Armado continues . . .
“. . . rather than the single major ‘allegorical’ theme of the play? Precious little, it seems, or you would have spent more time producing real evidence (if you had any) and less playing pointless wordgames of the kind that anybody can play with just about any piece of English writing.”
Reread my last post if you still believe that you can duplicate my methods with any piece of writing.
I’m guessing that you would consider a signed, authenticated 1603 letter from Juan de Mariana to William Shakespeare urging Shakespeare to use Mariana’s name in a play containing an allegory about debasement as “real evidence,” but short of that, what else would you consider “real evidence”?
Armado goes on:
“Now the Angelo / Angel (coin) argument is probably the strongest in your essay – since Shakespeare’s text explicitly, as you say, makes a metaphorical connection between Angelo and a coin . . . . It is unsurprising, therefore, that you did not invent this argument, but simply borrowed it from other sources. The Arden 2 “Measure for Measure” (edited by J.W. Lever, 1965), for example, already points out “the coin imagery” of this section, and also – in regard to 3.2.264-265, “O, what may man within him hide / Though angel on the outward side!” – makes explicit the likely link between the name Angelo and the Angel coin, noting “Angelo is the spurious ‘angel’ in terms of the coin imagery and also …”
“If this were all that your essay consisted of, then it would be merely an act of quotation or plagiarism, and would have no value whatever as a new academic essay.”
Throughout these posts, I’ve been begging you to look at the Lever’s notes to MFM to see that I’m not the only one who has seen significant references to coinage and debasement in the play. What’s astonishing is that when you finally do it, you turn around and practically accuse me of plagiarism.
Armado continues:
“Why am I willing to consider accepting the Angelo / Angel wordplay, but so ready to reject the Krause attempts to add various new forms of wordplay on a similar theme? The answer is very simple. The Angelo / Angel theory is based on a detailed reference to Shakespeare’s writing. The four lines quoted above from the first scene of the play seem very clearly and obviously to be a reference to coinage. The Arden even keeps the Folio spelling (“metal” not “mettle”) which would make this an overt punning metaphor, with the coin imagery as Angelo’s primary meaning. This is not an obscure hidden code that could easily have been wrongly invented by a commentator and projected at the play, nor one which we could easily duplicate with other texts, instead the coin reference is a deep and integrated part of Shakespeare’s original text.”
The first sentence of your paragraph promised a lot more than the paragraph delivered. Again, the fact that Lever and other scholars have noted all these economic/coinage references in MFM absolutely refutes your baseless claim that it’s “ridiculous” to think Shakespeare might have written such an allegory. Shakespeare was a master of double-meaning, and concerned about economic issues. Why is it ridiculous that he would insert such an allegory into one of his plays? At this point, the matter that you have identified as “trivia” is mostly material that wasn’t even in the original paper. If you go through previous posts, or better yet, the paper itself, you will find more than 20 separate pointers, supporting the debasement theory from several different angles. This may seem to unfair to someone untrained in logic, but to defeat my argument, you will need to show that a significant number of the points that I make can be explained by other means.
“Let’s compare this, for a moment, with the many Krause theories, and note how threadbare they look by comparison.
Again, be careful not to characterize my theory as “many Krause theories.” There is a common thread to all of the “pointers” that I have provided that constitutes a single unified theory.
“Note how often the Krause argument depends entirely upon the coincidence of a single word or just a part of a word, with no detailed textual reference or support to suggest that Krause’s interpretation is correct, and with almost all of the evidence for the claim being based not on Shakespeare’s text, but on Krause’s own theorising about the text.”
Same comment. As I’ve mentioned before, you are not providing examples of where my argument breaks down. You’ve cherry-picked two of the sub-sub arguments and not even done a good job of “refuting” them.
“As a result we find ourselves faced by an entirely circular logic. The reason that Krause suspects that there is a reference to a particular person is because it would fit with his theory of the meaning of the play, but at the same time the only evidence that Krause has for his theory as to the meaning of the play is that it contains these references to particular people. There is nothing holding up Krause’s claims except other claims made by Krause, which themselves are held up by nothing, but the first set of claims. And so, ad infinitum.”
As you’ve already demonstrated in this post, you still don’t understand the argument. You’ve just admitted that there are other references to coinage in the play. That’s a start. Now admit that Shakespeare might have been concerned about economic issues (as evidenced by work of scholars cited in footnote 19). That’s already two pieces of evidence that support my theory. Now admit that you can’t find a “great soldier Frederick” who died at sea around the time of the play other than Federigo Spinola. That’s another piece of evidence that supports the theory. Now acknowledge that if I am correct about the debasement metaphor and that Mariana is Juan de Mariana, that helps us understand why the Duke forced Angelo to marry Mariana in the end (if you need me to, I can probably dig up various quotes from scholars over the years wondering why Shakespeare would have ended the play that way), why Isabella wishes Mariana dead, etc., etc. (“ad infinitum,” as you say, because you really do have to address a substantial number of my arguments to defeat the unified theory).
Armado continues . . .
“Krause *assumes* that Shakespeare would have considered Mariana to have saved Angelo from being tainted by sin (actually, wasn’t that the Duke using Mariana as a tool?) . . .”
So what if the Duke is using Mariana as a tool – doesn’t that fit with the Duke as a monarch figure in the debasement allegory? And wasn’t it still the substitution of Mariana that “saved” Angelo?
Armado continues:
“. . . he *assumes* that there is a connection between this risk of moral taint and the deliberate “debasement” of coinage by governments decreasing the level of base metal (but when Shakespeare talks of coins full of base metal, he is usually talking about forgery or coin-clipping or error, as he does explicitly in the example in 1.1, where Angelo states that the figure of the Duke could only be stamped upon him if he had been tested and proved to be sufficiently good metal, there is no reference in the play to the Duke or anybody else deliberately authorising coins with base metal),”
Debasement, whether by government or not, results in an impure coin, which makes a good analogy for human sin. In any event, there is evidence in other plays for Shakespeare’s concern with government-caused debasement. See works cited in FN 19.
Armado goes on:
. . . the reference to deliberate debasement by an inflationary government therefore exists primarily in Krause’s imagination and is not overtly expressed within the play itself, and finally Krause *assumes* that this inflationary debasement theme in “Measure for Measure” (which he just made up) proves that when Shakespeare named his character Mariana, he must have been doing so as a reference to Juan de Mariana, who wrote a book condemning inflationary debasement
This does not come primarily from “my imagination” – it comes from (1) the historical fact that English people at the turn of the 17th century – including middle-class playwrights like William Shakespeare – were concerned about debasement of the coinage, (2) the fact that some of Shakespeare’s other plays show concern with economic issues in general and government-caused debasement in particular (or is it simply inexplicable to you that all the scholars who have argued this were published as well?), and (3) the observation that the debasement allegory neatly explains a significant number of hitherto-difficult- to explain references, lines, and actions of the play.
” … but, oooppss … we’re still not finished. Unfortunately Juan de Mariana wrote that book *AFTER* Shakespeare wrote this play, and there seems to be no evidence anywhere in the world (certainly none that Kent and Krause can find) which proves that Mariana was famously associated, by his own countrymen let alone by people in England, with the subject of debasement until he wrote that book, . . .”
I’ve mentioned in the essay and in a previous post that Alan Soons’ biography of Mariana says that Mariana’s views on debasement were published in the 1599 edition of De Rege. As I explained in that connection, I don’t have the resources to confirm or refute this, but it’s plausible. And if it turns out to be incorrect, then perhaps Mr. Soons had another basis for thinking that Mariana’s views were published before the turn of the century. As Kent points out, Mariana’s History of Spain – which was published in part to introduce other Europeans to the glory of Spain, and which certainly introduced them to Mariana – dealt with currency issues. See my earlier post for other possibilities.
Mr. Armado continues:
“. . . so Krause conveniently assumes that Mariana must have been excessively interested in the subject several years beforehand, and that Shakespeare *must* have heard about Mariana’s interest by some indirect means or other (not that Krause can explain how, he just must have), and what’s Krause’s evidence for all this? … Why – the fact that Shakespeare called his character Mariana, of course. So there we have a perfectly circular argument, with no evidence to support it at either end of the chain.”
You are confusing an argument based on circumstantial evidence with a circular argument. For one thing (among many others that break the “circle”), the reference to Frederick points to Spain and points to Juan de Mariana. Mariana’s actions in the play fit perfectly the role of someone wanting to protect a coin from debasement. Isabella and the Duke play monarch roles in the debasement metaphor. See the essay, my comments above, and all my previous posts for more evidence. [if anybody reading this still thinks the argument is circular, look at my Sept. 15 post]
Armado writes:
“>Which alternative is the more far-fetched?
Which do you think? The one where we have to make up an interpretation of Shakespeare’s play, make up a chain of links between Shakespeare and Spain for him to hear about Mariana, and make up a fame for Mariana for which we have no evidence on an opinion that we do not even know that he discussed in any detail with anybody before that date? Or the one where we accept that Shakespeare used a Christian-name which appears in a good deal of Renaissance literature and happens by pure coincidence to have been the surname of a man who somewhere virtually on the other side of the Renaissance world was destined eventually to write about inflationary debasement (a theme that Shakespeare does not seem to treat on in this play)?”
I see I was premature in thinking that you would have understood my previous posts, or made a more serious effort to understand the essay.
You show yourself to be particularly ill-informed by your assertion that Mariana was “virtually on the other side of the Renaissance world.” There were plenty of Spaniards in London (who do you think wrote the letters compiled in “A Spaniard in Elizabethan England”?) and Shakespeare’s plays contain plenty of Spanish connections.
Armado writes on:
“I put the name “Mariana” into the EEBO (Early English Books Online) database, and found a good variety of hits before and after Shakespeare wrote “Measure for Measure”. One of these hits was on a play by Robert Wilson, published in 1591, shortly before Shakespeare wrote “Measure for Measure”. The play is called “A pleasant commodie, of faire Em the Millers daughter of Manchester with the love of William the Conqueror”.
“To my great amusement, this play turns out not only to contain a “Mariana”, but by her second scene this Mariana is immediately involved in the plotting of a bed-trick, by which an unwanted suitor is tricked into marrying a woman who has fallen in love with him, and to whom he originally committed himself, instead of the woman he was wrongfully pursuing.” . . . “So after all that, I think we can be fairly certain that it is more than a coincidence that Shakespeare’s Mariana carries the same name as Wilson’s Mariana, since both women are involved in very similar bed-tricks that persuade men to marry the right women.”
Given all the time that you have spent on this argument, it’s a shame you were unable to apply your own critical eye to its defects. You seem to be completely oblivious to the fact that you have fallen into the trap that you mistakenly accuse me of having falling into – using modern search tools to make a forcible connection between two points to support a theory. The bed trick was an old device in literature long before Shakespeare used it and long before Wilson used it. We could probably find dozens if not hundreds of female names that had been involved in bed tricks – some of them multiple times – in stories that Shakespeare might have been familiar with when he wrote Measure for Measure. The fact that he happened to pick one of the dozens or hundreds of names previously used can safely be ascribed to coincidence, just as surely as the Oxfordian argument about Horace and Horatio can (especially given that in your story, the Mariana character plays the Isabella role). [and, as I noticed later, there was no bed-trick]
As in the case with your St. George argument, if you want to build a publishable paper around this one, you will have to show more than one connection, and you will have to link them to a common theme. My advice to you is to keep trying.
Armado continues:
“Furthermore, it seems obvious that my theory is on much stronger footing than Krause’s alternative suggestion of Shakespeare’s “source” for the name Mariana, since my suggestion does not hinge on a personal interpretation of the play (for which there is no direct evidence) as Krause’s does, but is instead based on the main plot of both plays where numerous scenes are given over to the bed-tricks by which the two men are persuaded to marry the morally right woman by mistake, when they would rather have married or slept with the morally wrong woman deliberately.”
Again, there were dozens or hundreds of women’s names to pick from. Your new argument is no better than your previous argument, which is that it’s merely a coincidence that Mariana’s name is identical to Juan de Mariana’s.
Armado continues:
“Furthermore I do not have to invent Krausian fantasies about how the mere conversations of a Spanish academic should end up in the ears of an ordinary English playwright, nor do I have to play with time to make the contents of a source appear in history before the source was written (there is no evidence that anybody in Spain, let alone anybody in England, associated Juan de Mariana with the debasement of currency before he wrote his book), . . . .”
You’re repeating yourself again. Find answers to your “arguments” above, in the essay or in my previous posts. And of course, the reason that you don’t have to find any other connections is because your “solution” is exactly the kind of “one-word” coincidence that you (incorrectly) say that I am using to support my argument.
Armado goes on:
“. . . by contrast my suggested source is an English play, which would have been written and performed by Shakespeare’s fellow actors in a theatre in the very city where he lived, and then printed and sold in the very London bookshops that he frequented.”
And of course, you assume that Shakespeare was so unimaginative that he had to find names for his characters in the works of other playwrights . . . .
Armado goes on:
“So, to ask Krause’s question back at him, which sounds less likely to you? –
1) Shakespeare named his “Measure for Measure” character Mariana as part of an obscure and peculiar allegory about the inflationary debasement of coinage (a theme that Shakespeare never directly mentions in “Measure for Measure”), referring to a Spanish academic in another country who had not yet published anything to do with inflationary debasement of coinage, but would do so *AFTER* Shakespeare wrote his play (at which time Mariana’s book would begin to circulate in Spain), and despite the fact that we have no record of anybody in the world at this time associating the name “Juan de Mariana” with the topic of debasement of currency, let alone anybody suggesting that he was so famous as an exponent of the subject that his surname alone would be understood as a reference to this subject in foreign countries, we must assume that he was a major advocate of this subject before he wrote his book (and before Shakespeare wrote his play) and that by some imaginary visible system Mariana’s Spanish views were carried to Shakespeare in London without leaving any trace, printed or written, in the historical record.
*** OR ***
2) Shakespeare borrowed the name from “Fair Em”, an English play that was written and performed in London at a time that Shakespeare was quite probably a member of the very company for which that play was written and by whom it was performed, and even if he was not directly present in the company, Shakespeare would certainly have been present in the London theatres and bookshops where the play was performed and sold. Shakespeare probably borrowed the name because the two plays shared a major plot device, in which the character “Mariana” was involved in both plays.
So which theory do you prefer, Tom Krause?”
Definitely 1), albeit without all your gratuitous adjectives. You confidence in the “historical record” – or more accurately, that tiny portion of the historical record available to me – is grossly misplaced. Apart from the fact that what I have looked at does support a pre-1604 date for Mariana’s publication, there is a vast historical record that has not been looked at, and even that vast record is miniscule compared to actual history. Sometimes, inference can be reasonably used to fill the gaps. You still have not addressed any of the arguments from the essay that make the debasement allegory compelling. All of the objections you have raised to the argument were crystal clear to me at the time the theory first occurred to me, and are addressed in the essay itself and in these posts. As explained above, your “alternative explanation” is worthless.
You have shown great industry on this project and in some ways I appreciate it. The problem is that you suffer from a lack of direction, having only your own warped compass to guide you, and your comments have generally not been particularly helpful. If you want to be truly useful on this project, you should spend a little time researching the “great soldier Frederick” issue. See if you can find one, and if you do find one, try to apply what I’ve tried to teach you about distinguishing good coincidences from bad before using it as an argument – for example, try to come up with a hypothesis about what the play is referring to that would embrace that meaning, or just see if you can make it fit with your “Fair Em” theory. And if you’ve already looked, why don’t you let us know whether you found one or not? [no response to this challenge]
Armado also writes:
“If Tom Krause had created the “allegory” that Kent sees in “Twelfth Night”, then we could rest assured that virtually nothing in the play would have anything to do with the actual people or the events in which they were involved, instead we would simply see a few one-word long “coincidences”, particularly in names. So that Olivia would have been called some variant on the name Elizabeth (Betty? Isabella?), and Andrew Aguecheek would have had some variant of Anjou’s name or title.”
Again, you fail to grasp the significance of the pointers. They all point to a common theme. They are not one-word coincidences; they all point to a common theme. Try to understand the argument before attempting to characterize it. [this is crux of the semantic argument – I call them pointers, he calls them coincidences. It’s annoying that he seems unable to grasp the difference, and repeatedly puts “coincidence” in quotes, as if that’s part of MY argument]
“Instead, Tom Krause’s “allegory” is a peculiar literary critical invention, designed to allow a literary critic to look clever without actually requiring any real action on the part of the playwright (you can play the Krause game with just about any set of names, and any subject or theme, in just about every work of Literature).”
If you still believe this, please reread my last post. As I said there, if you can duplicate my methods, you probably can produce a publishable paper. But as you have thus far not come close to showing that you even understand the methodology of the paper, you are quite far away from having anything publishable on your hands.
Armado goes on:
“Of course Krause did not personally invent this method, a variety of would-be literary critical nutcases have been there before him, including simply thousands of mutually contradictory anti-Stratfordians.”
Still classifying me with the anti-Stratfordians. Did you read my explanation of the difference? Do you understand the difference? I’m looking forward to your response on this issue. [he never produces a coherent response to this]
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1701 Friday, 10 September 2004
[1]
From: Moderator
Date: Friday, September 10, 2004
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Leonato
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 10:57:30 EDT
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Katharine
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 19:27:09 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Holofernes
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 16:17:37 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Holofernes
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 16:44:53 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[6]
From: Costard
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 15:18:59 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[7]
From: Costard
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 18:12:19 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[8]
From: Costard
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 15:25:16 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[9]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Friday, 10 Sep 2004 03:22:37 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1688: Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Moderator
Date: Friday, September 10, 2004
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
I have consulted with my Advisory Board and decided not to post some of the messages that I have received in this thread today because I feel that the language has crossed the threshold of acceptable academic discourse. For now on, in this thread, I will not post vitriolic, vituperative contributions. If this thread is to continue, contributors will need to address the issues and not the persons in reasonably short postings. I will be returning those posts that I have withheld and offering the contributors the opportunity to restate their positions.
Editor-Moderator
[Since no posts appear from Armado, we can assume that at least one of the returned messages was his]
[2]————————————————————-
From: Leonato
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 10:57:30 EDT
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
I’m not going to get into the particulars of the Mariana-Measure debate, but let me offer a mini-review.
I like to see argument, even vigorous argument, but feel dismay when the contention descends into personal attacks. I don’t know personally any of the combatants, so this is an attempt at an impartial assessment. Tom Krause has the right to promote his theories, and Kent has the right to publish and defend them. Armado is entitled to disagree with those theories. So far, so good.
My experience of Armado’s SHAKSPER posts is that he seems to be one of the more articulate and sensible voices in the conference. [can’t say I share that experience] I would feel more comfortable defending him if he had not now been brought to the point of using words like idiotic, nutcase and garbage when criticizing Krause’s work. But his point that coincidences are dangerously common and it is very easy and very tempting to read too much into them is well taken. It’s a caveat we should all emptorate, not just Krause and Kent. [we can see where this is going. The condescending Leonato falls into the same trap as Armado, by labeling everything “coincidence” before evaluating the evidence. I probably should have responded to this post, but I was out of town and generally had very little time].
Kent accuses Armado of spewing abuse, unclear writing, knowing nothing, contradicting his betters, etc etc. [all true, of course] I went back and read thru the thread from the beginning and Armado’s initial disagreements with Krause’s theories, while pretty complete, were mildly phrased. [Is Leonato working as Armado’s shill here? It seemed petty to point it out at the time (so I didn’t), but for the record, Armado’s initial post labeled my article as a “fantasy concoction” based on a methodology comparable to the “ridiculous and corrupt” methods of the anti-Stratfordians, and accused Kent and me of “suffering from extreme gullibility.” Kent responded by referring to Armado’s “sour, constricted principles” – an accurate description if ever there was one for his results-oriented reasoning – and compared him facetiously with the well-respected skeptical scholar Richard Levin, none of which rose to the level of a personal attack. Armado, from then on until stopped by the moderator, repeatedly used the words “garbage” and “idiot[-]” to describe me and the paper. By the time Kent accused Armado of “spewing abuse” regarding the work of his “betters,” that’s exactly what Armado was doing. The escalation of anger has emanated from Kent’s side [this might have been an honest mistake by Leonato, but it’s a mistake all the same, and Armado later sanctimoniously quotes it in his defense. An accurate depiction of the “escalation” of hostilities is available here]; his how-dare-you-disagree attitude has been apparent from the start. I concede that Armado has now also begun to use angry dismissive words in his responses. [“now also has begun . . .” is simply wrong]
I was almost amused when Kent attempted to insult Armado by comparing him to Richard Levin. [this was Kent’s first response to Armado, and I would not even characterize it as an attempted insult] I know Levin has gained a rep as a contentious writer, but, while I don’t always agree with him, there is much wisdom in what he says. If Armado is like Levin, he is in good company. Levin, by the way, while taking many writers to task, does not indulge in ad hominem attacks. [which makes Armado distinctly unlike him]
I don’t want to get on Kent’s or Armado’s bad sides, or be seen as picking on them. Really. I’m just making a plea that this thread be brought down to the level of scholarly disagreement. I’ve seen interesting things said on both sides. Perhaps there’s more to be said, perhaps it’s time to agree to disagree. Insults get us nowhere.
Leonato
[3]————————————————————-
From: Katharine
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 19:27:09 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
Armado v. Krause Round 237
Gentlemen! Sharpen your weapons! My groaning in-tray reports that the latest post on this subject is amounts to 115KB. Words, words, words. If it is entirely necessary for you to be bludgeoning each other in this unseemly fashion, would it be possible to make your arguments with enough wit and succinctness to keep the rest of us entertained? [my posts were long mainly because, in fairness to Armado, I found it necessary to quote him before responding to him. Armado’s posts were clearly much longer, and much much more beside the point]
Yours (yawn) Katharine
[4]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 16:17:37 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
. . .
Tom Krause wrote:
“Holofernes writes: “Actually, we don’t know that Shakespeare intentionally named Angelo after the coin.” See Armado’s last post, with the Lever discussion.”
This is probably no more than I deserve, but I would point out that there are those (including N.W. Bawcutt in his Oxford edition) who consider that the coin imagery (something of a commonplace in Shakespeare’s plays at this time) was exaggerated by Lever. Bawcutt doesn’t accept “Spirits are not finely touched / But to fine issues” (1.1.36-37) as coin imagery, rather than at least the wording of biblical imagery (from St Luke, as it happens).
Angelo certainly says “Let there be some more test of my mettle, / Before so noble and so great a figure / be stamped upon it.” (1.1.49-51), but it is not obvious that he is referring to the Angel Noble, so dramatic irony (at best) is all that could be claimed. (“Metal” and “mettle” were two spellings of the same word.) [as usual, it’s hard to follow Holofernes’s point]
I might as well add (as I have pointed out before) that the whole “Shakeshafte” nonsense results from a lack of onomastic knowledge – “Shakeshafte” is the Lancashire form related to the predominantly Warwickshire “Shakespeare”. Somewhere else, in another part of the wood, there could have been another unconnected player named “William Wagstaff”. [and yet, many Stratfordians believe it, who also know what the word “onomastic” means. I myself am agnostic on the issue]
Holofernes
[5]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Thursday, 9 Sep 2004 16:44:53 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
As far as the names of the characters are concerned, it doesn’t seem unreasonable that Shakespeare should have populated what is presumably a Habsburg Vienna with a mixture of vaguely Italian and vaguely Spanish names. It is, of course, the usual Never-Never land where everyone behaves as if they were in a Tudor or Stuart London. There is a nod towards a vague Roman Catholicism – at least to extent of people being nuns or friars – but the awful lurking suspicion remains that Shakespeare might not have realised that the predominant language ought to be German.
Holofernes
[7]————————————————————-
From: Costard
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 18:12:19 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
This from Krause, which he repeats a number of times:
Isabella and the Duke play monarch roles in the debasement metaphor.
But, as your thesis postulates, wasn’t the monarchical role to initiate debasement, not forestall it? [What’s your point? Shakespeare’s ideal monarch was one who resisted debasement]
[8]————————————————————-
From: Costard
Date: Thursday, 09 Sep 2004 15:25:16 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
If “picture in little” is a coin, why would anyone pay “Forty, fifty, an hundred ducats apiece” to acquire one, when it could be obtained for its face value. A 100 ducat coin would hardly be “little.” [short answer: that’s the whole point – in a debasement, even a 100 ducat coin would be brought down to a manageable size, like the Scottish 20 pound coins issued under James]
[9]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Friday, 10 Sep 2004 03:22:37 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1688: Question on Measure for Measure
I’m afraid I can’t dedicate much more time to this either (and will be traveling over the weekend and have many upcoming commitments that will prevent me from posting as regularly as I have been). I’m going to start this one by just reviewing the basic points of the Measure for Measure allegory one last time, for people who came in late, and perhaps with the hope that Mr. Armado will eventually realize how innocuous it all is.
Mr. Armado’s last post probably contains more mischaracterizations, exaggerations, and bad arguments than the previous ones put together and I will only have a chance to address a few of them below. If anybody with a reasonably intact prefrontal cortex sees something in Mr. Armado’s post that requires reply beyond what I provide below and have provided in previous posts, please let me know, either by email or a separate post, and I’ll address those points in a future post. Of course, any comments directed at improving the essay would be most welcome.
To put the theory simply, I think Shakespeare may have written a nifty little allegory into Measure for Measure. Here goes:
As we know, the basic plot is that the Duke leaves Angelo in charge – in part to “test” him – and Angelo enforces a law that has not been enforced for many years against Claudio, who has gotten his fiancée pregnant. Isabella pleads on behalf of Claudio, and Angelo tells her that he will let Claudio live if Isabella will only sleep with him. Isabella refuses, and goes so far as to tell Claudio that he is going to die, before the disguised Duke introduces her to Mariana, Angelo’s ex-fiancee, who was abandoned by Angelo five years ago when her dowry was lost. A bed trick is arranged, and Mariana rather than Isabella sleeps with Angelo. Meanwhile, Angelo’s order to execute Claudio (doublecrossing Isabella) is thwarted by the Duke, who sees to it that someone else’s head is substituted for Claudio’s (the “head trick”). In the end, everything is revealed. Angelo’s “punishment” is to marry Mariana. At the very end, the Duke, after having proposed to Isabella once and not getting a response, says: “What’s mine is yours and what is yours is mine//So, bring us to our palace; where we’ll show//What’s yet behind, that’s meet you all should know.”
Measure for Measure has been considered a problem play, although many scholars see nothing wrong with it. The so-called “problems” include Isabella’s extreme self-righteousness and selfishness in refusing to help her brother Claudio, Mariana’s five-year infatuation with the faithless Angelo, the Duke’s decision to force Angelo to marry Mariana, and the very odd romance between Isabella and the Duke – which is never suggested until the “proposal” lines at the very end of the play.
The allegory starts with the recognition that Angelo shares his name with an English coin, the Angel, which features in several puns across Shakespeare’s plays, and also in several in Measure for Measure, playing on the name “Angelo” (these are the ones that Mr. Armado seems to think I have stolen from other commentators). Let’s go back to the first scene of the play, in a line quoted by Mr. Armado:
“Now, good my lord, Let there be some more test made of my metal, Before so noble and so great a figure Be stamp’d upon it” (1.1.47-50).
One can imagine at this point a Jacobean playgoer nudging his companion and saying: “Now that’s a coin in danger of being debased.” It’s pretty clear that Lever can imagine that, and, given Mr. Armado’s respect for Lever, maybe Mr. Armado can imagine it as well.
Of course, Mr. Armado would never admit that the companion might have nudged the playgoer back and said: “Yeah – let’s see if anyone does anything to prevent it.”
But that’s the germ of the allegory.
Let’s see what happens next. Isabella comes along.
Playgoer 1: There it is – I told you he was in danger of being debased. If he gets his way with Isabella, then he’s debased.
Playgoer 2: Well, let’s hope that doesn’t happen. Playgoer 1: Isn’t Isabella a Queen’s name?
Playgoer 2: So the coin is threatening to debase the queen? That doesn’t make much sense.
Playgoer 1: Well, if you think about it, what they’re doing up there is very like what goes on between a monarch and the coinage. The monarch is sorely tempted to allow the coin to become debased (usually because he or she needs or wants the money), but allowing the coin to become debased would, in effect, debase the monarch as well.
Playgoer 2: So the pressure to give in to Angelo to save Claudio is like the pressure on a monarch to debase the coinage?
Playgoer 1: Yep.
The playgoers are glad to see Isabella resist Angelo, and understand why Isabella has to tell Claudio that he is going to die.
Playgoer 1: That’s pretty harsh!
Playgoer 2: Yeah, but that’s the sort of tough decision a monarch has to make if he or she is committed to not debasing the coinage.
But of course, they would like a happy ending, for Claudio as well as the coin. And now the disguised Duke comes along, and says he has a way for Isabella to save Claudio while preventing both the coin and herself from becoming debased.
Playgoer 1: So the other monarch figure is disguised. What do you make of it?
Playgoer 2: Let’s wait and see.
Enter Mariana. Mariana can save the coin from debasement, because she was betrothed to him before. If she takes Isabella’s place in Angelo’s bed, Angelo will not be debased, and Isabella will not be debased!
Playgoer 1: See, I told you someone would save the coin from debasement.
Playgoer 2: Yeah, but who is Mariana supposed to be?
Playgoer 1: Juan de Mariana – didn’t you see that pamphlet last week? He’s mad because Philip III refused to follow his advice and debased the Spanish coinage. Now shut up. Playgoer 2: Spain debased their coinage? When?
Playgoer 1: It started 5 years ago.
Playgoer 2: What a minute – didn’t he just say that Angelo abandoned Mariana 5 years ago?
Playgoer 1: Yep.
Playgoer 2: Wait a minute. Wasn’t a Mariana involved in a bed trick in that play we saw last week? Doesn’t that prove that all bed tricks involve Marianas? Or that Marianas are always involved in bed tricks? Or in any event that this Shaxberd guy took his Mariana from some other Mariana?
Playgoer 1: If you believe that, you’d probably believe that the Earl of Oxford wrote this play. It’s most likely a coincidence. And anyway, I just told you Mariana is Juan de Mariana.
The Duke identifies Mariana further by reference to the “Great Soldier Frederick.”
Playgoer 1: Now do you get it? What Frederick recently died at sea?
Playgoer 2: Oh I get it now – Spinola. Yeah, there’s a Spanish connection here. Wait a minute – Isn’t Spinola Italian?
Playgoer 1: Yes, but he basically pledged his family fortune to Spain and he’d been fighting for Spain for the last ten years.
Playgoer 2: But wasn’t he killed in a naval action off Ostend? The play says he was “wracked” at sea, not “killed in a naval action off Ostend.” Here, let me show you the dictionary definition of “wracked.”
Playgoer 1: Shut up.
We learn that Mariana lives on a moated grange:
Playgoer 1: Wasn’t that Jesuit Campion captured at a moated grange?
Playgoer 2: Yeah, so? I think the moat is there to symbolize the fact that Mariana has isolated herself from the rest of the world.
Playgoer 1: Good point. But Mariana was a Jesuit, so there is another connection there.
Playgoer 2: We got it with the Spinola gag. Get back to the play.
Playgoer 1: Maybe the guy who wrote this thing had Jesuit connections . . . .
Playgoer 2: I guess that’s possible…. But shut up and let’s watch the play.
Isabella: “What a merit were it in death to take this poor maid from the world!”
Playgoer 2: That’s pretty radical! What does she have against Mariana?
Playgoer 1: Well, King James is sitting right over there and he’s smiling.
Playgoer 2: But why?
Playgoer 1: Do I have to explain everything to you? Mariana wrote a book against the Divine Right of Kings, in which he advocated tyrannicide. This is Shaxberd’s way of turning the tables on Juan de Mariana.
The play continues and Angelo tries to break his promise to Isabella and have Claudio executed.
Playgoer 1: Who’s going to save him from debasement this time??
Playgoer 2: Maybe the Duke! He’s a monarch figure after all. You know, he reminds me of King James.
The Duke: : “O what may man within him hide! Though angel on the outward side!”
Playgoer 1: As if we’d forgotten that Angelo was named for a coin!
And sure enough, the Duke plays the head trick on Angelo and saves him from debasement by this means.
We reach the final scene where all is revealed.
Playgoer 1: Now how can we be sure that Angelo stays pure?
Playgoer 2: The Duke’ll make him marry Mariana – just you watch!
The Duke makes Angelo marry Mariana.
Playgoer 1: That takes care of the coinage.
The Duke proposes to Isabella.
Playgoer 1: That sure came out of the blue!
Isabella is silent.
Playgoer 2: Is she marrying him or not?
The Duke says the final line:
“What’s mine is yours and what is yours is mine. So, bring us to our palace; where we’ll show What’s yet behind, that’s meet you all should know.”
Playgoer 1: But she never accepted his proposal. Why are they shacking up? What happened to her plan to become a nun?
Playgoer 2: Wait a minute! I know why she doesn’t say anything! She’s Elizabeth. “Isabella” is Spanish for Elizabeth!
Playgoer 1: How could you know that?? Spain is completely on the other side of the Renaissance world!
Playgoer 2: Shut up, you idiot.
Playgoer 1: Oh, yeah. I’ve seen you hanging out with that Antonio Perez guy.
Playgoer 2: And you should hear what HE says about Juan de Mariana!
Playgoer 1: Anyway, so if Isabella is Spanish for Elizabeth, then that last line is really more about the succession than anything else.
Playgoer 2: Right – it fits well enough with the “[w]hat’s mine is yours and what is yours is mine” bit.
Playgoer 1: And it explains how it can be “our palace” without them getting married . . .
Playgoer 2: And that final bit could be James telling Elizabeth that he can show her everything that is yet to come in his reign without embarrassment.
Playgoer 1: And thinking of Elizabeth as Isabella certainly fits with Isabella’s virginity. Old Bess sure passed up a lot of good opportunities to stay the “Virgin Queen.”
Playgoer 2: And she also restored the coinage, which her father had started debasing 19 years earlier.
Playgoer 1: Didn’t somebody say something about 19 years in the play?
Playgoer 2: Yeah – I think that was the period of time when everything in Vienna was basically debased, because the laws weren’t being enforced.
Playgoer 1: Man – that Shaxberd dude is deep.
Playgoer 2: Yes, but quite accessible if you live in these times.
Playgoer 1: Yeah – did you see how he worked the Anjou affair into Twelfth Night?
Playgoer 2: Wait a minute. Juan de Mariana? Is he that guy who wrote that history of Spain that was intended to introduce the rest of us Europeans to the glory of Spain?
Playgoer 1: Yeah. And before that, he worked for the Spanish Inquisition. He must be about 70 years old!
Playgoer 2: Did you learn that at the University?
Playgoer 1: No, I went to a pretty good grammar school.
Playgoer 2: You know, I was just thinking about how much the Spanish Inquisition hates Elizabeth.
Playgoer 1: So what?
Playgoer 2: If they ever find themselves having to censor this particular play, they’ll just have to rip the whole play out of the book!
Ok. That’s the basic allegory, plus a suggestion of how it might have struck a pair of Jacobean playgoers. If this format is too weird, all I can say is I’ve explained it differently elsewhere in these posts and in the paper. As I have tried to explain before, it’s an organic theory that starts with the observation that Angelo is named for a coin who is in danger of becoming debased (based on a line that even Mr. Armado seems to recognize as having something to do with coinage), and goes on to show how the concerted action of the other characters prevents the debasement. My belief is that the names of two of the other characters – Mariana and Isabella – were not randomly chosen, but were chosen to represent Juan de Mariana and a monarch figure, quite possibly Elizabeth.
We have gotten this far without reference to anything that Mr. Armado has identified as “trivia.” As I have shown with the playgoers, an educated playgoer could easily have recognized Mariana as Juan de Mariana from the name (of course, I made that part about the pamphlet and the conversation up), but the connection to Spinola helped. I like the Spinola connection, because it supports the theory right at the point were the playgoer or reader might be looking for a hint of who Mariana is supposed to be. But, like all the other pointers in the play, the Spinola reference is not necessary.
As I have tried to explain to Mr. Armado, many of the items that he considers “trivia” are things that the debasement allegory explains, not things that the debasement allegory depends on (witness his incisive critique of my point about Claudius + Nero = Claudio). Of course, the more the theory explains, the better it is, and that’s why all those things are in there. So feel free to look at the paper itself, or my previous post on this subject to see if you feel that there’s a possibility that Shakespeare knew about Roman coinage, and intentionally named three of his debased characters with the “Claud-” root. And if you decide that I have not been persuasive, remember, it’s not particularly important support for the allegory theory.
Mr. Armado has raised two major arguments against this allegory. I’ve addressed his argument about Mariana’s publication date several times including in my last post – including by explaining how it’s not circular to say that Mariana’s role in the play itself helps show that Shakespeare did indeed know who Mariana was; I’ll wait to see where his position goes before writing more on that subject.
His other major objection is that he finds my methods “worthless” because he is unable to distinguish them from those of the anti-Stratfordians. I’ve also addressed this several times before, but his last post renews this argument with such vehemence that I think it’s worth looking at one more time, perhaps from yet another angle.
As I tried to explain to Mr. Armado before, one reason that the anti-Stratfordians can come up with so many coincidences is that they are mapping a large number of facts (Shakespeare’s complete works) upon another large number of facts (the biography and perhaps the written works of an anti-Stratfordian candidate). He grasped this argument, but then asserted that the anti-Stratfordians can come up with more coincidences than I can using just a single play. I have not spent as much time with anti-Stratfordian literature as he apparently has, so I can’t vouch for the truth of the statement, but it sounds plausible to me. It’s plausible, but not the least bit relevant to what he is trying to prove. If someone has written an entire book about how only one play supports the Earl of Oxford theory, then that probably means they first looked through all 37 plays to find the one they could find the most coincidences in. And then – and this is the big difference – they had the entire, reasonably well-documented life of Oxford, plus his poems, in which to look for “coincidences.” That’s a much greater sample than the relatively confined universe of “debasement.” One would expect more “coincidences” with the Oxford life than with a debasement allegory.
As I’ve said before, there is a big difference between demonstrating that a play can be read as an allegory that represents an organic continuation of a theme that everyone admits is in the play already (i.e. my allegory simply extends the opening theme of a test of Angelo), and “demonstrating” that something about a play proves that it was not written by the accepted author. The difference is all the more pronounced in that the anti-Stratfordians approach a play looking for support for their pet theory, whereas I simply was struck by what appeared to be an allegory in the play itself.
Ok. I’ll briefly go through Mr. Armado’s post now. Again, if you think he’s onto something that I haven’t adequately addressed, let me know.
Armado writes:
“Now the problem with the Bible Code is the method. The method is corrupt. It is not that the answers that were being turned up were wrong. So it makes no difference whether the person who is searching the Bible Code is turning up codes that say possible or true things (such as a list of assassinated presidents, who really were assassinated) or whether the person who is searching the Bible Code is an obvious lunatic nut following his own obviously false agenda (turning up codes saying that presidents who died naturally were actually assassinated by Adolf Hitler’s secret cell of Marxist revolutionaries). The method is worthless, so the results are worthless, whatever the results say, however they say it. I shall pause until a later stage in this post before trying to demonstrate (yet again) that your method is worthless and produces results every bit as mutually contradictory and valueless as those produced by anti-Stratfordians who seek to use the same methods for their own purposes.”
At the risk of confusing you further, I’ll state here that you are dead wrong to assume that a “method” such as that employed by the Bible Code or even the anti-Stratfordians is necessarily corrupt. At a certain ratio of [number of “coincidences”]:[size of the dataset(s)], the “coincidences” become increasingly less likely to be “coincidences.” An example is this paragraph. Someone reading it might infer that I am patiently explaining a mathematical or logical concept to someone who seems not to understand mathematics or logic. The fact that every sentence in this paragraph points to that general conclusion cannot be coincidental – the paragraph is too small and the “coincidences” are too numerous. [Armado never addresses this basic point, no matter how many times I repeat it]
In fact, the problem is not in the method, but in the analysis of the results.
One way to characterize my “method” is as “the assembly of circumstantial evidence that points to a single conclusion, and the testing of that conclusion by whatever means possible.” This is what lawyers often do to prove their cases, and it’s one way that scientists formulate and test theories. And you can even put the Bible Code arguments and the anti-Stratfordian arguments under this umbrella – again, they are wrong not because of the method, but because of their interpretation of the results (and usually because they have failed to adequately test the theory, as evidenced by the fact that for them, the same data can produce opposite results).
Armado goes on:
“You also promptly offer an ideal refutation to the small number of your own arguments that are not based on infantile wordgames that can be played with equal efficiency on any and all English texts, by stating “Another difference between the anti-Stratfordian arguments and mine is that in the case of authorship, there is already a perfectly suitable and well-supported answer”. Of course, there is also a “perfectly suitable and well-supported answer” as to why the players in Hamlet are travelling (the child actors have become more popular than them), and to what Claudius’s “picture in little” is (it is a miniature portrait), . . .”
On your “picture in little” point, am I the one that has to break it to you that Shakespeare occasionally employed double-meanings? Why can’t a “picture in little” of a monarch be a coin? Isn’t a coin a little picture of a monarch? The beauty of double-entendres often is that both meanings have support. [no response to this]
On the “why the players are traveling point,” why does the fact that you can find “one suitable explanation” mean that we have to stop looking for others? As far as I can tell, most scholars reject the explanation that you find so suitable (as discussed in my paper there are at least six or seven alternative theories out there). But it’s the first one you thought of, and it’s “suitable,” so it must be right? [no response to this]
Armado writes:
“Please don’t expect me to go on discussing your nonsensical theories with you forever, as you spin in ever-decreasing circles trying to prove that black is white. I simply don’t have that much time to waste.”
Likewise.
Armado goes on:
“You do this sort of thing again and again, often rolling out blatantly false justifications for doing so, such as “Nevertheless, there is no good reason for Shakespeare to import this particular Elizabethan artefact (miniature portraits) into medieval Denmark”. Now I know, and you must know, that this is a false argument. So you’re either lying to yourself or deliberately lying to us. I prefer to think of you as an amiable idiot rather than a cheat, so I’m guessing that you’re deluding yourself. There are two reasons why this statement is a falsehood, and the first is that everybody knows Shakespeare *routinely* imports Elizabethan artefacts into “medieval Denmark” (and every other time and place that he portrays). Shakespeare puts guns and chiming clocks and books with pages in ancient Rome. In “Hamlet” there are a whole raft of them, including the University at Wittenberg (opened in the sixteenth century), the travelling players with boy actors playing women (English Renaissance habits, not Medieval Danish), the theatre company made up entirely of boy actors that has displaced them, the rapier and dagger with which Laertes and Hamlet fight their duel, Hamlet’s black mourning clothes (the wrong colour for Medieval Denmark, as 19th century actors keenly discovered), and I somehow doubt that Medieval Denmark would have used ducats as their main currency (although I may be wrong about that as they were using them by the Renaissance).”
There is actually a useful comment beneath some of the bile here. In previous drafts I had a footnote talking about the various prochronisms in Shakespeare, including the striking clock, Wittenberg, cannons, etc. I wasn’t trying to fool anyone, I just left it out to economize on space, perhaps because I thought I had made it obvious that “miniature portraits” just don’t seem to fit into the play. So maybe I’ll work with this passage. [in the end, I didn’t change the passage much. On rereading it, it’s clear that it was only Armado’s results-oriented reading that caused him to raise this as an issue]
Armado writes:
“Of course you aren’t nearly so careful with some of your other equally ridiculous arguments. I gave a particularly hearty chuckle when I came across your claim that “Understanding ‘picture in little’ as a reference to coinage bearing Claudius’s image solves these problems, and makes for a better line. Even without props, this is likely the first meaning that would have occurred to Shakespeare’s audience. ‘Picture’ was slang for coin – as in ‘whose purse was best in picture’ (WT 4.4.603) – and ‘picture in *little*’ helps to drive the point home”.
“Oh, how I chuckled. There are a couple of reasons for chortling merrily at your self-satisfied delusions here. Firstly, because it should be rather obvious to everybody – including yourself – that when Renaissance writers or readers saw reference to a “picture in little” they were most likely to assume that it referred to a miniature portrait. Do you want some evidence for that statement? You seem to accept this earlier in your essay where you describe the extensive popularity of the miniature portraits themselves in Shakespeare’s time . . . .”
This is more good feedback. I kept redrafting that part as my confidence in the interpretation grew. I probably overstated the case when I said that it was “likely the first meaning . . . .” [I was too kind here, and it might have been misleading, since, as shown above and below, Armado was way off base with his analysis of this line. ]
“The problem with this, of course, is that Krause is quite simply wrong. Picture was never slang for coin, and if he thinks it was I would ask him to find us a clear example of this word used in this way. The example that he thinks he has found in “Winter’s Tale” simply won’t do, and here’s why . . . .”
Actually I didn’t find the Winter’s Tale cite, I got that interpretation from Fischer’s Econolingua, and she cites other contemporary examples. It does seem more plausible than Pafford’s explanation (primarily because “coin” doesn’t appear to have occurred to Pafford, whereas “picture” obviously occurred to Fischer), but I’ll take another look at it. As to the rest of your discussion of the “picture in little” line (in which you demonstrate that the phrase typically meant miniature portrait, not coins), you miss the point that I am proposing a double-entendre, not an alternative definition. [I was obviously tired and in a hurry when I wrote this – as discussed above in the comments embedded in Armado’s original post, Fischer is clearly right]
Armado goes on:
“. . . This makes this a bad experiment in the scholarly sense, since arguments that are not disprovable are immediately worthless, as they are in science. Krause has tried to make his claims unfalsifiable (a word that he should look up in a scientific handbook if he has not heard it before), and that is automatically evidence of a bad argument.”
I appreciate your attempt to introduce some science into your critique, but you’ve really picked a weird way of doing it. While “unfalsifiability” may be evidence of a bad argument in science, much of literary criticism is inherently unfalsifiable (especially when the author isn’t around to deny a proposed meaning). That doesn’t make it all “worthless.” I’m sorry that my theory happens to fit that mold, but if THAT’s your reason for thinking it must be bad, you need to go back to school.
I’ve glanced at your arguments regarding the essay’s discussion on pp. 2-4 of the play where you explain how none of these lines has to do specifically with government-caused debasement. You make some good points, but the problem is that I never said that those lines were references to government-caused debasement. If you think I somehow dishonestly implied it, I’ll take another look and consider modifying the way I’ve set that up. [also too hurried. As shown in my comments on his original post, it’s not clear that he made any “good points’; since all his comments are based on a misunderstanding of debasement. My point here is not incorrect – the paper didn’t claim that each of the lines had to do with government-caused debasement – but I should have explained that anything having to do with impurities in the coinage or metal is relevant to my theme.]
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1711 Monday, 13 September 2004
[1]
From: Armado
Date: Friday, 10 Sep 2004 16:28:04 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Armado
Date: Friday, 10 Sep 2004 22:15:04 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Holofernes
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 12:40:30 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Nathaniel
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 13:47:57 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Holofernes
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 14:00:26 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
[6]
From: Holofernes
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 15:03:23 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
[7]
From: Montano
Date: Sunday, 12 Sep 2004 17:28:46 -0700 (PDT)
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1644 Question on Measure for Measure
[8]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Sunday, 12 Sep 2004 22:46:34 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
[9]
From: Armado
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 09:50:59 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Armado
Date: Friday, 10 Sep 2004 16:28:04 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
Krause asks for an allegory that will pass his six tests (even though I would argue that his own “debasement” allegory fails them comprehensively). As I have said, I do not have either the time nor the motivation to do this task justice. Just by looking at Krause’s footnotes, you can see that he spent a considerable chunk of his life researching his essay and formulating his claims. [Mommy – he’s hurting my feelings!! In fact, I’ll admit that I’ve spent a considerable chunk of my life just now slogging through these posts a second time, for the purpose of annotating them] If I was really to produce a series of assumptions and claims that were to match Krause’s as an endeavour, I would have to spend just as long, which I am not willing to do. The false allegory that I am about to make up, therefore, is more likely to take me a few hours than weeks or months, and it should be understood that if I – or anybody else – could be bothered to spend as much time on this as Krause has, we could produce a much better parallel fake-allegory.
I will start by summarising Krause’s own offering. In order to compare like with like I am only going to look at one play and one theme. [if only he had compared like with like . . .] Krause’s essay actually contains numerous themes jumbled up together, so that Luke Kirby appears in Krause’s “allegory” although he has nothing to do with debasement, or Shakespeare, or the text of this play when the name “Luke” appears. [continuing to fail to address my explanation of why Luke Kirby may be relevant] In this summary I am going to begin by listing all those points which actually directly refer to Krause’s supposed major theme, “debasement” in one play, “Measure for Measure”.
These are as follows:
1) ANGELO’S NAME AND ROLE. Krause tells us that “In ‘Measure for Measure’, a character named for an English coin (Angelo, for the English Angel) – whom others view as a model of purity – is actually debased and at risk of becoming irredeemably debased. If the character named for a monarch (Isabella) yields to his entreaties, both the coin and the monarch will be debased. Fortunately, a character named for a Spanish Jesuit who argued against monetary debasement (Mariana for Juan de Mariana) intervenes, and prevents both from becoming debased … The forced marriage of the coin (Angelo) to the anti-debaser (Mariana) reflects Shakespeare’s hopes that King James will pursue a policy of non-debasement. [This is mostly a quote from me, and is not inaccurate]
2) MARIANA’S NAME AND ROLE. Krause claims that Mariana is named after Juan de Mariana, who argued against monetary debasement, and that the character Mariana by marrying Angelo stops him from becoming debased. [also not inaccurate; but he fails to mention or address the contiguous references that point to Mariana – the great soldier Frederick and the moated grange. Armado apparently intentionally omits these references, because in his view they have nothing to do with debasement (which allows him to argue that I have jumbled several themes together). But of course, if they are used to point to Mariana, they have everything to do with debasement]
3) ISABELLA’S NAME AND ROLE. Krause claims that Isabella is named after Queen Elizabeth I (Isabella being a foreign variation on Elizabeth), and Krause claims that Elizabeth’s role in saving the English currency from debasement (by reversing her father’s debasement) is represented by Isabella’s role in saving Angelo from debasement. He also mentions Isabella’s and Queen Elizabeth’s shared virginity, suggesting that the final marriage of Elizabeth to the Duke represents the succession of the English throne from Elizabeth to James (although I might point out that Isabella gets married at the end of the play, [really? What line?] and Elizabeth rather obviously never did, nor was James I ever one of her suitors, if anything he was her honorary son as a result of being chosen as her heir). [this started out fair, but degenerated with the parenthetical – my point is that the play is intentionally ambiguous on whether they get married, and the comment that James was not one of her suitors seems to be the product of a mind in disarray.]
4) THE DUKE. Krause claims that the Duke, as monarch, represents James I. He suggests that Shakespeare portrayed James as having debased the Scottish coinage (represented by allowing Angelo to take power) [I actually don’t suggest this anywhere, although it’s an interesting idea] but then gave the Duke the role that he hoped James would play in England (helping to rescue the coinage from debasement). [not exactly] Presumably he is also thinking about the fact that both James and the Duke were rulers. [Not really fair, since just about everyone who has commented on the play has noticed the parallels. I was not breaking new ground here and saw no reason to delve into the issue beyond citing others, which the paper plainly does]
5) CLAUDIO’S NAME AND ROLE. Krause suggests that Claudio is named after the Claudine Emperors, and that the name was chosen because those Emperors were associated with debasement. [not completely unfair, but the real point was that Shakespeare consistently used the “Claud”-root in this manner in Hamlet and Much Ado About Nothing] He also suggests that as Isabella’s brother, he represents Queen Elizabeth’s brother, Edward VI – who, like his father, debased the coinage.
6) JULIET’S NAME AND ROLE. Since Claudio does not debase Angelo, Krause is forced to claim that Juliet also represents a coin. [Armado’s notions about what I am “forced” to do at every turn are exhausting. I noted the potential connection between Juliet and angels, and moved on] This he does by noting that Juliets in other plays are referred to using coin and ‘angel’ imagery more than other female characters (although I should point out that this is repeatedly to the celestial creature and not the coin, so Krause is presuming a double-meaning that is unlikely to be there – I would also need to see firm evidence for Krause’s claim about the particular association between Juliets and coin-imagery before I was convinced).
7) LAWS SLIPPED FOR X YEARS. Krause claims that this time in which the Duke’s laws were allowed to slip represents the period during which Edward VI’s coins were in circulation (fourteen years), or the period when Henry VIII’s debased coins were in circulation (nineteen years). Shakespeare apparently makes the mistake of using both figures, contradicting each other. [as noted, the numbers fit]
8) FIVE YEARS RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ANGELO AND MARIANA. Krause suggests that the fact that Angelo had “spoken of marriage” with Mariana five years before marrying her represents the five years between the introduction of debasement in Spain in 1599 and the first recorded performance of “Measure for Measure” in 1604. [the numbers also fit]
So now, I’ll start putting together my own “allegory” [using a vast ocean of data, as opposed to the debasement puddle]. I don’t know whether the first stirrings of this deliberately false allegory (which, in any case, could not possibly co-exist with Krause’s allegory, since it requires the same names and characters to mean completely different things, or have a completely different significance) [of course, this is not even true, since Shakespeare was quite good at juggling separate meanings for words and lines] rest unconsciously with my reading of Krause’s essay, as I find in rereading it that he does himself suggest that “While the name Mariana was a plausible woman’s name, and was the adjectival form of Mary or Maria (and thus could be associated with the virgin Mary, Catholics, Queen Mary Tudor or Mary Queen of Scots)”, but these are fairly obvious connections for any Renaissance enthusiast to make and I had consciously forgotten this by the time I started forming my own allegory, so any debt to Krause is subconscious.
To begin then:
Mariana, in my allegory, is a representation of the Virgin Mary or spiritual faith in the one true religion (which, of course, is the Catholic religion – this play is being written by Catholic William Shakeshafte son of Catholic John Shakespeare and those Protestants in his audience are all heretics, who need some allegorical moralising). [already the improbability is apparent]
Isabella, a Catholic nun (the Protestants had no nuns, Henry VIII abolished them), represents the worldly Catholic Church, which was virginal (all priests swore an oath of chastity) and had a religious vocation, and in particular the Spanish Empire which led the Catholic resistance against English Protestantism and its attempts to corrupt the Catholic nations and their church (hence the character being named after the Spanish queen at the time of Henry VIII’s Reformation, Isabella). England’s attempts to corrupt the Catholic nations and church with their hereticism – as seen for example in their support of Dutch Protestant rebellion against Spain – is represented by Angelo’s attempt to sexually corrupt and compromise Isabella trying to convert her from religious virginity to worldly whoredom – Isabella’s verbal resistance and cunning scheme represent Spain’s constant military resistance to the English and Protestant threat). [a milder version of Armado’s theme is not out of the question – it’s apparently what Nathaniel subscribes to, and it’s been put in writing by James Ellison (cited in the published paper at footnote 105) as well as Clare Asquith in Shadowplay.]
Angelo represents the heretical English nation and Englishmen – his name being a reference to that famous reference by Pope Gregory the Great (representing the Catholic church) on viewing pagan Englishmen in the Italian slavemarket, who declared them – for their physical beauty – “Not Angles, but angels” (Angelo being, like them, a pagan at heart with the outward appearance of an angel). [note how this isn’t exactly compatible with the other plays on his name as the English Angel coin. Although, as I said above, Shakespeare was capable of juggling multiple meanings, I do tend to agree with Armado that it’s unlikely that the play contained both allegories; thus, the well-recognized Angel-coin connection points to my allegory, not his]
Mariana’s brother Frederick we can take over from Krause’s essay as Federico de Spinola but – just to show how easy it is, having found a random name, to bind it into a theme, we will massively improve on Krause’s own explanation (Krause’s only connection being that Mariana was Spanish, Federico was working for the Spanish, and the name Isabella was Spanish for Elizabeth – which has nothing whatever to do with Krause’s own allegorical theme of debasement) by binding Federico much more tightly into the main theme of our own allegory, Federico in fighting for the Spanish and the Catholic faith was a “great soldier” for, and the protective spiritual “brother” of Catholic faith (represented by the Virgin Mary / Mariana) who died while trying to forcibly reconcile the English nation and the Catholic Church (since his ultimate aim was to lead an invasion of the English nation on behalf of Catholicism and Spain, and return England to the Church), Federico’s potential to bring about the unity of England and Catholicism (Angelo and Mariana) is represented by the dowry that brother Frederick carries on his ship, when the ship sinks and Frederick dies (representing Federico’s death in a sea battle), this potential unification (the dowry to bring about the marriage) is lost, and England returns to its intransigent hereticism, rejecting Mariana / Mary and the Catholic faith. [of course, given the minimal role that Frederick plays in the text, it’s anomalous to give him this big a role in the “allegory.” In my case, I use him just to identify Mariana – which is all Shakespeare used him for – and thus do not “bind[] him more tightly to into the main theme of [the] allegory”]
The “laws let slip” for fourteen years are explained by the fourteen years between Henry VIII’s illegal (by Catholic standards) remarriage and excommunication by Pope Clement VII both in 1533 (which finally broke off all official ties between England’s monarch and the Catholic Church) and Henry’s death in 1547 [it’s hard to see why Henry’s death is chosen as the relevant point here – the schism continued after he died].
The”laws let slip” for nineteen years” refer to the nineteen years between the Act of Supremacy in 1534, which confirmed Henry VIII officially as the Supreme Head of the Church in England (usurping the position of the Pope) and 1553 when Queen Mary I reinstated the Catholic Bishops as she returned England to Catholicism. [given his pick of 1533 to make the 14 years fit, and his pick of 1534 to make this one fit, it’s clear that the timeline of the schism is so clogged with events that you can always find what you want. And as a matter of common sense, the 19 year period should fully encompass the 14 year period: if he is right on the 14 years (1533-1547), that makes 1533 a “slip” year; so if he is also right that 1534-1553 were “slip” years, then this is actually a 20-year period (1533-1553), not a 19-year period. But why do I bother?]
The Duke represents Philip II, who – through marrying Mary I – was briefly King of England and tried to guide it back to Catholicism (hence his position as Angelo’s master), [see how Armado has something like 70 years of well-documented history, including the biographies of dozens if not hundreds of people, to work with. All I had was some very scanty information about debasements in England and Spain, and just a handful of personalities. Clare Asquith’s Shadowplay shows how this sort of thing can be done for ANY Shakespeare play and the schism, and thus (unless Asquith is right) is a demonstration, using Armado’s own method, that Armado’s counter-allegory is wrong] upon the death of Mary I, Philip did nothing to prevent the succession of her sister and instead tried to woo Elizabeth with the idea of marrying her and restoring himself to the English throne (symbolised by the Duke leaving his country – representing England – and allowing Angelo, representing Queen Elizabeth and the Protestant Englishmen, to rule the country) [we know it’s fake, but isn’t the idea that the Duke represents Philip II a bit preposterous? Can the same be said about any of my proposed representations?], but he continued to act secretly behind the scenes (with the Duke’s return in disguise and secret plotting to help Isabella and Mariana representing Philip II’s role in sending Spanish spies, missionary priests [including Jesuits] – symbolised by the Duke disguising himself as just such a man, a religious Friar – and political agitators into England to aid the English Catholics, [although of course, the Duke was disguised as a friar when OUTSIDE of “England” (i.e. outside the presence of Angelo)] who are represented by Isabella and Mariana, their worldly Catholic faith represented by Isabella and their spiritual Catholic faith represented by Mariana) and continued to try to bring about a reconciliation between England and the Catholic faith (represented by the marriage of Mariana and Angelo) by diplomatic means or by war (represented by the Duke’s role in tricking Angelo into marrying Mariana). [except that in real life, King Philip II is long dead by the time the play is performed, and has been singularly unsuccessful in his military ventures. Note also that Armado’s Isabella was in real life his duke’s mother. And what of all the scholars who think that the Duke represents James?]
Since this is an allegory about the relationship between Catholicism and England, and not one about the debasement of coinage, we can also bring in all the examples from Krause’s own essay that are actually about Catholicism and have nothing whatever to do with debasement, while these have nothing directly to do with Krause’s debasement allegory (since not one of them has anything to do with debasement at all), [continuing to miss the point and not address my comments] they are rather obviously an integral part of the main theme of my allegory about the relationship between England and Catholicism, and so we can slot them in here with much more justification than Krause can (obviously, I might claim if I actually believed in the allegory that I was creating, while following his misleading “debasement” allegory, Krause accidentally stumbled across some of the parts of the *REAL* allegory inserted in the play by Shakeshafte, one which in its other parts flagrantly cannot co-exist with Krause’s theory and which provides a much more natural home for the Jesuit and Catholic references that Krause thinks he has found). [An inadvertent argument in favor of publication. As I’ve said, Shakeshaftians should be grateful to me for pointing out that Lyford Grange had a moat, regardless whether they agree with the allegory I propose]
Therefore, the moated grange is Lyford Grange, which in real life was used by the Jesuit Father Campion, and so here is the home of Mariana (Catholic faith) because in real life it became a symbolic home of the spiritual Catholic faith that wishes to reach out to and unite with England, represented by Mariana with her wish to embrace and marry Angelo. [this is actually not bad, if you are a Shakeshaftian and refuse to accept the debasement allegory. But you can’t refuse to accept the debasement allegory on the basis of anything Armado has said]
Mariana’s grange is within “Saint Luke’s” because this represents Luke Kirby, who is named here in association with Mariana was trying to do Mariana’s / Mary’s work in converting Angelo / England when he was captured, tortured and martyred. He had a home for Mariana (Catholic faith) in his heart. [again, Shakeshaftians will be interested in the Luke Kirby suggestion]
Angelo’s five year-old promise of marriage, followed by five years of refusal, and then a sudden marriage, represents the five years between the Western Rising (an English Catholic rebellion against Edward VI and his introduction of a Protestant Prayer Book in 1549) and the date of the marriage of Queen Mary I of England and King Philip II of Spain, which took place in 1554. [confirming what I just said about the ocean of history that Armado has to work with. Finding a suitable five-year period given all the possibilities is child’s play] When the Western Rising occurred it some briefly thought that this action was a promise that there would shortly be a reunification of Catholicism and the English people (the marriage of Angelo and Mariana) set in motion by these rebellions, but the promise was short-lived as the rebellion was crushed and England/Angelo – despite this brief suggestion of a possible reunification of England with Catholicism – continued in its stubborn heretical ways until Edward’s sudden early death, which brought about a sudden and literal marriage between the Catholic world and England, when Philip II of Spain married Mary I, and became the joint monarch of a once again Catholic England – a marriage of England and the Catholic world that the Catholic Shakeshafte hoped would one day happen again, sometime after his play was performed. [either the play is set in the deep past or it isn’t. This part of the allegory makes no sense]
Claudio’s name is easily explained by the fact that Claudius Acquavia was General (leader) of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) from 1581 until more than a decade after “Measure for Measure” was performed. [right, and 30-50 years after the other “events” in your allegory] As General of the Jesuits he was responsible for training and sending all the missionary Jesuits into England to minister to the Catholics there. In this allegory Claudio (named after this General) symbolises all of the missionary Jesuits in their kindly mission to help the English to reform from heresy and join the Catholic Church. [how does the main “relationship” in the play – Isabella and Angelo – fit in here? It fits perfectly with my allegory – which is all about whether Angelo and/or Isabella will become debased. But if Angelo lusts after Isabella (a random Catholic), why do we even need Mariana? Why not just let Angelo marry Isabella? I can’t believe I am engaging at this level]
In the play the relationships of the Jesuits (represented by their leader) and the loyal Catholic English people is symbolised by Claudio’s legitimate but unofficial relationship with Juliet (and we can borrow Krause’s theorising – dubious as it is – to say that Juliet was clearly a representative of the good English person, open to forming a union and eventually a marriage with the Catholic priesthood, since Krause tells us that Shakeshafte routinely calls his other Juliets ‘angels’ and here we know that angel really does mean the divine creature with wings [as it clearly does in those plays] and not a coin, and the term is used, as with Angelo, because Juliet is one of the strangely attractive pagan English, but in this case open to Christian conversion (as Pope Gregory the Great had hoped when he first saw them). Unfortunately the brutal authorities of England, represented by the unjust Angelo (who outwardly looked like an angel, as Pope Gregory observed, but had unfortunately turned out to be inwardly a devil instead, as Shakeshafte says repeatedly within the play) punished Claudio (the Jesuits) and Juliet (the Catholic English people who welcomed priests and desired a union with the Catholic priesthood and church), despite the fact that their relationship was a legitimate one despite its secrecy and unofficial nature. [The central theme of your allegory is carried by a couple of bit players. How do you explain Isabella’s refusal to save Claudio?] Shakespeare’s association of Juliets with angels and with English Catholics (especially pregnant ones) is doubtless additionally suggested by the name of Saint Juliot – also known as Saint Julitta, who was one of the last Christians martyred by the decree of pagan Roman Emperors (Emperor Diocletian being responsible for the tenth and most terrible persecution of the early Christian church). With her three-month old child Cyriacus, also later made a Saint, she fled persecution of Christians in Lyacaonia, and went from there to Isauria to Tarsus in Cilicia, where she was finally killed during the persecutions instigated by Diocletian, after her child had been killed before her eyes. Shakeshafte’s angelic saintly Catholic Juliets are therefore dedicated to the memory of Saint Julitta, who like them faced persecution by the pagan/heretical authorities of countries not friendly to the true religion. [again, if this is the allegory, it doesn’t make much sense to relegate such major players to such minor roles]
I’ve only spent a couple of hours at this and I’ve barely looked at any books, just a few random flicks through reference books and glances at the Internet, [right, because you’re such a genius that you carry all this stuff in your head] despite this I’ve managed to match Krause’s allegory on just about every point, and when I haven’t matched it I’ve gone beyond it in drawing even more allegorical detail out of Shakespeare’s play than Krause does for particular individuals and places. [BECAUSE of the detailed subject matter of your choice of allegory, which makes the allegory worthless in its own right, and doubly worthless as a “counter-allegory”] Even when I’ve decided to co-opt Krause’s arguments (the grange, “Saint Luke’s”, Mariana’s brother Frederick) they fit much better into my allegory than they did into Krause’s, for a start they’re actually on the right subject (Krause’s allegory is about currency debasement, which none of these three people and places had anything to do with, [repeated ad nauseum, never addressing my explanation that they all pointed to Mariana] but mine is about the relationship between England and Catholicism, in which all three were intimately involved) and what’s more I’ve shown via allegory new things about all three references which simply are not compatible with Krause’s alternative allegory: the grange is the home to Mariana because Lyford Grange was the English home of Catholic spirituality in its use as a Jesuit base, I’ve explained why Federico de Spinola was Mariana’s brother and why he was carrying her dowry, I’ve shown why Mariana lives within a place named after Luke Kirby, while Krause cannot find any way to attach him directly to Shakespeare’s text at all.
Now I’m sure that Krause will accept that there are multiple and endless references to Catholicism, and to the relationship between Catholicism and the English people and state, that scholars have claimed to see (sometimes with more evidence and justification than at others) in Shakespeare’s plays. When I have a chance to get out to the library and collect some relevant sources, I’ll post at least the 10 instances that Krause demands within “Measure for Measure” itself, and another 10 instances from various other plays. I think though, that Krause would accept that just a few of the texts on the question of the Shakeshafte / ‘Is Shakespeare Catholic?’ theory would allow me to pass this section of Krause’s test. [the Krause test nowhere suggested that you could pick the schism as the theme, and the reason it “works” for you is the same reason that the Bible code works for others, which has nothing to do with the merits of my argument]
I may have more to say later about why my allegory passes the other tests at least as well as Krause’s does, and often better, but first I would be interested to hear Krause’s reaction to this allegory? I know, almost for certain, that he will suggest that it is nothing like as good as his own (“true”) allegory and is therefore a “false” allegory and – unlike his own – nothing to do with Shakespeare’s real intentions. [if you had been reading my posts, you’d know why I said this]
The only other reaction that I can imagine is that Krause would claim that both allegories are true, and were intended by Shakespeare. This is obviously not a valid argument, since it would be all but impossible to deliberately create two overlapping but completely different allegories of this kind in the same play, and any author who did so would merely confuse his audiences and himself. Since Krause wishes to imagine that Shakespeare’s audience watching the play for the first and only time instantly saw in it the allegorical model that Krause’s supposed Shakespeare wished them to see, [given that the first performance was before the Court, it’s rather doubtful that Shakespeare would have wanted them to see Armado’s allegory] it is inconceivable that these audiences were expected to see multiple conflicting allegories all at the same time. Such an experience for somebody viewing the rapid movement of real theatre is quite simply impossible (as – in fact – is the sort of convoluted and abstract reasoning that Krause uses to set up many of his counter-intuitive “readings” of words, phrases, and large sections of the text). [of course, this is all Armado’s characterization. As can be seen by reading the paper, there is nothing convoluted, abstract, or counter-intuitive about it. At the end of the day, Armado has shown how easy it is to use the vast event- and personality-rich topic of the schism to map an allegory onto a Shakespeare play. Clare Asquith has now done this for all of Shakespeare’s plays, a result that has been appropriately greeted with considerable skepticism. In order to somehow “defeat” the debasement allegory with a counter-allegory, Armado would have to show how an equivalent debasement allegory, with equivalent support, can be found in Shakespeare’s other plays, preferably a play in which it hasn’t already been found]
I would also point out that since nobody since Shakespeare’s time has seen anything like Krause’s allegory in the play, Krause’s belief that the average household servant groundling would have been instantly enlightened is far from credible. In short I cannot imagine anybody being able to reproduce virtually any part of Krause’s allegory from their own independent research (even if you told them that “the allegory is about debasement”) without having read Krause’s essay first. Readings that are supposed to be “obvious”, but which are actually impossible for others to see independently without help, cannot be given much credence. [he never addresses the play I constructed in my last post, even though it specifically shows how the allegory might have been apparent to a playgoer]
[Note how this “final” refutation of my argument not only failed miserably to put a dent in – much less truly address – the Measure for Measure argument, but it also completely fails to address the Hamlet argument, which is not about allegory, but about better interpretations]
Armado.
[2]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Friday, 10 Sep 2004 22:15:04 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
“I like to see argument, even vigorous argument, but feel dismay when the contention descends into personal attacks. I don’t know personally any of the combatants, so this is an attempt at an impartial assessment.”
Leonato is quite right. I overreacted in response to Kent, and as a result unfairly allowed my feelings about Tom Krause’s method to spill over into personal comments, which was especially unjustified since Tom Krause had no part in any provocation. [stating the obvious, but it’s better than not saying it] I have apologised offline to Tom Krause (although not for the reasons Kent suggested that I should) and he has been kind enough to accept my apology, and I apologise here to the Moderator and to the list. [Armado’s actual apology was only for calling me names, not for making bad arguments. Even in his apology, he blamed his bile on an intolerance for bad arguments] I will try to post more moderately and react less emotionally in future.
Armado.
[3]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 12:40:30 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
Perhaps we ought to consider “moated grange”, which is probably another of Shakespeare’s eccentricities. Strictly speaking, a grange is an outlying farm of a monastery or feudal lord, used for the collection of tithes or feudal dues, and so with additional barns (hence the name: it really means ‘granary’). It would be run by a steward or bailiff, although it is not impossible that a member of the monastic community would oversee it. It would not need to be moated, because that is a quasi-defensive feature. “Quasi” because the feature is really one of feudal status rather than practicality. And as an outstation, monastic or secular, it would not have that status. [he seems to be about a month behind on this thread; this has been gone over before. There’s still no explanation of why that sort of grange would have a moat]
Lyford Grange was indeed moated – although it is not clear (to me, at least) whether the moat still survived in the 1580s. [I’ve explained in these posts and in the paper that it featured in Campion’s capture] It was not, however, a grange! [when is a “grange” not a grange?] It did indeed belong to the Abbey of Abingdon, but had long been let to a secular tenant – who had presumably constructed the moat to buttress his dubious status. [point?] Baddesley Clinton is certainly moated, but that wasn’t a grange either! [no idea if he is right or wrong here; but no matter what, it’s best to just leave Baddesley Clinton out of it]
Holofernes
[4]————————————————————-
From: Nathaniel
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 13:47:57 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
Holofernes writes …
“the awful lurking suspicion remains that Shakespeare might not have realised that the predominant language ought to be German.”
The suspicion remains that WS thought Vienna was in Italy. This is the writer after all who gave Bohemia and Milan sea coasts and didn’t seem to know that Venice has canals. [right, the gondola in Merchant of Venice had wheels] WS was not taught Geography at school and, as far as we know, never left England, so none of this should surprise us.
And if WS was able to make such elementary (to us) howlers in his knowledge of European geography, how likely is it then that he was aware of arcane economic issues in foreign lands? [what is arcane about debasement?? Foreign coins were a part of the circulating currency in England, and had to be checked carefully to ensure that they were not debased – or if they were, what their true metal content was. And of course debasement was a part of England’s history, and was continually debated there, not to mention in Scotland].
Tom Krause writes as though WS took the FT and the Economist. Even if this obscure Spanish book on currency debasement had appeared before WS’s play, the book would not have been on sale in Paul’s Yard for WS to leaf through. Any books written by Jesuits were confiscated by the authorities and burnt. [always showing off his knowledge of Jesuits; anyway, you don’t need to read a book to learn that Mariana was against debasement]
Nathaniel
[5]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 14:00:26 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
Tom Krause wrote:
“Playgoer 2: Wait a minute. Juan de Mariana? Is he that guy who wrote that history of Spain that was intended to introduce the rest of us Europeans to the glory of Spain? Playgoer 1: Yeah. And before that, he worked for the Spanish Inquisition. He must be about 70 years old!”
Playgoer 1 would appear to be in error – Mariana seems to have had no connection with the Spanish Inquisition (inquisitors tended to be Dominicans), although they did plague him in his later years, as they did anyone who wrote on theology. [answered in my next post; of course he did] Mariana would have remained a footnote in the historiography of Spain (and an even smaller footnote in the history of economics) had it not been for his “De Rege et Regis institutione”. The only conceivable interest in England would have been any comparison with James’s “Basilikon Doron”, [which of course was also out at the time of MFM, it may be that Holofernes is trying to be helpful] but in France it attracted adverse comment because its apparent defence of tyrannicide could be seen to justify the assassination of Henri III. [I’m not sure I have a reference to this “adverse comment”; in any event, it supports my case] But that was nothing to the storm that broke over his head in 1610 when Henri IV was assassinated by someone who might (or might not) have been a Jesuit. That made the Jesuits a byword for infamy, and earned Mariana his present entry in the Encyclopaedia Britannica. [it’s probably true that were it not for this later event, EB would have overlooked him entirely. But that says nothing about how well-known he was in his day]
The Duke identifies Mariana further by reference to the “Great Soldier Frederick.”
If Federico was indeed the younger brother, it would, of course, have been Ambrogio who “pledged his family fortune to Spain” (Playgoer 1). [checking just now, it turns out playgoer 1 said “basically pledged . . . .” All I meant was that Federico certainly put a lot of family money into the effort] Federico’s footnote in military history is due to his (ultimately unsuccessful) daring deployment of galleys in the North Sea. One wonders whether he was following contemporary Mediterranean practice or, like his brother, inspired by classical authors (as was Captain Fluellen, of course). [somewhat pointlessly showing off what he just looked up]
“As I have tried to explain to Mr. Armado, many of the items that he considers “trivia” are things that the debasement allegory explains, not things that the debasement allegory depends on (witness his incisive critique of my point about Claudius + Nero = Claudio).”
I seem to have missed this one the first time around. Shakespeare would have been perfectly well aware that “Claudio” was the Italian form of “Claudius”. [as we all know] He might conceivably have heard of his contemporary Claudio Monteverdi – whose brother was called Giulio Cesare!
Holofernes
[6]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Saturday, 11 Sep 2004 15:03:23 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
If anyone is actually interested in Juan de Mariana’s 1609 treatise “De monetæ mutatione” – even though it has no possible connection with Measure for Measure [we see where he stands, although not why] – it has been translated into English (as ‘A Treatise on the Alteration of Money’) and published in the Journal of Markets & Morality, Volume 5, Number 2 (Fall 2002), pp.523-593, and is available here:
http://www.acton.org/publicat/m_and_m/2002_fall/mariana/
Holofernes
[8]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Sunday, 12 Sep 2004 22:46:34 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1701 Question on Measure for Measure
Costard writes:
“This from Krause, which he repeats a number of times: Isabella and the Duke play monarch roles in the debasement metaphor.
“But, as your thesis postulates, wasn’t the monarchical role to initiate debasement, not forestall it?”
The proposed message is that monarchs should follow Elizabeth’s example and resist all pressure to debase the coinage.
Costard also asks:
“If “picture in little” is a coin, why would anyone pay “Forty, fifty, an hundred ducats apiece” to acquire one, when it could be obtained for its face value. A 100 ducat coin would hardly be “little.””
The theory is that those were the “face” values of coins, and thus a person “selling” something worth 20 ducats in exchange for a 20-ducat coin would in fact be “buying” the picture of the monarch for 20 ducats of value. The fact that 20 and 40 were numbers commonly encountered in English coinage would have clued the audience in to the fact that coins were at issue. (The second quarto is 20, 40, 100).
The next question, as you suggest, is how to deal with the fact that a 100-ducat coin would be large. One possibility is that Shakespeare was simply using “ducat” in a “notional” sense, as indicating what his audience would understand as a foreign denomination, and that he didn’t intend for them to over-analyze the question of just how big a 100-ducat coin would be. If a prop was used (e.g. Hamlet flips a coin in Rosencrantz’s face) then no further hints were necessary.
But if one goes down the path of over-analysis, an explanation for the high face values is that the coinage has been debased. When the coinage has been debased, previously-unthinkably-high-denomination coins may be issued. For example, while the Scottish coinage had the same “absolute value” as the English coinage in the 14th century, Scottish debasements over the years resulted in a Scottish pound being worth only 1/12 of an English pound by Shakespeare’s time. As a result, James’s Scottish coinage included a 20-pound issue – a denomination that would have been impossibly huge if in English pounds.
For what it’s worth, I actually had a look at a 100-ducat coin (of the Holy Roman Empire) of 1629 at the Smithsonian over here. It’s pretty big, but still no bigger than a typical miniature portrait.
Tom Krause
[9]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 09:50:59 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1688 Question on Measure for Measure
A lengthy and irrelevant post that mostly attacks (using lengthy summaries of reviews) a work by Mallin cited by Kent, as well as Kent’s publication record – I’ve deleted the more irrelevant material.
Kent’s argument – that because Mallin claims there are allegories in Shakespeare, then Krause’s essay must be worth printing – would be unconvincing in any case, since Krause’s allegory is evidently nothing like those which Mallin claims to see within the plays, and Krause’s “evidence” is even more contestable and paper-thin, not nearly as cohesive or well-developed as Mallin’s theories. [becoming offensive again, without support] Even if we found historical evidence that Mallin was entirely right about the allegory in “Twelfth Night” this would not, could not, mean that any and all allegory theories were thereby vindicated (such thinking would immediately validate Oxfordianism and all brands of anti-Stratfordianism, and most of their false conclusions). Instead Krause and Kent would still have to argue for their theory and its validity point by point, as Krause is apparently willing to do, but Kent is evidently not. [and neither are you, since you seem to spend all your time attacking other arguments that have no bearing on the validity of mine] Kent’s attempt to use Mallin as an argument by authority to vindicate Krause’s claims, however, is even more ineffective since Mallin’s own claims are clearly contentious and unconvincing to a good number of the scholars who have read them (I would suspect that this includes the majority of those who have read Mallin’s book), and therefore clearly Mallin’s unproved hypothesis cannot be used as evidence to support yet another even more contentious and unconvincing theory. [I actually tend to agree with Armado that relying on Mallin does not particularly support my theory, but he is oblivious to the irony of his comments here – just as the existence of other possibly true allegories says little about whether mine is true or not, neither does the existence of possibly false allegories. Armado is only good at detecting the flaws in his own arguments when someone else is making them]
“ I’m afraid that the problem with Armado is that, while he rails at great length against modern criticism, he hasn’t actually read much of it. That is telling, from my point of view.” [quoting Kent]
I have no doubt that I read less modern criticism than Kent, but I still read a good quantity of it. If I try to analyse Kent’s reading patterns from his postings, however, (as he has attempted to guess mine) I might assume that Kent reads considerably less historical criticism and has considerably less contact with the theatre and with theatrical writing about Shakespeare than I do, and it is also fairly self-evident that he has not read nearly so much (if any) of the work by the anti-Stratfordians, which is a very good way of learning about the nature of bad and invalid arguments and methods in Shakespearean Studies, an understanding of which would have effectively inoculate Kent against the mistake of taking seriously arguments of the kind that Krause advances in his essay (exactly identical in form and nature to many invalid anti-Stratfordian arguments). [Armado unwittingly puts his finger on his own problem. By “learning” – quite possibly the hard way – that the Oxfordian arguments are incorrect, he has “inoculated” himself against many other forms of argument] Kent evidently likes to think that his own balance of reading makes him superior to me as a Shakespearean critic. I would suggest that my own rather less restrictive range of interests allows me to understand the context of modern criticism rather better than Kent seems to. Those who know nothing of the past are condemned to repeat it.
[irrelevancies deleted]
“2. Mariana was well known long before 1604-1605 as one of the leading intellectuals of his day. His interests were varied and deep, and those who knew of him knew that he had special interests in politics, the nation-state, Catholic theology, and money matters, especially how currency affects a country’s economic welfare. All of this was clear to intellectuals and other smart people as early as 1592, when his collected volumes on Spain came out.” [quoting Kent]
All of this seems markedly beside the point. [not nearly as beside the point – and thankfully much shorter – than your “arguments”] Krause’s essay assumes that William Shakespeare (in England) could use Juan de Mariana’s surname alone as a representation of somebody who significantly opposed the debasement of currency by governments at the time that “Measure for Measure” was written and first performed (which happened before Mariana published any book on debasement). This not only requires that Juan de Mariana should have written vaguely about money at some point (what historian has not?) but that Mariana be specifically *FAMOUS* for writing about debasement. Even if some minor references to debasement occurred in Mariana’s great History of Spain, these are unlikely to have been singled out by readers around the world as his main topic (which they clearly were not). Every modern historian who writes about World Wars I and II writes about inflationary debasement of currencies (it’s what happened between the Wars in Germany, and a major factor in setting off the second one) [there was inflation, but it had nothing to do with debasement], but that doesn’t mean that if we find a character called Tailor (or a character who *is* a Tailor) in a modern play that uses metaphors about counterfeited coins a few times, we can confidently claim that the character must be an allegorical representation of A.J.P. Taylor, who wrote quite a bit about inflationary debasement of currency, but wasn’t exactly famous for having done so (as opposed to all the other things he did equally well). [it’s true that my theory is based on the inference that Mariana’s views on debasement were known. That’s something I haven’t been able to prove (yet) by direct evidence, and it’s something Armado will never be able to disprove. At present, all we have is the circumstantial case, which Armado has never addressed, except to mischaracterize it as “circular.”]
Besides, even before we get to this point, we have to establish whether Mariana wrote anything at all about the debasement of currencies before “Measure for Measure” was written. [redundant – as repeatedly explained, we do not *have* establish this] Krause’s essay makes it fairly clear that, as far as Krause knows, he did not. Krause himself, in his most recent post, mentions Alan Soons, whose Biography of Mariana suggests that Mariana wrote a chapter about debasement in his 1599 work “De Rege” *before* debasement was introduced by Philip III of Spain, but while Krause seems conveniently closer to being convinced now that it is becoming an important issue in supporting his argument (“I don’t have the resources to confirm or refute this, but it’s plausible” is Krause’s latest line on this suggestion), it seems obvious that Krause was less convinced when he originally wrote his essay, which states that “Angelo’s primary excuse for having abandoned Mariana – that Mariana’s ‘reputation was disvalu’d in levity’ (5.1.221) – could be a complaint that Mariana’s book ‘De Rege’ – published in 1599 – was lighter (had more ‘levity’) than it would have been had it included Mariana’s thoughts on debasement, which would not appear in print until the second edition of ‘De Rege’ in 1605”. [how irritating that he can hold my refusal to accept anything but clearly established fact in the paper against me. The footnote mentions Soons’s work, and expresses the same doubts I have continued to express] Since Krause evidently has access to sources that suggest that the chapter on debasement was only added to the 1605 second edition of “De Rege” [cited in the paper, of course], the most likely explanation for Soons’ claim is that Soons accidentally read a copy of the 1605 edition, while assuming that the text it contained had originated on the date of first publication. [I wrote to Soons on this very issue, and he wrote back saying he was “sure” it was in Yale’s copy of the 1598 edition. I note that some sources refer to a 1598 edition and some to a 1599 edition – I’m fairly sure that these were the same edition] Clearly, therefore, if Krause wishes to make new claims on the basis of an assumption that some 1599 editions did contain this chapter, then he needs to produce some evidence of a 1599 edition that did do so. Since Soons’ claim is evidently dubious, it cannot be used as firm evidence unless or until it has been confirmed. [nobody’s using it as firm evidence]
Kent evidently accepts that there was no reference to debasement in “De Rege” and therefore falls back on Mariana’s “Historiae de rebus Hispaniae” published in 1592. Having seen Kent’s posting I am not even sure that Kent has actually read this volume since the points that he makes are so generalised and unspecific as to suggest that he has not.
As it happens, I have access to a 1699 English translation of Mariana’s book (provided by EEBO in a poor-quality PDF scan), and although I have not had time to read the whole book, I have been looking specifically at the monarchs that Mariana himself identifies as those most responsible for inflation as the result of debasement of currency in his book “De Monetae Mutatione” (which can be found in English translation as “A Treatise on the Alteration of Money” at http://www.acton.org/publicat/m_and_m/2002_fall/mariana/intro.html). Now, when Mariana wrote his 1592 book on the History of Spain he did not write about Philip III of Spain (the current monarch) nor about Philip III’s debasement of the Spanish gold currency, since that had not yet taken place. Mariana’s later treatise, however, makes clear that although silver and gold had not yet been debased in Spanish History, the copper “Maravedis” had been debased repeatedly, and their value had consistently fallen through Spanish History. Mariana gives a list of the value of the maravedis at significant points in Spanish History and makes clear that the biggest fall in its value took place during the reigns of Henry II, John I, Henry III, and John II of Castile (all of whom followed one another to the throne). Rather obviously if we find any references to the debasement of currency in Mariana’s History of Spain, then, it should appear in the histories of these particular monarchs. I am gradually reading through these sections of the Book, which form a substantial part of Mariana’s whole work, and will report back honestly on any references to debasement that I find. [despite this promise, he never reported back one way or another. I haven’t looked at the book myself, in part because the 1699 translation by Captain Stevens is supposedly not very good. At some point, someone should read the original Latin to see what can be found; but it probably won’t be me – if references to debasement are there, Armado and his ilk will say that’s a long way from proving that Shakespeare was aware of them; if they are not, I will say that it doesn’t prove that Mariana’s post-debasement complaints did not reach Shakespeare’s ears. Note to anyone reading – a potentially more fruitful place to look for Mariana’s pre-MFM debasement views is “De Ponderibus et Mensuris,” published in 1599, which has not been translated, and which exists only in rare book rooms, and on microfilm in at least one unhelpful library] To date I have finished reading the history of Henry II, and the only reference of any sort that could possibly be related to the debasement of currency is a one-sentence throw-away line reading “A certain sort of base money called Agnus Dei’s was here regulated how it should pass”. Now Mariana was certainly not going to become famous around the world as an opponent of debasement on the basis of a single sentence in several densely packed chapters, and if debasement has a similarly marginal presence in the rest of Mariana’s work, then we can be fairly certain that nobody in Spain, let alone in England, would have thought of him in relation to this topic as a result of his writings until well after “Measure for Measure” had been written and performed, at which time Mariana finally released a whole book on this topic. [Except that the Spanish debasement started in 1599. There’s no doubt he formed his views long before MFM was written; the only question is if he conveyed them to anyone, and if so, to whom] Unfortunately for Krause and Kent, this would have been far too late to have influenced Shakespeare’s play.
Krause offers one alternative to Mariana talking famously about debasement in one of his published books before “Measure for Measure” was written, and that is a sort of assumption that Mariana wrote or said something on the subject which has not survived to the present day, but which was safely passed around the Renaissance world from Spain to Shakespeare in London. It should be fairly obvious that no serious academic theory could base its central argument on such a fantastical creation, since any academic world that allowed such phantom creations to act as “proof” of a theory would allow us to make up just about anything and claim it as fact. [this is Armado’s standard alone. If one central point needs to be proved by circumstantial evidence, the argument is worthless. It should be obvious that Armado has no idea what he is talking about.] Since Krause is trying to give us some reason for believing that it is even a notional possibility that Shakespeare used Mariana as an allegorical figure to represent debasement, he cannot use Shakespeare’s use of the name ‘Mariana’ (rather obviously best known as a straightforward girl’s name) as his only evidence that Juan de Mariana had created that theory and was already famous for it at that time: this is circular reasoning and is wholly invalid. [I’ve explained in previous posts why it’s not circular, and I do so in the next post as well. Another instance of Armado’s inability to hear what is being said to him] As Anthony Dawson suggested in relation to Mallin, if Literature scholars want to make arguments based on history than they must stick to the firm standards established by historians, [quote a historian establishing the particular standard you are trying to enforce. I’m not sure I’ve ever met a historian who doesn’t acknowledge that much of history is speculation. If it is properly identified as such, its presence adds to – not subtracts from – the discourse] — or else “historical events or elements in a text, can be made to mean anything one wants, [and] the consequence is that they can end up meaning nothing. There is no brake to such interpretive ingenuity, just because there is no criterion of evidence that one can rely on. Thus the idea of history as adopted by such extreme new historicists as Mallin would seem the polar opposite of history as traditionally conceived by historians, because the demand for rigour in the marshalling of evidence has been abandoned”. No serious historian would be likely to accept the phantom book or event that Krause wishes to create in order to justify his time-travelling thrusting of Mariana’s opinions and reputation (which developed after his 1605 publication of “De Monatae Mutatione”) backward in time far enough to allow it to be one of the major sources of Shakespeare’s “Measure for Measure”. [As before, the event is not the least bit improbable, given that debasement had gone on for five years in Spain. Mariana’s book “De Ponderibus et Mensuris” (Of Weights and Measures), published in 1599, certainly made him acutely aware of the problems with debasement – whether or not he discussed them in that book is another unsolved but very solvable mystery, as I had not been able to access the (Latin) copies of that work. As for how Shakespeare might have learned of Mariana’s views, I subsequently learned that Shakespeare had intimate contact with Spaniards – including most likely one who had written a book about Mariana – while serving as groom of the chamber for the Spanish peace delegation a few months before the first performance of Measure for Measure – see Paper.] That Kent is willing to try to justify such a tactic suggests that Kent, similarly, is not willing to follow the historical standards set by real historians (rather than would-be Literary scholars playing at being historians). This by itself is enough to leave Krause’s theory without any credibility at all. [no, your argument leaves you without credibility]
Armado.
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1722 Tuesday, 14 September 2004
[1]
From: Kent
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 09:19:16 -0400
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Armado
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 15:43:34 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Nathaniel
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 16:22:43 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 23:50:04 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 15:43:34 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
With my World Shakespeare Bibliography restored, I have looked at a number of other reviews of Mallin’s “Inscribing the Time”, which Kent wishes to use as evidence that Shakespeare’s plays contained allegories, in order to try to support Tom Krause’s claims. [highly irrelevant, but typical of Armado’s style]
[More lengthy and irrelevant discussions of Mallin and his reviewers deleted here]
Armado.
[4]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Monday, 13 Sep 2004 23:50:04 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
Before I get started on this response I want to reemphasize for anyone who has not read my essay that the essay itself fully anticipates and addresses all of the major substantive criticisms that have been leveled against it to date. I mention this only because Mr. Armado (although I am very grateful for his changed tone in his most recent post) still occasionally implies that I have attempted to hide something or am somehow shifting positions. Please read the essay, or review my previous posts, before giving any weight to those characterizations.
Mr. Armado has two main arguments:
1) that the argument for a debasement allegory in MFM is bad and insufficiently supported; and
2) that the argument should not be published.
I will return to 1) below, but the more important question for the list is clearly the second: what “standard of proof” should be applied in the decision to publish an article that purports to break new ground?
In this regard, I would be very interested to hear if others on the list agree with the position that Mr. Armado takes with respect to the question of what caused the tragedians to travel in Hamlet.
As close readers will recall, Mr. Armado said on Sept. 8:
“Of course, there is also a “perfectly suitable and well-supported answer” as to why the players in Hamlet are travelling (the child actors have become more popular than them)”
and then on Sept. 9:
“Read Krause’s essay, and you will find him dishonestly creating things that (according to Krause) are difficult to understand, purely so that he can solve them. Nobody’s ever had any problem understanding why the players in Hamlet have to travel, for instance, it says in the two reliable texts of the play that it is because child actors have replaced them in the public’s esteem.”
I am not trying to use this as an example of Mr. Armado’s unfamiliarity with the different versions of Hamlet (although it does that quite nicely, in that it reflects his apparent belief that Q1 – which mentions children – is a more authoritative text than Q2 – which doesn’t). Nor am I trying to use it as another example of Mr. Armado’s general refusal to accept anything that departs from some unknown (to anyone but him) dogma (although it does that as well). Rather, I’m using the question of what made the actors travel as an example of one of those open-ended questions for which the correct answer is as yet unknown, and may be unknowable. Under those circumstances, what criteria must be met before an article espousing a particular view is published?
Rosencrantz’s line that the actors’ “inhibition is due to the late innovation” is the most direct clue we have as to what has caused the actors to travel. The ensuing discussion in F about the child actors (along with a fleeting reference to children in Q1) leads a minority of scholars to believe (with Mr. Armado) that it was the rise in popularity of the child actors. But this view is rejected by scholars who believe Q2 to be authoritative, because while the tragedians are traveling as a result of an innovation in Q2, there is no reference to children.
As a result, the field is more or less wide open for conjectures about what caused the tragedians to travel. The essay lists 8 possibilities, all of which have been suggested in print:
1. “inhibition” refers to a London Privy Council order of June 22, 1600;
2. inhibition refers to a hypothetical Danish order depriving the Tragedians of residence;
3. inhibition refers to the closure of theaters due to the London plague of 1603;
4. innovation refers to an unnamed political disturbance;
5. innovation refers to the Essex rebellion of 1601;
6. innovation refers to the threatened rebellion of Kent against Danish dominion;
7. innovation refers to the accession of James I to the throne in 1603; and
8. innovation refers to the child actors themselves (the proposal that Mr. Armado identifies as “suitable” and which causes him to look no further).
These eight proposals are perhaps not quite mutually exclusive, but are nearly so. If any one of them is correct, then seven others are most likely incorrect. And yet, scholars have been allowed to publish papers or books advocating each of these proposals.
Without looking at the specifics of the proposals, one might say that any one of them has about a one in eight chance of being the right answer. Should they all have been refused publication on that basis?
In each case, the proponent of a particular position has done essentially what I have done with respect to Measure for Measure – they have come up with a hypothesis as to Shakespeare’s meaning, and then have gathered all the intrinsic and extrinsic evidence that they can find that supports that meaning. They then present it in a paper. Who among us (other than Mr. Armado) can say with certainty which of these eight theories are correct? How is my “methodology” any different from those of the scholars who were published on this point? For that matter, how is my “methodology” any different than that of any scholar who proposes a particular interpretation for a particular play, or a particular line of a play?
Mr. Armado’s answers to date are wholly unsatisfactory. As I have attempted to explain to him, his contention that a proposed interpretation of a play must be rejected if it is “unfalsifiable” does not hold water, since it would result in very little if interpretation of Shakespeare’s plays ever being published.
Equally flawed is his contention that my argument so resembles that of the Oxfordians that it must be wrong. While one must certainly beware of the traps that the Oxfordians have fallen into, that doesn’t mean the method is completely worthless. Suppose, for example, that (a) the Oxfordians found ten times as many “coincidences” in Shakespeare’s plays pointing to Oxford as they have, (b) they were able to present truly compelling evidence that Shakespeare himself was illiterate, and (c) we didn’t have all the contemporaneous references to Shakespeare that indicate that he did indeed write his plays. Especially in view of (b), wouldn’t we have to admit that they might be on to something? But it’s the same methodology, isn’t it?
Apart from the debasement allegory, my essay proposes an answer [to] at least one question that Measure for Measure raises that hasn’t been satisfactorily answered: it proposes that the great soldier Frederick refers to Federico/igo de Spinola. Despite access to powerful search engines and vast databases, none of my “critics” has proposed anyone else. Even if everything else in my proposal turns out to be wrong (which it won’t, because, unfortunately for Mr. Armado, my proposal is “unfalsifiable”), scholarship has benefited by the Spinola proposal, and others are free to use him in their proposed interpretations of MFM, as Mr. Armado so neatly does (and he does it with my “moated grange” = Lyford Grange as well), albeit facetiously. [For that matter, the FAQs to this website identify at least ten points made or uncovered by the paper that should be of interest to Shakespeare scholars even if the debasement theory is wrong]
In addition, I’m honestly not sure how anybody can disagree with my proposal that Hamlet’s reference to Claudius’s “picture in little” MIGHT have been a double-entendre for coins. If your answer is “it isn’t”, why are you so sure? How can we ever be “sure” of what was in Shakespeare’s mind? What’s wrong with putting the proposal out there? [and don’t forget how irrational Armado’s rebuttal was – that if “picture” means coin in this instance, it must always mean “coin”]
Ok. The above is my heart-felt question for the list. To summarize, how is my paper any different from any other proposal advanced to answer questions for which there are no absolute answers? How does one decide which such papers should be published?
As to Mr. Armado’s demonstration of a Catholic-Protestant allegory in MFM and his prediction that I will reject it, he got that right. If only he had read my previous posts more carefully, he would have seen why I would reject it, and it could have saved him the time of working it all out. As I explained before, the Oxfordians can come up with a lot of coincidences even from a single play because they have a large dataset – Oxford’s well-documented life – to map the play to. Mr. Armado is able to come up with a plausible sounding [being charitable again] religious allegory for MFM for the same reason – he has the vast dataset relating to the Catholic-Protestant conflict to pick and choose his representations from. As he has indicated, he could probably come up with a similar allegory for that subject for any of Shakespeare’s plays. If he truly wants to spend time creating allegories that would defeat my contention that the debasement allegory in MFM is more than coincidence, the only way to do so is to demonstrate a similar allegory – i.e. debasement (a much smaller dataset than the Protestant-Catholic conflict) – in another of Shakespeare’s plays. Until he does that, he is comparing apples and oranges. Mr. Armado’s “methodology” of criticism, though entertaining, has absolutely no probative value.
Lest Mr. Armado argue that I “invited” him to provide this “proof,” recall that the only time I came close to doing that was when he proposed that a reference to St. George in Henry VI was a reference to George Blaurock, and that he could find an Anabaptist theme in Henry VI. The Anabaptist “dataset” is so small that I had (and still have) complete confidence that he would not be able to do so.
Holofernes writes:
“Lyford Grange was indeed moated – although it is not clear (to me, at least) whether the moat still survived in the 1580s. It was not, however, a grange! It did indeed belong to the Abbey of Abingdon, but had long been let to a secular tenant – who had presumably constructed the moat to buttress his dubious status. Baddesley Clinton is certainly moated, but that wasn’t a grange either!”
As to Lyford Grange, I don’t see how anyone can dispute that it’s a moated “grange,” given its name (regardless of dictionary definition of “grange”)
As to Baddesley Clinton, I was relying on Mr. Nathaniel’s representation that it was a grange. If it isn’t, it’s certainly irrelevant to MFM.
Nathaniel writes:
“Tom Krause writes as though WS took the FT and the Economist. Even if this obscure Spanish book on currency debasement had appeared before WS’s play, the book would not have been on sale in Paul’s Yard for WS to leaf through. Any books written by Jesuits were confiscated by the authorities and burnt.”
Again, one wouldn’t have to read FT or the Economist to learn the one-byte fact that Mariana was against debasement. And I’ve proposed several possible ways that Shakespeare might have learned this that don’t involve leafing through a copy of Mariana’s works in St. Paul’s Yard.
Holofernes writes:
“Playgoer 1 would appear to be in error – Mariana seems to have had no connection with the Spanish Inquisition (inquisitors tended to be Dominicans), although they did plague him in his later years, as they did anyone who wrote on theology.”
Here’s a quote from G. Kasten Tallmadge, “Juan de Mariana,” in Gerald Smith, ed., Jesuit Thinkers of the Renaissance (Marquette U.P. 1939), at 159:
“During this time [the 1570s] he was appointed synodal examiner and counsel for the Holy Tribunal of the Inquisition. His fame waxed greatly, and by 1580, when he was forty four years old, he was recognised everywhere as one of the highest authorities in matters of theology.” [it was nice of Holofernes to let me slip this in, since it didn’t make the cut in the paper]
Holofernes also writes:
“If Federico was indeed the younger brother, it would, of course, have been Ambrogio who “pledged his family fortune to Spain” (Playgoer 1).”
Fair enough. I think Playgoer 1 overstated the case slightly (proving that even ignorant playgoers would see the allegory!).
Armado writes:
” . . .although I might point out that Isabella gets married at the end of the play, and Elizabeth rather obviously never did, nor was James I ever one of her suitors, if anything he was her honorary son as a result of being chosen as her heir).”
Are you sure Isabella gets married at the end of the play? Reread my posts and you will see that I am not proposing a marriage between Isabella and James (it’s about the succession).
Armado writes:
“Krause claims that the Duke, as monarch, represents James I. He suggests that Shakespeare portrayed James as having debased the Scottish coinage (represented by allowing Angelo to take power) but then gave the Duke the role that he hoped James would play in England (helping to rescue the coinage from debasement). Presumably he is also thinking about the fact that both James and the Duke were rulers.”
I did not suggest a connection between James’s debasement of the Scottish coinage and the Duke’s allowing Angelo to take power. As to the parallels between James and the Duke, in the essay I simply cited other scholars who have noticed parallels. If you think they are all wrong too, let me know and I’ll pass it on.
Armado writes
“Clearly, therefore, if Krause wishes to make new claims on the basis of an assumption that some 1599 editions did contain this chapter, then he needs to produce some evidence of a 1599 edition that did do so. Since Soons’ claim is evidently dubious, it cannot be used as firm evidence unless or until it has been confirmed.”
Despite your characterization, I am not making “new claims” about Soons or any 1599 editions. I mentioned Soons in the essay and in two posts (this is the first time you’ve addressed him), each time indicating that his statement appeared to contradict those of other secondary sources. As I have said from the beginning, Soons’s statement might be right, and it might be wrong, and it might be based on some other information that would support earlier publication of Mariana’s views. I do not have the resources to resolve the conflict, but when the essay is published, perhaps someone else with the resources and the interest will find the answer. That is just one of the many benefits of publishing the piece.
But to throw the question back at you, if I were to confirm that Mariana’s views were published in 1599, would you then allow Kent to publish the paper? (And if not, what’s the point of looking?) [no response]
Armado also writes:
“Since Krause is trying to give us some reason for believing that it is even a notional possibility that Shakespeare used Mariana as an allegorical figure to represent debasement, he cannot use Shakespeare’s use of the name ‘Mariana’ (rather obviously best known as a straightforward girl’s name) as his only evidence that Juan de Mariana had created that theory and was already famous for it at that time: this is circular reasoning and is wholly invalid.”
I’ve explained before that the conclusion that Juan de Mariana’s views were known is not based on circular reasoning, but on circumstantial evidence. The evidence includes the Spinola reference, the moated grange reference, and the fact that Mariana is at the center of a debasement allegory. We can infer that this means that Mariana was intended to represent Juan de Mariana and that Shakespeare thus knew of Mariana’s views.
I recognize that you disagree that the circumstantial evidence proves the case, but that’s an issue of the quantum of the evidence, not a basis for dismissing the argument as “circular.”
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1732 Monday, 15 September 2004
[1]
From: A Gentleman
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 13:20:57 +0000
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Kent
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 09:26:00 -0400
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Jacquenetta
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 09:58:28 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 17:33:59 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 21:13:32 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
[6]
From: Montano
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 11:33:53 -0700 (PDT)
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
[7]
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 14:34:53 -0500
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
[8]
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 15:06:20 -0500
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: A Gentleman
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 13:20:57 +0000
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
Count me as another appreciator of Eric Mallin’s _Inscribing the Time._ I think his situation of “Hamlet” and “Troilus and Cressida” in the context of the failed Essex rebellion is quite persuasive.
–A Gentleman
[2]————————————————————-
From: Kent
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 09:26:00 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
Tom Krause writes:
“How can we ever be “sure” of what was in Shakespeare’s mind? What’s wrong with putting the proposal out there?
Ok. The above is my heart-felt question for the list. To summarize, how is my paper any different from any other proposal advanced to answer questions for which there are no absolute answers? How does one decide which such papers should be published?”
Tom’s fine response to his critics is exemplified in this short quote, and I have no doubt that the emotion (“heart-felt”) behind it is real. When I studied under Kenneth Muir, he was editor of Shakespeare Survey – a far more prestigious journal than SRASP (as Armado would be sure to emphasize), and he talked with me one day about exactly this issue. He said that there is no way of ascertaining the absolute truth about a Shakespeare text. He also said that he routinely published pieces that he personally disagreed with, as long as they were well and fully argued, well documented, and persuasive (at least to an imagined audience if not to Muir himself). Most important, they should offer something new about Shakespeare that would make his readers think.
I have always tried to follow Muir’s advice, first as editor of SRASP (1990-1996), and afterwards as a member of the Editorial Board. To my mind, Tom’s essay meets the tests that Muir set forth. After all, even if Krause is wrong, publishing his piece will give scholars with more resources and insights than I (like Tony Dawson) the opportunity to demonstrate why it is wrong. Nothing I’ve read so far on this list has done so, but maybe it will happen. On the other hand, maybe it won’t. If Tom’s essay is of the caliber of those in the 30s and 40s which “allegorized” Shakespeare, then it’s a damn good essay, even if it’s controversial and happens not to be Armado’s cup of tea. (But what is Armado’s cup of tea? And how would any essay meet his standards for absolute proof and absolute truth?)
Finally, one question: instead of researching other people’s views of Mallin’s work, why doesn’t Armado read the damn book and make up his OWN mind about how good or bad it is?
But if he needs help, he should read my own review of Mallin in Shakespeare Newsletter.
Mallin has his flaws, but to my mind, he’s terrific overall – and I don’t give a rat’s a– if that’s a “minority” position. I stand behind it 100%.
Kent
[3]————————————————————-
From: Jacquenetta
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 09:58:28 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
Mr. Krause writes: “I’ve explained before that the conclusion that Juan de Mariana’s views were known is not based on circular reasoning, but on circumstantial evidence. The evidence includes the Spinola reference, the moated grange reference, and the fact that Mariana is at the center of a debasement allegory. We can infer that this means that Mariana was intended to represent Juan de Mariana and that Shakespeare thus knew of Mariana’s views.”
I confess that I have not read *all* the lengthy posts on this thread with complete attention, but I have read the majority of them. I have great respect for Professor Kent. I have long admired most of Mr. Armado’s postings. Mr. (or Dr. or professor… Forgive me if I have misstated your credentials; it is not deliberate) Krause I have too little SHAKSPER knowledge of to have formed an opinion. However…
As I read and re-read the above statement what comes to me from it is this:
I <Krause>conclude that Shakespeare knew of Mariana’s views because my interpretation of the Spinola, moated grange and debasement allegory in the play proves it. They prove it because I interpret them to prove it. [answered convincingly in my next post]
That to me seems like circular reasoning in a classic form. It’s not “circumstantial” — it’s imposed from the outside and then cited as proof.
I am troubled, not only by Mr. Krause’s torturing Shakespeare’s plays into a form of his own devising, [simply assuming Armado is right, as if it’s beyond debate. It’s sad how people believe the arguments that they want to believe, rather than evaluate them for logic] but others’ efforts as well. Why must scholars reach beyond the text to impose obscure interpretations that may speak volumes to contemporary economists or historians (debasement theory), psychologists (Hamlet’s diagnosis), socialists (_The Tempest_ as pro or anti colonial screed), etc.?
It can be fun to do! I’ve made the argument in a graduate paper that Sonnet 20 is clearly homosocial if not homosexual. I tend to believe it, but I also think I was abusing the sonnet’s lyricism, language, beauty and even “meaning” (if one can fairly use such a word for a poem) in order to make my case. One does what one must <wry grin>.
But the more I read and especially *see* Shakespeare’s plays, the more certain I am that, regardless of Shakespeare’s personal spirituality and/or religious beliefs, regardless of whatever political bent he may have had, his plays are about *people* and their natures– in all our grand sprawling glorious goodness and evil — and not about someone’s (never Shakespeare’s!) personal hobby horses– be it monetary policy, Catholicism/Protestantism, “the” spiritual message, or whatever else a given scholar or commentator is hawking this month. [oblivious to the irony of having made a circular argument, just after pontificating incorrectly about how to recognize one]
If this makes me anti-academic, the Moderator may feel free to strike me from this List… But I deeply believe such tortured analysis goes leagues beyond what Shakespeare himself intended, even on a subconscious level.
Oh, and Mr. Armado… Your little game of counter-allegory-crafting was masterly and simply proves my point as well as yours.
Jacquenetta
[4]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 17:33:59 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
“I’ll add is (1) Mallin’s book seems far more persuasive to me than to Armado and some others”
This hardly turns it into unquestionable evidence that you can use to support the validity of Krause’s allegory theory, as you attempted to do. I have already pointed out that even if Mallin was entirely correct (which I for one do not believe that he is) then it would not help Krause’s argument in any way, and Krause would still have to argue the validity of his own theory point by point. [Redundant but another example of how incapable Armado is into applying his own critique to his own arguments. Of course he’s right that no matter how persuasive Mallin is, it’s got nothing to do with my argument. By the same token, no matter how unpersuasive the anti-Stratfordians, the Bible Code, and Armado’s fake counter-allegories are, it’s got nothing to do with my argument. In any event, perhaps Kent was merely trying to point out that allegories are often worth publishing, which at least makes some sense as compared to Armado’s endless refutations of irrelevant arguments] A similar argument to yours would be to state that since some scholars think that Shakespeare is making a reference to Queen Elizabeth when he describes the “Imperial votress” who is missed by cupid’s dart in “Midsummer Night’s Dream” (a much more convincing and popular theory than anything that Mallin has to say) every single character that somebody thinks is based on a real Elizabethan or Jacobean person really must be. [as usual, caricaturing the opposition’s arguments] The very first people to benefit from such an argument (in both my hypothetical case, and in the argument that you are presenting) would be the Oxfordians, who would therefore have been proved right when they said that Hamlet was an allegory about Edward de Vere, with de Vere as Hamlet, Burghley as Polonius, Anne Cecil as Ophelia, Horace Vere as Horatio, Queen Elizabeth I as Gertrude, and so on. Unless you are really desperate to declare your support for the Oxfordian theories, you should quickly drop your false argument that because one person suggests some allegories exist in Shakespeare (although his views are mostly regarded as ridiculous) every other allegory theory must also be considered correct. [typical – attacking an argument that Kent never made] Your claims are logically worthless.
[more personal insults and irrelevancies deleted]
Armado.
[5]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Tuesday, 14 Sep 2004 21:13:32 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1722 Question on Measure for Measure
“I guess Armado has to have an enemy. Having trained most of his guns on Krause recently, now he’s aiming them at me. I won’t bite.”
Kent is now apparently accusing me of creating the hostility between us in these postings. This is not in fact true. I had only ever posted four messages in two threads in response to posts by Kent (as far as I know) before the discussion between Kent and myself became so angry that posts were pulled by the Moderator and the SHAKSPER board.
In both threads, Kent had started launching insults and personal attacks against me (without any real justification, as far as I am concerned) and then having started a disagreement continued to attack me with much more hostility than was present in my replies to him. As Leonato stated on-list (and as others have commented to me by personal E-Mail) [I’d love to know who these mysterious “others” are, who would go out of their way to console poor Armado like this]:
“I went back and read through the thread from the beginning and Armado’s initial disagreements with Krause’s theories, while pretty complete, were mildly phrased. [“corrupt and ridiculous”, “fantasy concoction”, “suffering from extreme gullibility”] The escalation of anger has emanated from Kent’s side; his how-dare-you-disagree attitude has been apparent from the start. [It was more like “how dare you say such stupid things without reading the article”, but he said it to Nathaniel, not Armado] I concede that Armado has now also begun to use angry dismissive words in his responses”. [yes, he only started using “garbage” “stupid-”and “idiot-” and the like after Kent called his “principles” “sour” and “constricted.” I have to say Armado has some nerve quoting Leonato’s obviously mistaken post]
In fact Kent’s abusive use of personal insults began in a much earlier thread (the only other one in which I have replied to posts by Kent, as far as I am aware) and once again Kent’s personal hostility was not provoked by any personal attack on him as a person by me, but merely by the fact that I dared to disagree with him about interpretations of Shakespeare.
All of the posts between myself and Kent can be seen by clicking on the links below (which appear in the order in which they are posted). It should be fairly obvious from reading these posts which of us wished to make an enemy out of the other. I would particularly point to my many conciliatory comments to Kent in the first thread in which I
assured him that I viewed theories such as his as “wonderful and convincing” as interpretations if not as historical fact “… These are the things that keep Shakespeare’s plays – as well as literary criticism – fresh and alive in the modern world, and they should be celebrated and continued” but with the reservation that “they should not – so often –
present themselves as the only, unadulterated, unquestionable (although completely different from past ideas and assumptions) truth! Most of these arguments, however good, give us new ways of looking at the script – suited to our own times – not truer interpretations of the script’s original historical meaning”. I finished the post trying to be even more conciliatory: “”Those things (new readings vs. historically accurate interpretation) are at least equally valuable, and in fact refitting the plays to have rich and significant meaning to modern audiences may ultimately be more important to the survival of Shakespeare’s plays through the ages”. [so why couldn’t you be this “reasonable” in this thread?]
Unfortunately Kent was in no mood to accept conciliatory statements from somebody who dared to disagree with him, and responded with personal insults.
The first thread was:
“The Murder of Gonzago”
http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/0892.html – Armado post 1.
http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/0909.html – Kent post 1.
http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/0921.html – Armado post 2.
http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/0930.html – Kent post 2.
http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/0939.html – Armado post 3.
http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/0951.html – Kent post 3.
[well, anyone looking at these will see that it’s a typical skirmish between those who see only (or almost only) the surface meaning of a play and those who look for more, with Armado making it personal with his all-too-familiar method of argumentation that “if you believe A, you must believe B-F” (where B-F are wacky theories that have nothing to do with A). Kent’s post 1 was limited to addressing the argument in Armado 1 (he starts: “This is an interesting observation, but I disagree on two counts” and says nothing personal in the rest of the post. Armado 2 began the personal bickering by saying: “Kent’s argument sounds reasonable to modern literary critics – who have grown used to looking for a ______ when they hear a sword, and the many similar (not just Freudian) complications and interpretations that modern literary criticism has thrown at literature to keep itself fresh.” He continues with five paragraphs (all but one of which are quite long) attacking modern literary criticism in general (and not Kent’s argument in particular), and in the end of the fifth paragraph and in the final short paragraph includes some “conciliatory” albeit highly condescending words about the value of modern criticism. Kent responded by defending modern criticism and pointing out how Armado (surprise, surprise) had caricatured it in his attempts to bring it down, and responds to Armado’s claim that Kent is overreading by saying that Armado is underreading. Armado 3 got very long and more personal, saying things like “. . . Kent is presumably sneering and waving his hands in contempt at such
an example . . .”and “. . . then it might be worth starting a compendium of all the bizarre and contradictory things that Kent must be willing to believe . . . .” Kent responded in kind, understandably showing his exasperation at Armado’s argument style (which matches the pattern “if you believe Shakespeare wrote about debasement, you must also believe that both Oxford and Bacon wrote Shakespeare”)].
At this point I was unable to continue answering the thread, as I had examinations coming up, and had to stop reading SHAKSPER for a while.
Kent rather obviously bore a grudge, since he promptly brought up the old thread five months later when I appeared in the current “Question on Measure for Measure” thread, and once again replied to a fairly innocuous post [the one about “fantasy concoction”, “extreme gullibility,” etc.] with immediate personal insults. [such as? “Sour and constricted principles”?]
“Question on Measure for Measure” http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/1647.html
– Armado post 1. http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/1664.html – Kent post 1. http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/1675.html – Armado post 2. http://www.shaksper.net/archives/2004/1693.html – Kent post 2.
[Interesting that he unabashedly provides these links. Maybe he doesn’t think any one will click on them. But to be clear, Armado wrote his extremely offensive posts 3-5 BEFORE Kent’s post 2 was posted, and thus cannot claim that he was reacting to Kent’s post 2 about “spewing” and “betters”]
In his last post, Kent accused me of “spewing” “abuse” and “venom”. In fact my only other reply to Tom Krause before Kent posted contained nothing more than a couple of dismissive comments [I think Kent was reacting to abusive spewing like “Now I wouldn’t put it past Tom Krause in his more idiotic moments . . .”], far less insulting than the comments that Kent had been directing at me for two threads. [I don’t think that Kent ever called Armado “stupid” or “dishonest” – or any of the numerous synonyms of these terms that Armado has applied to me – and it’s hard to even conceive of a more reprehensible insult in a scholarly debate, much less find evidence of one in Kent’s posts. In fact, everything that Kent said about Armado could be proved by simply reading the posts that Kent was responding to. The same cannot be said about what Armado says about me]
Unfortunately, as Kent was posting this particularly vitriolic attack (once again without any particular provocation), I was finally letting Kent’s long string of patronising and insulting posts get to me, [in other words, he’s gone back 5 months – to a dispute that he himself made personal back then – and considered Kent’s post about “sour and contricted principles” as the last straw] and in response I blasted at Krause’s arguments, but unfairly included a number of personal attacks on Tom Krause, instead of focussing only on his arguments. It was unfair of me to respond to Kent’s provocations and insults by attacking Krause (rather than his arguments or perhaps Kent), since Krause himself had played no part in Kent’s provocation, but I did afterwards apologise to Tom Krause (and the post of mine that The Moderator stopped was directed at Kent, in reply to his vitriolic personal insults to me, and was not to Krause). Kent, by contrast, has not apologised to me, and apparently still considers himself an innocent party, [he certainly is, on this thread, but apparently the statute of limitations has not run on the previous thread] despite the fact that most of the accusations that he threw at me in his most offensive posting [are we back on this thread? No objective person could find Kent’s posting more offensive than yours] could actually have been more properly applied to Kent himself (who *had* been abusive and insulting, repeatedly, through two threads – as Leonato and others have recognised [Was Leonato thinking of the 5-month old thread too? I’m still curious who the others are] – and who has also been supporting an academically infeasible argument [in your warped opinion; remember, you haven’t even touched the Hamlet argument, which makes up 60% of the article, and does not propose an allegory, much less “time-travel”]).
I think that perhaps Kent should reread his own postings and imagine how he would react if somebody had sent them to him. I have little doubt that it would have been by another display of bad temper and blatant insults. The one thing that Kent’s replies have seemed repeatedly short on (especially in the current thread) is detailed academic argument in support of his views. [I’ve been taking care of that] I might point out that even when I finally lost my temper [what, midway through your first post?], the vast majority of my posts were still based on detailed academic argument and citation of sources. [you can say this only because your posts were so long. But the sheer volume of bile is quite impressive, even if it’s buried in a lot of bad argument] Kent does not even have this to mitigate his behaviour in his own posts.
I have no interest in continuing this argument with Kent, and will only post in response to him in order to correct any more false statements or academically poor arguments that he makes.
Armado.
[7]————————————————————-
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 14:34:53 -0500
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
Okay, I’m too exhausted by computer troubles to tackle this whole thing, but Armado said something that leaves me aghast:
“so Krause is presuming a double-meaning that is unlikely to be there.”
This IS Shakespeare’s work we’re talking about, isn’t it? Shakespeare who regularly used ALL or most of the meanings of words with multiple meanings? For Mr. Armado to imply that Shakespeare is a WYSIWYG author like, shudder, Oxford is, well, I was going to say appalling but it’s really just so sad. [thank you Rosaline! About time someone else spoke up with this obvious point]
[8]————————————————————-
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 15:06:20 -0500
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1711 Question on Measure for Measure
Okay, I found a point of agreement with Mr. Armado:
“Since Krause wishes to imagine that Shakespeare’s audience watching the play for the first and only time instantly saw in it the allegorical model that Krause’s supposed Shakespeare wished them to see, it is inconceivable that these audiences were expected to see multiple conflicting allegories all at the same time. Such an experience for somebody viewing the rapid movement of real theatre is quite simply impossible”
Yes, and directors wrestle with this all the time. Dramatic logic doesn’t require you to understand any of it. That’s the logic of consequences: if you show a gun in the first act, you have to fire it in the third (or fifth in Will’s case). The forward action of most of the plays is so sturdy
But Shakespeare also used poetic logic, which is the logic of association, and that’s why people are still being blown away four hundred years later. Because every time we pick up a script of one of this man’s plays, we find something new.
To read Shakespeare, it helps to look at words geometrically. Meanings build up and out. If you can think of the normal play as the floorplan (built up by actors, director, designers), a Shakespeare play in reading has stories, attics, mezzanines, sub-basements, wings. None of it is exactly necessary in performance, although it fuels differing interpretations.
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1747 Friday, 17 September 2004
[1]
From: Kent
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 08:32:43 -0400
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Leonato
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 08:59:22 EDT
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Armado
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 15:55:39 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Polonius
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 15:28:49 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 22:02:35 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
[6]
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 16 Sep 2004 11:40:38 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
[7]
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 16 Sep 2004 19:42:30 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Kent
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 08:32:43 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
Armado writes to me the following:
“If, however, your real complaint is that I dared to compare your status and experience to that of other scholars at all, you might remind yourself that you were trying to announce your own enormous superiority to me (in the most insulting terms possible) on the basis of your *assumption*, not judged by any fair test, of my inferior status and experience.”
This is paranoid. Do you mean the post where I compared you to Tom Krause and pointed out that he is a much better writer than you? (That’s true, by the way.) I NEVER made a comparison between you and myself on this thread. You are delusional, Armado. [after everything that Armado said about me (including that I was deluded), Costard chose this statement of Kent to deplore in a contemporaneous thread about abusive posts. Some months later, Costard, forgetting his own dictum, repeatedly called another listmember “delusional,” and eventually I pointed out the irony in that thread. Costard also enjoys the rare distinction of being one listmember who actually referred to Armado as having “logic” on his side. This occurred in yet another thread, after I had pointed out that the Black’s Law Dictionary definition he had cited to support his peculiar view of what “amercement” meant in Shakespeare’s time was contrary to a thoughtful Supreme Court opinion by Justice O’Connor] I did say that you didn’t know what you were talking about in criticizing Krause’s essay, and I stand by that. By the way, so do you, since you immediately began to do the research that you should have done before opening your mouth.
[material unrelated to debasement theory deleted]
Kent
[2]————————————————————-
From: Leonato
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 08:59:22 EDT
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
A couple observations, a couple opinions, and a suggestion…
Ob1- The debasement theory of Measure for Measure and Hamlet has been so expounded, questioned, defended, attacked, explicated and generally verbed here that I suspect list members have seen enough of the various arguments and positions to know what they think. The debating [as distinct from the bickering] has been detailed and sometimes entertaining on both sides.
Ob2- Kent and Armado apparently rub each other the wrong way. It happens. One hopes they will keep this in mind for future encounters, and tread lightly. Poor Tom Krause, around whose head this storm has raged, has to his credit kept his good humor throughout.
Op1- My agreement with Armado and disagreement with Kent/Krause: I’m afraid I find the “Mariana-debasement allegory, picture-in-little reading etc etc” to be not very likely. I don’t have a detailed refutation ready– I just don’t find it convincing, and for some of the same reasons Armado finds it unconvincing. [which ones? The ones that refute the anti-Stratfordians? Or the ones that refute the Bible Code? Or the counter-allegories?] I’m part of the intended audience for these theories, and that’s my reaction, to which I’m entitled. [of course you are, but your opinion carries very little weight unless you identify which of Armado’s arguments you agree with (and hopefully, which you reject, because if you agree with them all, you’re as muddled as he is). One can’t help but wondering if Leonato’s prejudice against the argument contributed to his readiness to rewrite history and accuse Kent of commencing hostilities in this thread (see Leonato’s Sept. 9 post)]
Op2- My Agreement with Kent and disagreement with Armado: Of course it’s worthy of publication. I don’t really buy it [or most of it] but I can say that of a good deal of the critical and historical work I encounter. It’s a serious, researched attempt to shed light on certain aspects of these two plays. People should read it with an open mind in SHAKSPER’s papers file or when it’s published in print. [I think it’s because of this paragraph that I didn’t bother to respond to his previous one.]
Suggestion: Let’s move on. There’s been wrong on both sides. Armado’s and Kent’s continuous mutual recriminations are not very entertaining. I’m for a jig, or a tale of bawdry, or I sleep.
Leonato
[3]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 15:55:39 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
“Okay, I’m too exhausted by computer troubles to tackle this whole thing, but Armado said something that leaves me aghast: “so Krause is presuming a double-meaning that is unlikely to be there.” This IS Shakespeare’s work we’re talking about, isn’t it? Shakespeare who regularly used ALL or most of the meanings of words with multiple meanings? For Mr. Armado to imply that Shakespeare is a WYSIWYG author like, shudder, Oxford is, well, I was going to say appalling but it’s really just so sad.”
Rosaline has apparently had an immediate visceral reaction to my words, but she makes no attempt – in this post – to respond to their context, and I think it is important to put that context back here.
“6) JULIET’S NAME AND ROLE. Since Claudio does not debase Angelo, Krause is forced to claim that Juliet also represents a coin.This he does by noting that Juliets in other plays are referred to using coin and ‘angel’ imagery more than other female characters (although I should point out that this is repeatedly to the celestial creature and not the coin, so Krause is presuming a double-meaning that is unlikely to be there – I would also need to see firm evidence for Krause’s claim about the particular association between Juliets and coin-imagery before I was convinced).”
So Krause’s thinking runs along the following lines [major distortion alert].
1) In order for my debasement theory to say what I want it to here, I need the character “Juliet” from “Measure for Measure” to symbolise a coin. [not my thinking]
2) I cannot find any evidence in “Measure for Measure”, even by my own remarkably loose standards that she does do so. [whatever]
3) Therefore I will randomly go and look at other characters in Shakespeare’s plays called “Juliet” in order to try and show that they are symbolically portrayed as coins, and then I will claim that what Shakespeare says of one or two Juliets is true of all of them. [it’s not random, I just picked the most famous “Juliet”. Who exactly are the others?]
4) But Shakespeare gives no obvious imagery referring to any Juliet as a coin, however he does sometimes have characters refer to Juliet Capulet as metaphorically being an “angel” or, in a religious sense, living with “angels” after her death.
5) The word “angel” can mean an English coin as well as a celestial being. And Shakespeare uses puns based on this double-meaning in other plays, such as “Merry Wives of Windsor” (“I had myself twenty angels given me this morning; but I defy all angels, in any such sort, as they say, but in the way of honesty”).
6) Therefore every reference to Juliet and “angels” is a coin reference. [no, but symptomatic. This is exactly the argument he made when he insisted that I must view every reference to “picture” – inside Shakespeare and out – as a reference to a coin]
7) Therefore the Juliet from “Romeo and Juliet” symbolises a coin. [no]
8) Therefore the Juliet in “Measure for Measure”, who has the same Christian name, must also symbolise a coin. [overstated]
9) Which proves that the allegory that I am creating is entirely correct and was invented by Shakespeare. [no]
[Although his characterizations of my arguments are almost never fair or accurate, I have to say that this is the most twisted one yet]
Now, my first question to Rosaline would be, do you believe that Krause is correct? Was Juliet in “Romeo and Juliet” symbolising a coin because she is called an “angel”? Even if this is true, can we assume that all characters that Shakespeare calls Juliet must also be symbolising a coin? Do you believe that Tom Krause’s “debasement” allegory was created by William Shakespeare or by Tom Krause?
I’ll deal with Krause’s theory again, somewhere else, but let’s look particularly at Rosaline’s discomfort with my statement. Rosaline either hasn’t looked at the actual example connected to my comment, or she firmly believes that Shakespeare – because he is a writer who uses puns and multiple meanings – cannot say the word “angel” *without* meaning both celestial being and coin at the same time. [now he’s applying his “either”-“or” distortion to Rosaline]
In my opinion, Abigail is confusing two separate and unrelated statements.
The statement that we can both agree on is:
1) Shakespeare often uses double-meaning. [good; then why doesn’t he admit it as a possibility when proposed? He is completely oblivious to the fact that he is taking the much more extreme position here – that only Armado’s meaning is correct.]
The statement that Rosaline, probably unintentionally, seems to be insisting upon is:
2) Shakespeare *ALWAYS* uses double-meaning.
In the first case, we can say that it is entirely possible every time we see a word that has two or more meanings that Shakespeare may be using more than one of them in a punning way, and that we should look to see whether he is. He clearly does so in that “Merry Wives of Windsor” instance with “angel (coin)” and “angel (celestial being in the sense of the “good angel” and “bad angel” of Mediaeval tradition)”. But does this mean that we must accept that *EVERY* time that Shakespeare uses a word with two or more possible meanings he must be referring to all of them? [amusing that he can see the problem here in this misrepresentation of my argument, but can’t see the flaw in his own insistence that if “picture” is slang for “coin” then every reference to “picture” must be a reference to a coin] I am fairly confident that Rosaline would not accept such a thing, since the consequences for readings of Shakespeare’s plays would be atrocious and confusing, but otherwise why is she taking umbrage against my suggestion that in each instance where there is a possible pun we must look and see if there is evidence that a pun is intended (and that in the case of Juliet Capulet and angels there is fairly obviously no such pun)? [the point was a small one, and amid his distortions above, he’s captured it in part. Shakespeare was looking for a woman’s name associated with a coin. There are no women who are expressly associated with actual coins in his plays. But Juliet is associated with “angel” and an “angel” is a type of coin. Even if the double-meaning wasn’t intentional in Romeo and Juliet, that does not necessarily mean it wasn’t there in MFM. Read on – Rosaline has an even better response]
Since Krause’s theory starts with Juliet Capulet and angels, let us look first at Juliet Capulet and angels.
The two quotations in question are:
“O speak again, bright angel!” … and … “And her immortal part with angels live”.
So, does Rosaline think that these lines are actually likely to be punning on the word “angel” meaning an English coin?
Well, the overt meaning in both cases is obvious. Just in case we misunderstand it, a fuller citation of the two quotations makes it obvious that when Shakespeare talks about angels, he is talking about celestial beings.
“O speak again bright angel, for thou art As glorious to this night, being o’er my head, As is a winged messenger of heaven Unto the white-upturned wondering eyes Of mortals that fall back to gaze on him When he bestrides the lazy-puffing clouds And sails upon the bosom of the air”.
There are lots of clues here, if we really need any, that tell us which sort of angel Romeo is talking about. It flies. Coins do not fly. It has wings. Coins do not have wings. It is a “messenger of heaven”. Coins do not carry messages from heaven. It is by implication immortal (in contrast to the mortal watching it from below). Coins are not immortal, and can easily be destroyed. [He has a certain knack for belaboring the obvious]
Does Rosaline doubt that the overt meaning of this passage is that Romeo is comparing Juliet to a celestial being called an “angel” and not in any way comparing her with a coin?
What this leaves me wondering, in both the case of Tom Krause’s arguments, and of Rosaline’s is exactly how they would expect Shakespeare to write if he *was* only writing about the celestial being, and not about a coin. Personally I would expect exactly what we see here, a clear and detailed reference to a celestial being that does not include any significant or obvious double-meaning involving coins. Just because Shakespeare often uses puns, it does not mean that he is always punning. I am sure that Rosaline sometimes uses puns (as we all do), but I suspect she might be quite annoyed if somebody that she was talking to started analysing everything that she said in a Krausian fashion so that, for instance, they assumed that every word that she said about whatever subject that they were discussing was actually about sex (and you only have to look at the worst sort of Freudian psychoanalysis or literary criticism to see that it is very easy to claim that *EVERYTHING* is actually people talking about sex). [I’m happy to admit that “Juliet” = “angel” is a “forcible connection” and does not provide very much additional support for the theory. Nevertheless, if the rest of the theory is right, there’s a good chance that the naming of Juliet this way was intentional]
But let’s look at the other “angel” reference in “Romeo and Juliet”.
“Her body sleeps in Capels’ monument, And her immortal part with angels lives. I saw her laid low in her kindred’s vault And presently took post to tell it you”.
Here again, there is no real question that when Shakespeare says “angel”, he means “celestial being”. Juliet is – Balthasar thinks – dead, and her immortal part, her soul, is living with angels in heaven, while her body is resting in the grave.
Once again, this is fairly obviously not a coin image. What would that suggest? That Juliet’s soul was somewhere with a lot of money? That the only part of Juliet that would live beyond her is her savings? Rather obviously there is no purpose in trying to read this reference as a reference to coins, except Krause’s motivation in trying to post-justify the theory that he made up before examining the evidence. [turning offensive again. For the record, when I first came up with the theory, I knew that MFM had been first performed in 1604, and I believed that Mariana’s views had first been published in 1609 (it was actually 1605, if not earlier). It was only after the actual “evidence” in support of Mariana as Juan de Mariana started coming in that I began to think that the problem with the dates might be surmountable. I wonder if that last sentence will get me in trouble: “Krause admits that there is a problem with the dates!!”]
Now I’m not doubting that Tom Krause would be able to produce some sophistric hair-splitting, fact-blurring argument whereby both of these clear references to celestial beings are actually not that at all, but are instead detailed references to coinage. The entire point of Krause’s method is that it is so flexible and both rule and logic-free that it can be used to prove just about anything about just about any section of Shakespearean text, [he misleads himself by repeatedly picking at the secondary points. After the basic theme was in place and well-supported, I looked for and found connections like “St. Luke’s” = “Luke Kirby” and “Juliet = coin.” I am not at all confident that these connections are what Shakespeare had in mind, and I don’t see either of them as lending significant support to the theory. Armado seizes on this sort of thing, and displays it as an exemplar of the “corruptness” of my “methods” without ever addressing the more basic point – was Shakespeare interested in debasement, and if so, might he have put a debasement allegory in a play, and (e.g.) cast himself as the fantastick Lucio?] however I would be interested to know whether Rosaline believes that it is at all likely that Shakespeare was deliberately using the meaning “angel” = “gold coin” in either of these sections of text. If she does not believe that, of course, then she was wrong to disagree with my statement. If she does believe that, then I would ask her to explain what possible meaning she thinks Shakespeare intended in using “angel” to mean “gold coin” in these two instances, and I will then do my best to demonstrate that her attempted readings are blatant misreadings. [she does explain, and he never returns]
She might also want to have a look at every other reference to “angels” in Shakespeare’s plays. If she really believes what she said at the beginning of this post, then every single one of them must deliberately contain every single possible meaning of the word “angel”. [repeats the same illogical conclusion, akin to his insistence that if I believe “picture in little” refers to coins, then I must also believe that every single contemporary reference to picture – whether by Shakespeare or not – is a reference to coins] Can she find sensible (not Krausian) [I’ll consider that an insult] interpretations of all these passages that use every possible meaning of the word? If not: then once again, she was wrong to disagree with my statement.
Armado.
[4]————————————————————-
From: Polonius
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 15:28:49 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
Jacquenetta
“I am troubled, not only by Mr. Krause’s torturing Shakespeare’s plays into a form of his own devising, but others’ efforts as well. Why must scholars reach beyond the text to impose obscure interpretations that may speak volumes to contemporary economists or historians (debasement theory), psychologists (Hamlet’s diagnosis), socialists (_The Tempest_ as pro or anti colonial screed), etc.?”
This kind of thing seems to take on a life of its own. The “Populist allegory” theory of the Wizard of Oz, for example, refuses to die even though it has been demonstrated that L. Frank Baum was a Republican who backed McKinley. People just like “finding allegories”, even when they aren’t there, even (as in the curious cases of “Narnia” and the /Out of the Silent Planet/ trilogy) where they aren’t necessary. Really, one wonders what critics did with themselves before the /Psychomachia/.
I think it is, in modern times, partly a product of puritanism, and partly a product of the Shaw/Archer/Ibsen axis. (I align GBS with the puritans advisedly in this case.) I am old enough to actually have been taught in school that there was no drama worthy of the name before Ibsen. (Fortunately, I was inoculated by Walter Kerr before the infection took hold.) The urge to emulate the Ugly Duchess and end every paragraph with, “…and the moral of that is…,” is a strong one. Two millennia ago it gave us attempts to explain what Homer /really/ meant. A few centuries back, it gave us /Othello; a Moral Demonstration in Five Acts/ in Boston. A few decades ago, it almost completely destroyed the word “relevant”. [a showy stream of irrelevancies]
Rosaline
“Okay, I’m too exhausted by computer troubles to tackle this whole thing, but Armado said something that leaves me aghast:
“so Krause is presuming a double-meaning that is unlikely to be there.”
This IS Shakespeare’s work we’re talking about, isn’t it? Shakespeare who regularly used ALL or most of the meanings of words with multiple meanings? For Mr. Armado to imply that Shakespeare is a WYSIWYG author like, shudder, Oxford is, well, I was going to say appalling but it’s really just so sad.”
Inasmuch as what he said was “a double-meaning that is unlikely to be there”, and not “a double-meaning, which is unlikely to be there”, I don’t see the force of your complaint. [this is also pointless. From Armado’s point of view, there isn’t much difference. In fact, in context – where ultimately Armado’s point is that *he* doesn’t believe there is a double-meaning – it’s objectionable in either phrasing]
[5]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Wednesday, 15 Sep 2004 22:02:35 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
Jacquenetta writes:
“. . . Mr. (or Dr. or professor… Forgive me if I have misstated your credentials; it is not deliberate) Krause . . .”
My intimates call me “Herr Professor Doktor Krause,” and I can lay claim to both titles, though I rarely do.
Jacquenetta also writes:
“Mr. Krause writes: ‘I’ve explained before that the conclusion that Juan de Mariana’s views were known is not based on circular reasoning, but on circumstantial evidence. The evidence includes the Spinola reference, the moated grange reference, and the fact that Mariana is at the center of a debasement allegory. We can infer that this means that Mariana was intended to represent Juan de Mariana and that Shakespeare thus knew of Mariana’s views.’ . . . As I read and re-read the above statement what comes to me from it is this: I <Krause>conclude that Shakespeare knew of Mariana’s views because my interpretation of the Spinola, moated grange and debasement allegory in the play proves it. They prove it because I interpret them to prove it.
That to me seems like circular reasoning in a classic form. It’s not “circumstantial” — it’s imposed from the outside and then cited as proof.”
It would only be circular if I turned around and used what I had just “proved” – that Shakespeare knew Mariana’s views – to further support my argument that Shakespeare put a debasement allegory into MFM. Maybe an example will clarify the point: Let’s say that all the circumstantial evidence points to OJ as the killer and we know that the killer was right-handed. Mr. Armado says to me: “You need to prove that OJ is right-handed.” I say: “All of the circumstantial evidence shows that he is the killer, we know the killer is right-handed, so OJ is right-handed.” The circumstantial evidence that tells me that OJ is the killer equally shows that he is right-handed. Of course, if I were to use this “proof” of right-handedness as further evidence of his guilt, then it would be circular. But that’s not what I’m doing.
In this case, it’s actually Mr. Armado who was being circular, or at least relying on a false premise. Although I recognize that he has made other, unrelated arguments, the portion of his argument that I was responding to above struck me as follows: “Mr. Krause must find independent proof of Shakespeare’s knowledge of Mariana or else his argument fails. He has not shown independent proof, so his argument fails.” [Nobody except Prospero responds to this, and Prospero says that my “impeccable logic makes most of the other protagonists in this thread look absurd – two of them in particular.” One assumes he means Jacquenetta and Armado, but one shouldn’t overlook Holofernes and Nathaniel]
Jacquenetta also writes:
“But the more I read and especially *see* Shakespeare’s plays, the more certain I am that, regardless of Shakespeare’s personal spirituality and/or religious beliefs, regardless of whatever political bent he may have had, his plays are about *people* and their natures– in all our grand sprawling glorious goodness and evil — and not about someone’s (never Shakespeare’s!) personal hobby horses– be it monetary policy, Catholicism/Protestantism, “the” spiritual message, or whatever else a given scholar or commentator is hawking this month.”
There is no question that those of us who see contemporary references and other themes in Shakespeare’s plays are working on the very outskirts of what is important and meaningful about Shakespeare. But that doesn’t make us all wrong.
I know you’re not really trying to make an argument here, but I can’t help observing that you have provided a pretty good example of circular reasoning: “I’m certain that Shakespeare’s plays are about *people* and their natures, therefore Shakespeare cannot be about what anybody else happens to see in his work.”
Jacquenetta also writes:
“Oh, and Mr. Armado… Your little game of counter-allegory-crafting was masterly and simply proves my point as well as yours.”
Yes, it was cute, but as fallacious as any circular argument. As I said before, the differential sizes of the secondary datasets ([Catholic-Protestant conflict] [debasement]) render it meaningless. [unfortunately, either the Moderator didn’t understand the “>>” symbol that I had placed between the bracketed words (“much greater than,” where the brackets around the words denote absolute value), or his software changed it to something unrecognizable. He simply left it out; although I think it’s easy enough to get my meaning.]
Tom Krause
[6]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 16 Sep 2004 11:40:38 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
As I say, I have no interest in continuing hostilities with Kent, and most of the points in his recent E-Mail are things that I can answer by answering similar points made by Tom Krause (which I will do when I have time) [which he doesn’t], but there are a couple of minor things that I would like to respond to.
“Kenneth Muir, he was editor of Shakespeare Survey – a far more prestigious journal than SRASP (as Armado would be sure to emphasize),”
Once again, it looks suspiciously like Kent is trying to blame me for his own attitude. It was Kent, not me, who launched into a violent attack [using the word “spew” is “violent,” yet calling your opponent stupid and dishonest isn’t? And remember, Kent’s use of the words “spew” and “betters” only appeared long after Armado had gone over the deep end] on his opponent for daring to disagree with his “betters”, [no, it was for daring to call his “betters” nasty names in a supposedly academic discussion] although Kent’s own method of determining which person is better than another seemed rather subjective, to say the least, and looked like it might just consist of “Anybody who agrees with Kent is better than anybody who doesn’t”. [or it could be that anybody who clearly states his argument and addresses those of his opponent is a better writer – remember, Kent really just said I was a better writer – than someone who hurls insults, constructs and attacks arguments that were never made, and falls victim to the precise fallacies that he mistakenly accuses his opponents of falling for?]
As I pointed out to Kent at the time, I do not believe that one can judge an argument by looking at the status or qualifications of the person who presented it, nor do I believe that one can judge an argument by the status or prestige of the Journal in which it is published. Since Kent, in his own postings, has spent far more time attacking me rather than attacking my actual arguments, and since Kent believes that those who study Shakespeare should be graded in order, and those deemed inferior not allowed to disagree with their “betters”, it seems fairly obvious that these negative views (of ‘inferior’ people and journals) are more likely to be held by Kent than they are by me.
I do not question Kent’s position as a scholar, nor his publication record – both of which are perfectly good. However, I am always very happy to turn a bad argument back against its proposer, and if Kent wishes to abuse me whenever he thinks that I am daring to disagree with my “betters”, it seems only fair that I should be allowed to point out that Kent also has his “betters” in the Shakespearean world, and that – if he is to follow his own standards without hypocrisy – he should either never disagree with his “betters”, or should stop trying to abuse me when he thinks that I am disagreeing with mine. You might note that my method of determining status (number of publications in refereed journals, or in books published by academic presses) is much fairer and more empirical than the method used by Kent (which is simply: whoever Kent likes is the better of anybody that Kent does not like). [actually, I think if Kent has a prejudice it’s merely against small-minded, illogical, results-oriented, unpleasant contributors like you]
Despite showing that Kent’s argument about “betters” causes exactly as much damage to Kent’s cause as it does to mine, I should make clear that I absolutely do not believe in Kent’s argument. Just because Anthony Dawson is Kent’s “better” in academic terms does not mean that Kent is always wrong and Anthony Dawson is always right. I am certain, even without knowing much about the works of the two men, that there are at least some issues on which I would agree with Kent and disagree with Anthony Dawson. However, if Kent is not willing to kowtow to his “betters”, then he should perhaps stop lecturing me on how I should kowtow to mine (and there are plenty of people in the Shakespearean world who are my betters in one way or another, although I’m not at all sure that Tom Krause is one of them). [Kent wasn’t asking you to kowtow to your betters, he was telling you to apologize to them for calling them stupid and dishonest]
He also said that he routinely published pieces that he personally disagreed with, as long as they were well and fully argued, well documented, and persuasive (at least to an imagined audience if not to Muir himself).
Of course, I agree with Muir absolutely, and would never question the publication of Tom Krause’s essay (however wrong I considered it) if it passed the quality control tests that Muir sets out. [here we go again] However, although Krause’s essay may have a perfectly accurate Bibliography, the academic methods that he uses are so obviously corrupt, and break so many simple rules of logic and argument [given how many rules of logic Armado breaks throughout these threads, it’s hard to take him very seriously when he attempts to identify logical flaws in the arguments of others], that his essay is rather obviously not worthy of publication. I might also point out that not only does Krause fail to follow the rules normally adopted by literary and historical scholars (that stop people simply making things up and pushing them into plays or into history despite the fact that they have to distort and ignore real texts and records in order to place them there) [again, the irony is oppressive. What texts did I distort and ignore? Yet Armado’s hallmarks are distortion and ignorance (or is that “ignoration”?)], but he also fails to consistently follow the rules that he makes up for himself, and repeatedly contradicts himself in his essay, and in his posts in SHAKSPER in support of that essay. [remember, for Armado a contradiction is when you say a “picture” might be a coin in one scene, and then don’t admit that a “picture” must mean a coin every time it is ever written by anyone] At one minute Krause claims that unexplained anachronism is impossible in Shakespeare, [again, a distorting overstatement. In a transitional phrase, I noted that there was “no particular reason for Shakespeare to import the “picture in little” artifact to medieval Denmark.” Far from saying it’s impossible. The pointlessness of his critique can be seen from the fact that I could remove that transitional phrase with absolutely no effect on my argument] and that any reading which requires it should be rejected, [I never said this in the paper, and in my posts I freely acknowledged that there were plenty of prochronisms in Hamlet and other plays – none of which had to be rejected – and explained that I had originally gone into this point in more detail in the paper, but had cut it out to save space] at the next minute he is making much more anachronistic readings, without any attempt at explanation, himself. [there was plenty of explanation, in the paper and in this thread] At one minute Krause claims that the appearance of a single Christian name in Shakespeare’s plays is pretty firm evidence that Shakespeare is referring to a particular individual plucked out of a very distant part of Shakespeare’s more speculative biographies or out of the entire panoply of world history and literature, [of course not; more distortion] in the next he is lecturing us on the fact that a coincidence between first names can only be considered a coincidence (even in an instance where the name belongs to a character who takes part in the same plot device as Shakespeare’s character, in a play that was acted in by Shakespeare himself or at the very least by Richard Burbage and other members of Shakespeare’s company only two years before that company performed Shakespeare’s first major play – a much more direct relationship to Shakespeare and his play than Krause is able to find for any of his own “coincidences”). [incapable of recognizing, even under my tutelage, when he is employing a method far more “corrupt” than mine] In both cases, Krause’s own arguments would reject Krause’s major conclusions nicely. Any essay that rejects its own major conclusions has failed the major test of academic quality and should not be published in any self-respecting academic journal. [this comment is so divorced from the essay itself that it’s offensive]
“Finally, one question: instead of researching other people’s views of Mallin’s work, why doesn’t Armado read the damn book and make up his OWN mind about how good or bad it is?”
If you really need an answer to this one, I’m guessing that you’ve lived too long in the ivory tower. I do not live on a University campus, nor do I have unlimited access to interlibrary loans. My own University (Kent) does not have Mallin’s book, and they would not allow me to request it from another library unless it was a major part of my course, wanting a book to engage in SHAKSPER discussions is not enough to warrant wasting University money (and even if they did allow it, travelling onto campus to order and then to collect the book would be a long and expensive process). The only way in which I could get this book, therefore, is to pay full price for a second-hand copy of the book, or to pay even more to make pick-up and return trips to the University of London’s Senate House library in London. Rather obviously I see no purpose in spending my own very limited income on books that have a long string of bad reviews, and which have no relevance whatsoever to my own interests or studies. If I am going to spend money equivalent to the price of a substantial new or second-hand book, then I will choose a book that I genuinely want to read and that will actually have some use for me, now and in the future.
If Kent thinks that I should spend substantial amounts of money answering minor and illogical points on SHAKSPER (even if everything that Kent said about this book were true, it would still prove nothing about Krause’s very different claims), then I would be interested to know how much money Kent has spent on responding to posts from me? It seems to me, from reading his posts, that he has barely even bothered to pick up a single book (since Kent’s responses to me are notably free of any sort of research, or detailed argument of any kind).
I might also point out that I do not have the time to keep reading whole books on the whim of my SHAKSPER debating opponents, and will only do so when I feel that it is worthwhile, or that I will benefit in some way from the action.
“Mallin has his flaws, but to my mind, he’s terrific overall – and I don’t give a rat’s a– if that’s a “minority” position. I stand behind it 100%.”
That’s fine, but you still can’t use one dubious and disputed theory as if it was firm evidence to prop up another dubious and disputed theory, especially when the two theories are largely unrelated and massively dissimilar in quality and scale. [this is extremely offensive, given what Armado has said about Mallin]
Armado.
[7]————————————————————-
From: Armado
Date: Thursday, 16 Sep 2004 19:42:30 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1732 Question on Measure for Measure
I have a return to University coming up in a couple of weeks, and as a result of long-term health problems I am going to find that difficult and stressful enough without continuing battles on SHAKSPER. I also sympathise with those who have not enjoyed the personal conflict between Kent and myself. I hope that it is clear that I did not start any personal element of this conflict with Kent (I certainly did not intend to) [by calling me “stupid” and “dishonest” he was merely reacting in advance to the fact that he would soon get his feelings hurt by Kent] and, despite the difficulty in allowing somebody to snipe at me without refutation, I would prefer to finish it. As a result of both these things, I am going to suspend my access to SHAKSPER for at least a couple of weeks so that it does not distract me from my return to University, and so that Kent and anybody else who wishes to may have their last comments without me feeling provoked into responding.
If The Moderator allows me, I will try (probably tomorrow) to write a reasonably dispassionate last post dealing with arguments and not personalities summarising the reasons that I feel Tom Krause’s arguments do not reach the standards required for publication, [this never came; I’d like to say it was because Armado had a revelation, but somehow one doubts that] since both Krause and Kent have asked me to justify that claim from my own posts, but I will not read their replies. Again, I do not like to leave a matter unfinished as it seems in some ways rude to make a last statement and then refuse to listen to responses to my own arguments [well, that wouldn’t be anything new], but it seems likely that this is the only way that this thread will draw to a close. [it would have helped]
Armado. The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1771 Tuesday, 28 September 2004
[1]
From: Rosaline
Date: Friday, 17 Sep 2004 14:14:15 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1747 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Prospero
Date: Friday, 17 Sep 2004 19:34:48 +0100
Subj: SHK 15.1747 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Rosaline
Date: Friday, 17 Sep 2004 14:44:28 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1747 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Sunday, 19 Sep 2004 21:59:43 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1737 Long Posts & Lists
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Rosaline
Date: Friday, 17 Sep 2004 14:14:15 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1747 Question on Measure for Measure
2) Shakespeare *ALWAYS* uses double-meaning.
Oh, like I’m supposed to fall into a silly trap like that. [no, it’s really what Armado believes you are forced to argue] I will say that Shakespeare has the oddest tendency to drag meanings and associations into places you wouldn’t think they belong. He has a negative association with the word “pitch,” for instance. Even the perfectly innocent verb of the word will drag negative relationships into the passage. Just plain odd.
He also seems to use a kind of synaptic overdrive. He starts an image and his brain doggedly keeps supplying associations to it like the sorcerer’s apprentice.
As for Juliet Capulet, since she is likened to a “rich jewel,” I can’t imagine why a link to another thing of value would be out of the question. As for the “debased” association, if she hasn’t been debased by her secret marriage to Romeo, why can’t she tell her parents? After all, Will was the father of two daughters. Why should we assume that a runaway marriage would sit well with him? [nice job, Rosaline]
I don’t find Shakespeare’s multilevel imagery “atrocious and confusing.” I find it enlightening. And delightful. I did say that it wasn’t necessary for the dramatic logic of the plays to work. But it IS why we sit down and read them so carefully. And so often.
[2]————————————————————-
From: Prospero
Date: Friday, 17 Sep 2004 19:34:48 +0100
Subject: SHK 15.1747 Question on Measure for Measure
Blimey.
Happy to report that Krause’s impeccable logic makes most of the other protagonists in this thread look absurd – two of them in particular.
Not sure I personally buy his interpretation of MFM entirely, but the material he brings to light is undeniably interesting.
And to fight about whether or not Shakespeare could possibly have meant certain double meanings of words or other allegories is surely spectacularly beside the point? Didn’t the 20th century happen? Last I checked William Shakespeare wasn’t a member of this list.
m [a welcome comment from the world of the sane]
[3]————————————————————-
From: Rosaline
Date: Friday, 17 Sep 2004 14:44:28 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1747 Question on Measure for Measure
Damn. I scrolled down. Really, no one has the time to read all of this.
However. I was saddened by the “”angel” = “gold coin””. I understand that Mr. Armado would be more comfortable with mathematical equations, but poetic logic is simply not that linear. Yes, those passages are aggressively gooey and the references are to airy beings. Yup, yup, yup. Yup.
But everyone in England knew angels were gold coins, yes? YES? So no matter what flight of fancy Romeo engages in, the reality is that this thing of value, this Juliet, is much more solid, more of the earth, more real, than any celestial being. You can’t hold a heavenly creation the way you can a coin. Or a woman. So all the audience has to do is wait till the adolescent gets this frou frou out of his system and gets down to the real. Which they have now been cued to expect. Because Juliet is solid. And of value. And she can be held. Like a coin. Yes?
When Shakespeare had Romeo say “angel,” the association was made. Done deal. Because everyone in England already knew about the two kinds of angel. See, it IS possible for minds to hold contradictory images comfortably. Jesus, for instance, is a lamb. And the shepherd. Christians have NO problem with that, I hear tell.
[4]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Sunday, 19 Sep 2004 21:59:43 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1737 Long Posts & Lists
I defer to The Moderator’s views on the proper purpose of the list, as well as the best use of his time.
But I didn’t want to let this go without thanking The Moderator for giving me the opportunity to post my essay on the site, and also for his work in posting the comments of my critics and my responses to them on the Measure for Measure thread. Although there were additional qualities I could have wished for in my primary critic (Mr. Armado), he was not wanting in passion, knowledge, [I probably shouldn’t have said this, but I was trying to say something nice. He certainly is knowledgeable about some matters, but he is also mistaken as a factual matter about others, and eager to promulgate his mistaken view of the facts] and willingness to spend time researching and debating the topic, and I for one benefited from the experience. I hope that the opportunity for such a debate will be available to future authors.
Mr. Armado has offered to provide a summation of his arguments, and I will do the same, and then the thread will presumably end. I hope that our summations will be posted, because they should spare any future readers the necessity of reading through all the arguments and counter-arguments post by post. I apologize in advance to those of you who have lost interest in the thread, and hope that you will simply use the delete key and move on.
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1825 Tuesday, 5 October 2004
[1]
From: Leonato
Date: Friday, 1 Oct 2004 08:55:10 EDT
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1796 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: David Evett <d.evett@csuohio.edu>
Date: Friday, 1 Oct 2004 10:37:59 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1803 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Leonato
Date: Friday, 1 Oct 2004 08:55:10 EDT
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1796 Question on Measure for Measure
I’d like to point out that Gary Taylor’s very interesting article “Shakespeare’s Mediterranean *Measure for Measure*” is now available in the collection *Shakespeare and the Mediterranean* edited by Tom Clayton, Susan Brock and Vicente Fores, which has just been published by U of Delaware Press.
In it Taylor argues [persuasively to my mind] that the Viennese setting of Measure for Measure was not a feature of Shakespeare’s original version of the play, but probably was imposed by Thomas Middleton during a revision of the play performed in the early 1620s. He gives reasons for thinking that Shakespeare originally set the play in Ferrara, and that the Italianate names of most of the characters [including Mariana] derive from that early state of the text.
It’s an article well worth reading.
Leonato
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1888 Friday, 15 October 2004
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Thursday, 14 Oct 2004 21:10:36 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1838 Question on Measure for Measure
I’ve now read the Gary Taylor piece recommended by Leonato (“Shakespeare’s Mediterranean Measure for Measure,” in “Shakespeare and the Mediterranean”).
For my own part, it clearly only helps my case, as it shows that Dover-Wilson (cited in my essay) isn’t the only respected scholar who believes that MFM was revised sometime after 1605.
Again, my paper’s primary contributions on MFM are to point out that it contains a debasement allegory involving Juan de Mariana and to show how that allegory explains some specific lines, names, and plot elements of the play, and why MFM was removed from the Vallodolid copy of the Second Folio. How the allegory got there – whether Mariana’s views were published before 1605, whether Shakespeare learned of Mariana’s views despite their not having been published until 1605, or whether the play was later revised by Shakespeare or Middleton or someone else – is secondary, and may have to be worked out by others. Gary Taylor’s work is relevant to that secondary inquiry. [and yet, it’s Armado’s main criticism]
I think the major parts of Taylor’s arguments are worth repeating here since they bear upon several earlier discussions in this thread, including the setting of MFM, and its date (Nathaniel take note).
As Leonato says, Taylor’s conclusion is that the “site” of the play was moved from Ferrara (Taylor’s best guess at Shakespeare’s original setting) to Vienna by Thomas Middleton in 1621. He also posits that nearly all of 1.2 (the early scene featuring Lucio, the gentlemen, and Mistress Overdone) and parts of 2.1, 4.1., 4.3 and possibly 4.2 were added around that time.
His support includes the following:
1. Shakespeare’s 1603-04 audience would not have had any particular association with Vienna; indeed, MFM is the only English play written before 1660 that is set in Vienna. Vienna was known primarily as “the principall Bulwarke of all Christendome against the Turke,” yet Shakespeare makes no reference to Turks, Moors, or Ottomans in the play.
2. The play contains several obvious signs of revision including: (1) systematic expurgation consistent with 1608 Act to Restrain Abuses by Players; (2) act divisions; (3) a stanza of a Fletcher song that was written between 1617 and 1620.
3. An October 1621 English newsletter describing the King of Hungary’s advance on Vienna provides a basis for Lucio’s remark about the Dukes coming “not to composition with the King of Hungary . . . .”, and the first gentleman’s rejoinder “Heauen grant vs its peace, but not the King of Hungaries.”. [this seems to me to be a singularly unpersuasive point]
4. The Italianate names of the characters suggest that the play’s original setting was in Italy, and Shakespeare’s audience would have associated the city’s sexual licentiousness with Italy, not Germany.
5. The use of Ferrara was a common setting for other plays of the same period.
6. A major source for The Taming of the Shrew (Ariosto’s “I Suppositi,” translated by Gascoigne as “The Supposes”) was set in Ferrara, which could be seen as a model for the “Vienna” of MFM because it (1) had gates, (2) had a Duke who was considered “most juste,” (3) had a character who owned a grange, (4) used ducats, (5) had a character named “Litio” who resembled Lucio.
7. The plot of MFM also resembles that of Middleton’s “The Phoenix” (in which the Duke of Ferrara’s son goes into disguise to spy on people) which was first performed in court in February 1604, as well as Marston’s Parasitaster (most likely 1604) in which the Duke of Ferrara also spies while in disguise.
8. “Ferrara” has the same metrical structure as “Vienna.” (according to Armado, this would be attaching “mystical significance” to the metrical structure)
Along the way, Taylor addresses arguments of other scholars:
1. He dismisses as “nonsense” the notion that the play’s setting in Vienna was related to efforts by Queen Anne’s brother, the Duke of Holst, to raise men for service in Hungary (as advocated by Bennett and Marcus), and that Vienna in 1604 “would be associated with the efforts of the Holy Roman Emperor to suppress Protestantism in nearby Hungary” (Gibbons).
2. He explains that the Holst-Vienna theory fails to explain the main passage it seeks to explain (“Lucio: If the Duke, with the other Dukes, come not to composition with the King of Hungary, why then all the dukes fall upon the King.//1. Gent. Heauen grant vs its peace, but not the King of Hungaries.”). [of course, I have a decent explanation for this, if Hungary = Spain, as many think] 3. He also finds implausible the theory the King of Hungary is a “half-memory” of Corvinus, King of Hungary, from one of the play’s probable sources.
4. He rejects Dover-Wilson’s attempts to connect this passage to events of 1606 and Leah Marcus’s attempt to connect it to events of 1608. [both of which of course would involve time travel, although not as dramatic as Taylor’s]
Taylor also speculates that the second line of the play (Escalus: “Good my lord”) originally ended with the name “Vincentio,” but that the name was removed in the revision, in order to introduce the idea that the play was set in Vienna prior to confusing the audience with Italianate names. [definitely speculation]
Further support for the argument – as well as elaboration on why Taylor thinks the revision was done by Middleton – is found in Taylor and Jowett’s “With New Additions, Theatrical Interpolation in Measure for Measure,” in “Shakespeare Reshaped” (1994). In that essay, in addition to using mathematical techniques to demonstrate that 1.2 was unlikely to have been written by Shakespeare, Taylor and Jowett reject Lever’s – and Nathaniel’s – insistence that section 1.2 contains contemporary references that date the play to 1603.
Most significant for purposes of this thread is Taylor and Jowett’s critique of Lever’s analysis of Mistress’s Overdone’s line: “Thus, what with the war, what with the sweat, what with the gallows, and what with poverty, I am custom-shrunk.”
That line, plus the line about plucking houses down, provided the bases for Nathaniel’s pronouncement that the play must have been written in 1603. As attentive readers will recall, Mr. Bridgman also argued: “Mariana published his book on currency at least a year after Measure for Measure appeared. End of story.” [I have explained elsewhere why that’s not the end of the story even if Shakespeare did write the play in 1603]
The conclusion of both Taylor pieces is that Mistress Overdone’s line was written not in 1603, but in 1621. In “Shakespeare Reshaped,” Taylor and Jowett reject Lever and thus Bridgman by pointing out that (1) Shakespeare would be unlikely to have been so critical of the peace with Spain, which James considered to be one of his major accomplishments; (2) the term “sweat” was never used to describe the plague (one OED definition of “sweat” gives “sweating sickness” but it’s clear that the “sweating sickness” was not literally the plague that afflicted London in 1603), and thus “sweat” probably refers, as Dr. Johnson suggested, to a cure for syphilis; and (3) the reference to “poverty” is inconsistent with the fact that London was enjoying something of an economic boom in 1603. Taylor and Jowett are similarly unimpressed by the reference to pulling down of houses; they don’t consider it particularly topical, and in any event not as a reference to the Sept. 1603 proclamation cited by Lever and Bridgman, since that proclamation was for the prevention of the spread of plague and apparently (contra Bridgman) did not mention brothels and gaming houses.
Again, my own theory does not need to take a position here – but parts of it can shed light on the debate. On this particular point, I’ve pointed out that “sweat” might have been a double entendre for both plague and the fact that the practice of “sweating” coins caused them to shrink (a notion that is echoed in “custom-shrunk”). The desire for a double entendre (“sweat” with “sweat”) provides an explanation of why Shakespeare would refer to “plague” by one of its symptoms, rather than use a more accurate term.
I’ve also pointed out that the King of Hungary’s “peace” might be a pun for “piece” (“peece”) which was another word for “coin,” and this could help Lever and Bridgman meet Taylor’s criticism. Thus, if Lever and Bridgman are correct that the King of Hungary is the King of Spain, then the “piece” of the second half of the double-entendre is the debased Spanish coin, which is referred to elsewhere in the play [per my interpretation] and is consistent with the coinage and testing imagery that commentators and editors have observed runs throughout the play. The censors would not be offended by the double entendre (the idea of not accepting a foreign King’s coin would not be an affront to King James), and would not see the ensuing remarks in which Lucio and the Gentlemen point out that soldiers generally favor war as particularly critical of the impending peace with Spain.
An extra bonus of “Shakespeare and the Mediterranean” is its inclusion of Richard Wilson’s “‘Every Third Thought’: Shakespeare’s Milan,” to which I can’t do justice here. Among other things that will be of interest to anyone interested in the William Shakeshafte theory, Wilson contends that “Two Gentlemen [of Verona] . . . reveals how [Shakespeare’s] proximity to [Edmond] Campion’s mission may have shaped Shakespeare’s entire dramatic strategy. . . .” Wilson also mentions a letter from Campion to Robert Arden, a Warwickshire Jesuit and possible relative of Shakespeare’s who Wilson says went on to become canon of Toledo, thus providing another link between Campion and Shakespeare, and even between Shakespeare and Juan de Mariana (probably Toledo’s most famous Jesuit). [I’m not including these admittedly tenuous “connections” in my paper, but they are there, for what they are worth]
Mr. Armado left this thread some time ago, saying he had to return to University soon, but promising to “try” to write one last “reasonably dispassionate” summary of his argument as to why my essay does not meet the standards for publication. He hasn’t been back, and I need to submit final revisions to the essay in the next week or two, so I would be very grateful to anyone who can point me to anything Mr. Armado has said that the paper should take into account. I’ve waded through the hundred-plus pages of his critique. [my actual post continued: “I’ve waded through the hundred-plus pages of his critique and have found nothing but a mix of smug self-assurance, bad arguments, misrepresentations, and invective. He has apologized for the invective, but appears to stand by everything else.” The Moderator removed everything after “his critique.” That’s his prerogative.]
As it turns out, the only arguments that Mr. Armado has made that were not taken into account and addressed in the paper are either (1) completely indefensible; (2) based on bad analogies or Oxfordian logic; or (3) in the form “You’re wrong because I’m right” (and even here, his arguments often misrepresent my arguments and are almost always off-target).
Here is my rough summary of his reasoning, broken down by play and by category:
Measure for Measure
I. Indefensible Arguments: (1) The argument that my “methodology” resembles anti-Stratfordian or Bible Code arguments and therefore can only yield wrong conclusions; (2) The argument that my methodology and conclusions must be wrong because the conclusions are “unfalsifiable.”
II. Bad Analogies Based on Bad Math – Arguments analogizing my argument to bad arguments of his own invention: (1) The “St. George = George Blaurock” analogy; (2) the “Catholic-Protestant conflict” analogy.
III. Oxfordian logic: (1) The identification of a character named “Mariana” in “Fair Em.” This would just be another bad analogy if not for the fact that Mr. Armado actually has managed to fool himself, by means of a delightfully Oxfordian-esque argument, that he is onto something.
In short, the fact that “Mariana” appeared in a bed-trick [as noted, I later realized there wasn’t even a “bed-trick,” except in the loosest sense of that term, in “Fair Em”] in another play means nothing without supporting data that Mr. Armado failed to provide, such as just how common a name was “Mariana” in plays of that period, and how many such plays involve bed-tricks. Without that sort of supporting data, his argument is so bad that it would not even meet the standards for publishability in the laxest Oxfordian publication. Mr. Armado’s “discovery” most likely reflects the obvious fact that in all the plays involving bed-tricks, some of them will feature characters named Mariana, which is no more probative than the fact (acknowledged in the essay) that “Mariana” was a plausible woman’s name. And yet, impervious to both irony and logic, Mr. Armado repeats this argument again and again, right alongside accusations that my arguments have something in common with those of the anti-Stratfordians.
With this argument, Mr. Armado has shown us that his preconceptions have caused him to suffer from the very “extreme gullibility” that he accused Kent and me of suffering from in his first contribution to this thread. It barely needs saying that those same preconceptions contaminate his reasoning on nearly every other point he makes in his critique. [I’m grateful that the Moderator did not touch this characterization]
IV. “You’re wrong because I’m right” arguments: Any argument about the meaning of a particular line, esp. whether Shakespeare intended a particular meaning or double-meaning. These arguments often misrepresent my essay (and/or accuse me of dishonesty), are typically about minor points that I have made which Mr. Armado seems to think are critical to my argument, and almost invariably demonstrate Mr. Armado’s absolute conviction that he knows things that nobody could possibly know about Shakespeare’s intent. It would take much more time than it is worth to go through each of Mr. Armado’s arguments of this type (and I’ve responded to many of them already), but I’d be happy to provide responses to specific arguments that any other reader believes requires a response. [here, I could have provided as an example Armado’s mistaken insistence – and his basis for rejecting many of my proposed interpretations – that the government advertised whenever it debased the coinage. He appears to believe that anyone having a debased coin would be able to easily ascertain the value of that coin, and that it would be accepted at that value. Not only is he dead wrong that the government advertised, but he also does not realize that a major problem in debasements was what to do with your remaining “pure” coinage. Obviously, it had more intrinsic value than the debased coinage bearing the same face value. But in many cases, it was illegal to trade it for more. The result was hoarding, black markets, and a flight of “good money” to foreign lands, because foreign merchants would certainly not accept debased coin.]
What’s left – the only argument that has any merit, at least when stated in a non-Larquian (i.e. non-circular) fashion – is the fact that I cannot prove that Shakespeare knew Mariana’s views before he published MFM. But I was aware of this fact before I wrote the essay, and I have proposed several plausible ways of dealing with it, both in the essay and in this thread. [here, perhaps I should have cited all of the things that are unproven in the Jowett-Taylor hypothesis about the dating of MFM] It’s not a basis for refusing publication, much less proof that I am wrong and Mr. Armado is right.
Hamlet
I. Indefensible Arguments: See above. The arguments about methodology are not just indefensible as to the Hamlet argument, they are irrelevant to it. The Hamlet argument – which incidentally makes up about 60% of the paper but is barely addressed by Mr. Armado – is based on a wholly different type of reasoning that the MFM argument. [I should point out that the arguments should in any event be read in sequence. The Hamlet argument does not require the same level of inferential thinking as the MFM argument – it merely justifies a new, debasement-oriented interpretation of several lines in the play. A reader who has considered and understood – and perhaps even been persuaded by – the Hamlet argument will be more likely to entertain the MFM argument.]
IV. “You’re wrong because I’m right” arguments. Two prime examples of Mr. Armado’s reasoning (which seem to be his two main “refutations” of the Hamlet argument) are his arguments (1) that “picture in little” necessarily means “miniature portrait”; and (2) that “innovation” must refer to the child actors. As to the first, although he seems dimly aware that the paper acknowledges that “picture in little” may well have been a common term for “miniature portrait,” he goes through numerous non-Shakespearean usages of “picture in little” and demonstrates how these cannot refer to “coins,” a meaningless fact that I have no reason to contest. He has not answered my explanation that I was proposing a double-meaning, not an alternative, exclusive definition. As to the second, he has not explained why the second quarto contains a reference to an innovation, but no reference to child actors, except – in what we can only hope is an unintentional error that he still has not acknowledged – to say that children are referred to in the “two reliable texts of the play” (meaning presumably the Folio and the first quarto, which he apparently considers the reliable versions).
In sum, if somewhere buried in Mr. Armado’s illogical arguments, mischaracterizations, and ad hominem attacks lies support for his contentions that (1) the essay “is rather obviously not worthy of publication,” (2) the MFM argument “is almost certainly wrong,” and/or (3) the Hamlet argument is equally defective, then I encourage you to let me know, and I’ll respond in this space, and possibly even in the revised draft of the paper. In fact, if anyone thinks that Mr. Armado has made a single valid argument (apart from the already-addressed date argument) that does not fall into any of Categories I-IV identified above, I’d be interested to hear it.
Time-saving tip: If you think one of Mr. Armado’s arguments is compelling, take a look at the essay itself, and you will most likely find that the argument either misrepresents the essay or is already addressed.
I’ll conclude on a minor point:
A little more research has disclosed that as recently as the 19th century, numismatic writers were under the impression that 4/5 of Emperor Claudius’s coins were debased. Apparently, the realization that these “debased” coins were in fact counterfeits is a recent development. Accordingly, neither Shakespeare nor I need to go to Nero to find debasement, and I can simply remove one of the sub-sub arguments that Mr. Armado had such a virulent reaction to.
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1900 Monday, 18 October 2004
[1]
From: Lodovico
Date: Friday, 15 Oct 2004 06:45:09 -0700 (PDT)
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1888 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Costard
Date: Friday, 15 Oct 2004 13:57:41 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1888 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Lodovico
Date: Friday, 15 Oct 2004 06:45:09 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1888 Question on Measure for Measure
One thing that is not clear to me about your theory is how it relates elements from the source play to the allegory. Surely those plot and character elements would demonstrate some friction against the allegory?
Also, why would Shakespeare have chosen Promos and Cassandra to build such a complex structure on when surely it would have been easier to create his own plot structure if he was interested in commenting on these monetary issues? [answered in detail below]
I find it hard to believe your ideas anyway since they make assumptions that seem unlikely about how writers create their work, but to not account for Promos and Cassandra’s relationship to Measure to Measure marginalizes the whole argument. It implies that your allegory was just something tacked on by either Shakespeare or you to the body of a play whose real concerns are elsewhere. [addressed below]
[2]————————————————————-
From: Costard
Date: Friday, 15 Oct 2004 13:57:41 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1888 Question on Measure for Measure
“the fact that “Mariana” appeared in a bed-trick in another play means nothing without supporting data that Mr. Armado failed to provide, such as just how common a name was “Mariana” in plays of that period, and how many such plays involve bed-tricks.”
There are only about 400 extant English plays for the period antedating M/M. It would be the work of an hour or two online to answer this question, and Mr. Krause can do it as well as Mr. Armado. [but why is it my burden to make and then refute Armado’s argument? As things stand, Armado has made a bad argument based on incomplete evidence] My guess is that precisely two plays have Marianas involved in bed tricks. [I suppose, if you count Fair Em, which didn’t really have one] But if there were more, if it were as common as mistaken identity in modern crime drama, that would cut against Krause’s theory, as the use of Mariana in a bed trick would merely be a common device not likely to allude to Juan de Mariana. [I suppose one could concede some mild “cutting” against, if this turns out to be the case. But even if there is some correlation, that doesn’t mean that WS didn’t have Juan in mind this time]
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1908 Tuesday, 19 October 2004
From: Holofernes
Date: Monday, 18 Oct 2004 14:10:46 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1900 Question on Measure for Measure
Costard wrote:
Tom Krause wrote: the fact that “Mariana” appeared in a bed-trick in another play means nothing without supporting data that Mr. Armado failed to provide, such as just how common a name was “Mariana” in plays of that period, and how many such plays involve bed-tricks. There are only about 400 extant English plays for the period antedating M/M. It would be the work of an hour or two online to answer this question, and Mr. Krause can do it as well as Mr. Armado. My guess is that precisely two plays have Marianas involved in bed tricks. But if there were more, if it were as common as mistaken identity in modern crime drama, that would cut against Krause’s theory, as the use of Mariana in a bed trick would merely be a common device not likely to allude to Juan de Mariana.
There is, of course, a bed-trick and also a Mariana in “All’s Well That Ends Well”, the play generally agreed to be closest in date to “Measure for Measure”. [seeming to cut against Armado’s theory, since the Mariana doesn’t participate] There is no agreement as to which came first, but it has been pointed out that the bed-trick in “All’s Well” is integral to the plot, whereas that in MM is tacked on. [supporting my theory] Even if “All’s Well” was written second, it could indicate an audience demand for bed-trick plays with characters called Mariana – or a widespead interest in currency debasement, of course… [he clearly doesn’t believe this, but I do believe that it reflects his general good nature]
Holofernes
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1909 Tuesday, 19 October 2004
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Monday, 18 Oct 2004 22:10:21 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1900 Question on Measure for Measure
Lodovico writes:
“One thing that is not clear to me about your theory is how it relates elements from the source play to the allegory. Surely those plot and character elements would demonstrate some friction against the allegory?”
Actually, I’ve always thought that comparison with Shakespeare’s sources only supports the theory, because the elements of MFM that make up the debasement allegory – Mariana, Isabella’s name, the expanded role of the Duke, etc. – are all additions to the underlying story. Where is the friction?
Lodovico also writes:
Also, why would Shakespeare have chosen Promos and Cassandra to build such a complex structure on when surely it would have been easier to create his own plot structure if he was interested in commenting on these monetary issues?”
For starters, bear in mind that Shakespeare rarely created his plot structures out of whole cloth (last I heard, he did so only 2 out of 37 times). P&C gave him a basic plot structure and saved him the time and trouble of having to come up with one on his own. As to why he would choose P&C (or Epitia, for that matter, or the stock story underlying them both), remember that the theory is that he wanted to use a reverse debasement metaphor – i.e. instead of the usual use of debased coins to represent debased human beings, he wanted a story that would allow him to use human debasement as a metaphor for debasement of the coinage. P&C was an excellent vehicle for this, as it has much to do with human debasement.
On the other hand, the debasement allegory is not a particularly “complex” structure on top of P&C, and despite what I’ve said above, I think one could argue that the additions needed were so simple that it’s entirely possible that the idea for adding a debasement allegory only occurred to Shakespeare after he had chosen to write a play based on the P&C story. As everyone in this thread agrees, MFM is not just about debasement of the coinage, and the debasement allegory might not have been the most important point of the play to Shakespeare, who had a lot to say about a wide variety of issues.
But maybe I’m not getting your point – are you saying that the presentation of the theory suffers because it doesn’t expressly address Shakespeare’s sources, or are you saying there is something in the sources that somehow undermines the theory? If it’s the former, I can simply add something along the above lines (i.e. to the effect that the allegory from MFM is based on changes that WS made, a point that the paper already makes in its discussion of Mariana); if it’s the latter, then I’d be very interested to hear how.
Lodovico concludes:
“I find it hard to believe your ideas anyway since they make assumptions that seem unlikely about how writers create their work, but to not account for Promos and Cassandra’s relationship to Measure to Measure marginalizes the whole argument. It implies that your allegory was just something tacked on by either Shakespeare or you to the body of a play whose real concerns are elsewhere.”
I can’t tell if your statement that my ideas “make assumptions that seem unlikely about how writers create their work” is an independent thought. If it is, all I can say is that if a writer wanted to insert a debasement allegory into a dramatic work, nothing in my paper limits the writer to any particular method of doing so. If your argument is that no writer would ever think to insert an allegory into a dramatic work, then that’s a different argument which you’ll have to flesh out.
I think the remainder of your paragraph circles back to your original point. Although you say it dismissively, the implication you see is correct – WS started with his source, and “tacked on” a debasement allegory, just as he “tacked on” a lot of beautiful language and deep thoughts about justice, mercy, and, if Nathaniel and others who have proposed the same thing are correct, religious toleration. What does the fact that all this has been “tacked on” have to do with the merits of the argument?
Looking at it another way, if we could get at the “real concerns” of MFM simply by studying P&C, we’ve been barking up the wrong tree for a long time now. Of course, it’s Shakespeare’s additions to the sources that many find make the play “problematic,” and the debasement theory proposes solutions to those problems, not problems in P&C.
Costard writes:
“There are only about 400 extant English plays for the period antedating M/M. It would be the work of an hour or two online to answer this question, and Mr. Krause can do it as well as Mr. Armado. My guess is that precisely two plays have Marianas involved in bed tricks. But if there were more, if it were as common as mistaken identity in modern crime drama, that would cut against Krause’s theory, as the use of Mariana in a bed trick would merely be a common device not likely to allude to Juan de Mariana.”
My guess matches yours – Mr. Armado identified one, and Maria identified another; I’m sure one or both of them would have told us if there were more.
But I had the same trouble you did understanding Mr. Armado’s argument: it’s true that if there were a strong positive correlation between Marianas and bed tricks that would weigh (ever so slightly, see below) against my theory, but Mr. Armado seems to be arguing that because Shakespeare might have been familiar with another play where Mariana was involved in a bed-trick (although not as the substituted bedmate), that *must* mean that Shakespeare named his Mariana after that Mariana. That’s a terrible argument. As I’ve said, putting the debasement allegory aside, the chance that Shakespeare named his Mariana after Fair Em’s Mariana is considerably slimmer than the chance that he chose the name at random, given that the Marianas played different roles in the bed-trick and given that there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that Shakespeare was in the habit of borrowing names for his characters from other dramatists.
Your aside that I could do the grunt work as well as Mr. Armado deserves a brief comment: the “Fair-Em-Mariana” theory is his, not mine, and I am content to rest on the fact that no scholar in the past 400 years has pointed to a prevalence of Marianas in bed-tricks as an explanation for the name of MFM’s Mariana (despite considerable literature on bed-tricks as well as curiosity about Mariana’s name), and I can also take comfort from the fact that Mr. Armado would have told us if there were more than two. If I had to spend 1-2 hours refuting every possible weak and unsupported argument that could be raised against the debasement theory, I’d never finish (for starters, wouldn’t I have to do a similar analysis seeking and then refuting “borrowing” explanations for “Isabella” and “Claudio” as well?).
To take it one step further, even if we were to find some sort of correlation between Marianas and bed tricks, that doesn’t prove much. For example, I see significance in the fact that Mariana’s brother the great soldier Frederick who died at sea had the same name as a great soldier who had recently died at sea, just as others see significance in references to the gallows, the sweat, the war and an order about plucking down houses. If Shakespeare didn’t mean Spinola, why would he confuse his audience by using his name? Wouldn’t he have just picked a name and occupation that didn’t match those of someone who had recently died at sea? And if he did mean Spinola, doesn’t that mean that Mariana probably stands for something or someone as well? So even if you could correlate Marianas to bed tricks, the “Frederick” reference (among other things) militates against that being the final answer.
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1917 Wednesday, 20 October 2004
[1]
From: Cornelius
Date: Tuesday, 19 Oct 2004 15:25:32 -0300
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1908 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Holofernes
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 01:22:22 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1909 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Lodovico
Date: Tuesday, 19 Oct 2004 17:27:40 -0700 (PDT)
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1909 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Holofernes
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 02:05:10 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1888 Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Tuesday, 19 Oct 2004 22:01:20 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1908 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Cornelius
Date: Tuesday, 19 Oct 2004 15:25:32 -0300
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1908 Question on Measure for Measure
On the matter of how common the name “Mariana” was in plays, and for what it’s worth, Berger and Bradford’s Character Index lists 14 plays from the period with a character named “Mariana.” Another 10 named “Marian.”
Cornelius
[2]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 01:22:22 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1909 Question on Measure for Measure
Tom Krause wrote:
“For example, I see significance in the fact that Mariana’s brother the great soldier Frederick who died at sea had the same name as a great soldier who had recently died at sea, just as others see significance in references to the gallows, the sweat, the war and an order about plucking down houses. If Shakespeare didn’t mean Spinola, why would he confuse his audience by using his name? Wouldn’t he have just picked a name and occupation that didn’t match those of someone who had recently died at sea? And if he did mean Spinola, doesn’t that mean that Mariana probably stands for something or someone as well? So even if you could correlate Marianas to bed tricks, the “Frederick” reference (among other things) militates against that being the final answer.”
Nathaniel kicked this all off by commenting on Tom Krause’s style of reasoning. Once again Tom Krause has made the assertion that “the great soldier Frederick who died at sea” was a reference to Federico di Spinola, but without producing any evidence that anyone in England had heard of him! If no one had heard of him, why would the audiences be confused? For the record, my own view is that “Measure for Measure” is a work of fiction, and that the names have no significance. The onus is on Tom Krause to produce contemporary English reports of Federico and his death. [one might think that Holofernes was in my pay. He might have confused my admitted inability to get Mariana’s views on debasement into English hands, with an assumed inability to get Spinola there. As shown in my next post, it’s very easy to get Spinola there]
In a similar vein, it might inform the discussion of Juan de Mariana if it could be established which (if any) of his works featured in the only known large seventeenth-century Jesuit library in England, now at Lambeth Palace (!) – see Hendrik Dijkgraaf, The Library of a Jesuit Community at Holbeck, Nottinghamshire, 1679 (2003) isbn 0951881175. [I actually did take a look at this book, which predictably doesn’t deal with the time period we are dealing with. I don’t remember clearly, but I believe Mariana’s name came up, although at a much later date]
I do, however, find the correlation of Marianas to bed-tricks intriguing, and would suggest that Shakespeare (possibly unconsciously) picked up the name ‘Mariana’ while studying other bed-trick plays, preparatory to writing one of his own – probably “All’s Well That Ends Well”. [again with the idea that the Mariana in All’s Well is associated with the bed trick in that play. If this kind of reasoning goes, then anything goes.]
On a lighter note, I can report that I have not come to a conclusion over the knotty problem of whether Lyford Grange still had a moat in the late sixteenth century – nor, indeed, whether it was even called Lyford Grange, rather than More Place, its previous name. I have, however, located a chapel of St Luke, but it is three miles away from Lyford, is not in the same parish, and is not in the villages nearest to Lyford. [interesting, although he provides no source] Its precise location is left as an exercise for the credulous!
Holofernes
[3]————————————————————-
From: Lodovico
Date: Tuesday, 19 Oct 2004 17:27:40 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1909 Question on Measure for Measure
I probably did not pay attention enough to the whole debate and assumed you considered the allegory to be more central. If the allegory is only slightly related to the plot Shakespeare chose and has little impact on the play’s meaning, then it does seem to be a pretty marginal issue even in your account of it. [this might be an insult; I’m not sure]
Most allegories of the period (and after) have original plots, since it would be highly unlikely to find an existing story that would carry an analogy. But you say the allegory is not strongly connected to the main plot of Measure. It still seems odd for a writer to take trouble to insert allegorical elements into an existing plot structure. Even odder not to make bolder connections in the analogy and more clearly signaling intent.
While I am sensitive to the fact that there is much we do not understand about the first audiences’ understanding of the work and the signals embedded therein, the type of connections you make are not referred to in any documents that I know of from the period. Plays taken as analogies to contemporary issues (such as Richard II or A Game at Chess) more bluntly connect to the issues they were thought to be speaking about. No writer that I can think of that era refers to secret or covert meanings in contemporary drama, which would support this debasement allegory theory. They only refer to more overt meanings, even in plays though to use allegory or analogy. I know that in other writing of the period had a range of allegorical writing, but I cannot identify the sort of allegory you propose in drama of the period or in documents referring to the theater.
While it is possible that you are correct, there seems to be little evidence that supports your theory. There is no strong or definite context of similar work to place an allegorical Measure in, so the theory relies on our lack of knowledge about how writing was written and understood in Renaissance England. This theory cannot be specifically disproved since there is so little outside of your reading of the play to support it. [at least we have the acknowledgement of the first clause] I think that is ultimately the source of the frustration here. The whole theory is based on elements of the text that seem ambiguous proofs at best to most readers and there is nothing strong enough outside the play to tip the balance. The even more arguable references to angels in R&J seem to weaken the argument rather than strengthen it, [this is a throwaway line that Armado converted into a cause] because there the analogy would have even less point in most readers’ view. The allegory has little context in drama of the period and no strong evidence to indicate Measure is a unique case.
You can respond if you like and I would very much hope there is something I am missing to document the existence of work such as you suggest Measure is. I will let you have the last word and not respond back since I know this whole can of worms is irksome to many. I only re-opened it this far because the issue of context was one I looked for in the earlier thread and did not see addressed.
[4]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 02:05:10 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1888 Question on Measure for Measure
Tom Krause wrote:
The play contains several obvious signs of revision including: (1) systematic expurgation consistent with 1608 Act to Restrain Abuses by Players; (2) act divisions; (3) a stanza of a Fletcher song that was written between 1617 and 1620.
The Act was, of course, 1606 rather than 1608 [of course], but points (1) and (2) are easily answered when it is remembered that the First Folio text of “Measure for Measure” derives from a transcript by Ralph Crane. Crane seems to have been employed in some capacity by the King’s Men, and it is usually asserted that his transcripts are literary, but I would rather say that his role was to make new playbooks – he would therefore insert act divisions, and automatically carry out expurgation in line with the 1606 Act (expurgation was only required for performance, not publication). It is not clear why Crane did this, but he may not have been told that his transcripts were to be printer’s copy – it may have been a covert way of shifting publication expenses to the King’s Men, and away from the publishers. There may anyway have been a general programme of updating playbooks, and publishing Shakespeare’s Works may have been a spin-off from that. (I am ignoring the question of “massed entries”, but will simply say that it is not obvious to me that they are a literary rather than theatrical feature.)
As for (3), it is not obvious that the whole song (there is only one stanza in “Measure for Measure”) was written by Fletcher, nor that his play “Rollo” was written in 1617-20, rather than 1624-5 as previously thought.
What worries me about the attribution of revision to Middleton is that John Jowett has now come out and declared “Timon of Athens” (1605) to be a collaboration between Shakespeare and Middleton. If that is indeed the case, why should the putative Middleton revisions to “Measure for Measure” (1603/4) and “Macbeth” (1606), be revisions rather than the result of collaboration, and thus contemporaneous? [I guess it has to do with the “contemporary references,” which they only find in later events. But I am equally skeptical]
Holofernes
[5]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Tuesday, 19 Oct 2004 22:01:20 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1908 Question on Measure for Measure
Holofernes wrote –
“. . . it could indicate an audience demand for bed-trick plays with characters called Mariana – or a widespead interest in currency debasement, of course…”
Thanks John – I knew you’d come around!
Seriously, although it didn’t make it into the essay, it’s worth mentioning that Shakespeare’s other uses of Mariana – in All’s Well, and on the front page of three of the quarto versions of Pericles (meaning “Marina”) – are not inconsistent with “Mariana = Juan de Mariana.” The Mariana in All’s Well has only two substantive lines, in which she warns women not to allow themselves to become debased by men:
MARIANA Come, let’s return again, and suffice ourselves with the report of it. Well, Diana, take heed of this French earl: the honour of a maid is her name; and no legacy is so rich as honesty.
. . .
MARIANA I know that knave; hang him! one Costard: a filthy officer he is in those suggestions for the young earl. Beware of them, Diana; their promises, enticements, oaths, tokens, and all these engines of lust, are not the things they go under: many a maid hath been seduced by them; and the misery is, example, that so terrible shows in the wreck of maidenhood, cannot for all that dissuade succession, but that they are limed with the twigs that threaten them. I hope I need not to advise you further; but I hope your own grace will keep you where you are, though there were no further danger known but the modesty which is so lost.
And Marina of Pericles is Shakespeare’s model of purity – as shown in the brothel scenes, for example:
MARINA If fires be hot, knives sharp, or waters deep, Untied I still my virgin knot will keep. Diana, aid my purpose!
Note also the references to Diana in both plays. In All’s Well, Diana is a virgin character named for the goddess of chastity (thus a symbol of purity, thus a metaphor for pure coinage); in Pericles, Marina is appealing to the goddess herself.
And naturally we can tie the goddess Diana to Juan de Mariana, since he mentions her at the outset of his dedication of De Rege (1599) to Philip III.
Of course, Shakespeare went out of his way to tell us that “Marina” was so named because she came from the sea. On the other hand, putting “Mariana” on the front page – if it wasn’t a compositor’s error in a corrupt version of the play – could have been a signal to those who were looking for yet another play featuring Juan de Mariana.
Note to critics: while I am of course interested in your reactions to the above Mariana-Marina digression, please don’t make the mistake of thinking it is in any way critical to the MFM or Hamlet debasement theories.
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1924 Thursday, 21 October 2004
[Editor’s Note: I would appreciate it if contributors to this thread would make an effort to bring it to a conclusion soon.]
[1]
From: Nathaniel
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 14:54:26 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 12:38:35 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 12:46:49 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Maria
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 11:17:50 -0700
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[5]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Thursday, 21 Oct 2004 01:19:43 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Nathaniel
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 14:54:26 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
Tom Krause writes …
Note also the references to Diana in both plays. In All’s Well, Diana is a virgin character named for the goddess of chastity (thus a symbol of purity, thus a metaphor for pure coinage)
Mr Krause’s single-mindedness is stunning. As this thread develops we will no doubt discover that every mention of purity, goodness and grace in the canon is a reference to high quality coinage, while every mention of sin, vice, baseness, bastardy etc is a reference to cheap metal alloys. [actually, if we can establish that a particular play does have significant economic themes, this is not necessarily ridiculous] Diana in Pericles is certainly a metaphor, but if Mr Krause cannot guess what she stands for, he might consider the following …
1 – WS’s collaborator on Pericles was the Catholic recusant George Wilkins.
2 – In 1609 Pericles was included in a season of religious mystery plays staged by a troupe of Catholic recusant actors that toured the Yorkshire Dales.
3 – Pericles was the only secular play included in the 1619 playbook compiled by Jesuit schoolmasters at their school at St Omer.
4 – The climactic scene of Pericles is set around an altar dedicated to a virgin. The vestals who tend the altar are referred to as ‘nuns’.
5 – When Pericles was written there were no longer any altars dedicated to virgins, nor any nuns, in England. [more crypto-Catholicism. It’s amazing how intolerant some “believers” can be] Nathaniel
[2]————————————————————-
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 12:38:35 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
Mr. Holofernes, Shakespeare was very particular in his character’s names. If that hasn’t been amply proven by now, I dunno, I just dunno.
[3]————————————————————-
From: Rosaline
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 12:46:49 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
Mr. Yawney writes:
Plays taken as analogies to contemporary issues (such as Richard II or A Game at Chess) more bluntly connect to the issues they were thought to be speaking about. No writer that I can think of that era refers to secret or covert meanings in contemporary drama, which would support this debasement allegory theory. They only refer to more overt meanings, even in plays though to use allegory or analogy.
Yeah, most writers that we know from that period were What You See Is What You Get, WYSIWYG. Shakespeare wasn’t. That’s why we still study him, still discover new in his 400-year-old wordplay. He wasn’t ordinary and comparing him to ordinary talented writers is apples and oranges and always will be.
[4]————————————————————-
From: Maria
Date: Wednesday, 20 Oct 2004 11:17:50 -0700
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
It is entirely possible that some people in the original audience of Measure for Measure did indeed spend their time in the playhouse searching for allegories. (Who is meant by Mariana? Who is meant by Frederick? Where is this moated grange? Is Isabella Elizabeth? Is the Duke James I? Is there a political message here about debasement of the coinage? Is there one about religious tolerance? How can I get the author in trouble?). Some may even have been so avid to find hidden meanings that they discovered a few not intended by the playwright. Certainly enough of these people existed in contemporary theatre audiences for Ben Jonson to make fun of them in his Induction to Bartholomew Fair:
“…it is finally agreed by the foresaid hearers and spectators that they neither in themselves conceal, nor suffer by them to be concealed, any state-decipherer, or politic pick-lock of the scene, so solemnly ridiculous as to search out who was meant by the gingerbread-woman, who by the hobby-horse-man, who by the costermonger, nay, who by their wares. Or that will pretend to affirm, on his own inspired ignorance, what Mirror of Magistrates is meant by the Justice, what great lady by the pig-woman, what concealed statesman by the seller of mousetraps, and so of the rest. But that such person, or persons so found, be left discovered to the mercy of the author, as a forfeiture to the stage and your laughter aforesaid.”
Did Shakespeare put a debasement allegory in Measure for Measure? I don’t know. If he did, his audience would have caught it. But if he did not, his audience might have caught it anyway!
Cheers, Maria
[5]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Thursday, 21 Oct 2004 01:19:43 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1917 Question on Measure for Measure
Before I get started on individualized responses I wanted to say one thing: In a sense, there IS a debasement allegory in Measure for Measure – Mariana saves Angelo from debasement, and the two of them get married in the end, the perfect union of coinage and antidebasement principles. The question we are really debating is whether Shakespeare intended to put the allegory in the play, like whether or not what sounds like a pun in someone else’s speech is an intentional pun or an accident. Based on everything I know about Shakespeare and his work, I would give him the benefit of the doubt and conclude that he probably did intend the allegory. It’s fine for you to be skeptical (but please do consider the evidence), but I don’t see how some of you can be so nearly sure I’m wrong. It’s really not that much of a stretch, and it really does explain a lot about the play.
Cornelius writes:
“On the matter of how common the name “Mariana” was in plays, and for what it’s worth, Berger and Bradford’s Character Index lists 14 plays from the period with a character named “Mariana.” Another 10 named “Marian.””
It’s a start — if you can tell us how many total plays Berger and Bradford cover, how many of these involve bed tricks, how many of the ones with bed-tricks involve Marianas (and what role she plays in the bed-trick), how many total female character names are used in all the plays, how many female characters were involved in each of the plays and in each of the plays involving bed-tricks and in each of the bed-tricks, and probably a number of other quantities I’m not thinking of right now, then maybe someone who thinks it’s worthwhile can do the “correlation.” But please don’t do it on my account!
I can say with considerable confidence that with such a small number of Marianas in bed-tricks we will find that the variance is so high that we will not be able to infer a true positive correlation. And as I explained in a previous post, even a mathematically significant correlation would not address the basic question of whether Shakespeare might have meant Juan de Mariana.
Holofernes wrote:
“Nathaniel kicked this all off by commenting on Tom Krause’s style of reasoning. Once again Tom Krause has made the assertion that “the great soldier Frederick who died at sea” was a reference to Federico di Spinola, but without producing any evidence that anyone in England had heard of him! If no one had heard of him, why would the audiences be confused? For the record, my own view is that “Measure for Measure” is a work of fiction, and that the names have no significance. The onus is on Tom Krause to produce contemporary English reports of Federico and his death.”
I’m baffled by your apparent belief that the Spinola example demonstrates a defect in my “style of reasoning.” The last time you raised this point (your Aug. 24 post), I explained to you that Spinola had been a prominent member of Spain’s military force from 1593-1603, and that his death in a naval battle off Ostend would certainly have been widely reported (see my Aug. 25 post). Now you seem to be insisting that I prove (beyond this obvious inference) that the English had heard of him. Of course they had. He was operating a fleet of galleys in the English Channel for several years, where he preyed on shipping and had skirmishes with English warships (including one in which he lost all of his galleys but his flagship). Here is a quote from Wernham, “The Return of the Armadas: The Last Years of the Elizabethan War Against Spain 1595-1603” (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1994), p. 269:
“This second doubt [of the Queen’s decision to dismiss the army around London in August 1599] was speedily justified. Reports came pouring in almost at once that the six galleys from Santander, provided and led by Frederico Spinola, were at Le Conquet on their way to Dunkirk and Sluys. These authentic reports were, almost inevitably, accompanied by fresh rumours that the Ferrol armada was close behind them . . . . The London bands and a good part of the army that had been around the city were called back.”
This is in reference to the “invisible Armada” which “called forth defence preparations by sea and even more by land on a scale comparable to those of 1588.” (pp. 271-72)
In other words, England in 1599 feared a Spanish invasion, and felt that Spinola and his galleys were going to play a part in it. The reports that “poured in” about Spinola would have reached the ears of a good number of Londoners, who were busily preparing to defend their city. Wernham cites various contemporary sources, including Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, of the Reign of Elizabeth, 1598-1601.
I don’t have a citation to an exact contemporary source about Federico’s death, but I assure you it was a big deal. An account of it appears in Edward Grimeston’s “A Generall History of the Netherlands” (London 1608), and I’d be willing to bet, though I can’t prove just now, that Federico’s death is mentioned in Grimeston’s “A True Historie of the Memorable Siege of Ostend” (London 1604). [And the Dutch put out a medal commerorating the event — http://www.nmm.ac.uk/collections/explore/object.cfm?ID=MEC0069]
Does that satisfy my onus?
And where exactly do you draw the line on your “work of fiction” argument? Do you take a position on what the plague, the war, the peace, the sweat, the gallows, and the King of Hungary refer to? If you say they don’t refer to anything (it’s fiction, after all), then you are taking a position, but it’s a position that most critics disagree with. And if you say they refer to something, why would it be such a stretch for a name to refer to someone?
“In a similar vein, it might inform the discussion of Juan de Mariana if it could be established which (if any) of his works featured in the only known large seventeenth-century Jesuit library in England, now at Lambeth Palace (!) – see Hendrik Dijkgraaf, The Library of a Jesuit Community at Holbeck, Nottinghamshire, 1679 (2003) isbn 0951881175.”
Interesting, and this could be helpful if it tells us that the library was in existence in 1603-04 and what its collection contained then (does the book address these questions?). By 1610, Mariana’s De Rege work was clearly known everywhere, since it was thought to have inspired the assassination of Henry IV of France. It is also thought that King James had his very own copy of the treatise on currency debasement. And of course by the time of the Commonwealth, “there was scarce a Cobbler, tho’ he knew not so much as the Title of the Work, but quoted Mariana’s treasonable Doctrines to Authorize’s Ote’s Narrative . . . .” (from Stevens’ introduction to his 1699 translation of Mariana’s History of Spain).
Holofernes goes on:
“I do, however, find the correlation of Marianas to bed-tricks intriguing, and would suggest that Shakespeare (possibly unconsciously) picked up the name ‘Mariana’ while studying other bed-trick plays, preparatory to writing one of his own – probably “All’s Well That EndsWell”.”
What correlation? Why are you so eager to accept a “correlation” without proof (i.e. number of plays, number of Marianas, number of bed tricks, variance, etc.) but insist on more and more proof as to Federico?
Moreover, to make the assertion that Shakespeare studied other plays, don’t you have to establish that Shakespeare had physical access to those other plays? Do you know if they were in print? Don’t you have the onus of proving this?
You’re certainly entitled to “suggest” that this might be Shakespeare’s source (just as if we happened to learn that Shakespeare dated a Mariana in 1603 one could “suggest” that that was Shakespeare’s source). But it is a very weak suggestion, and the availability of that possibility simply doesn’t add anything to the existing argument as to Juan de Mariana. Unless you think (as Mr. Armado appeared to) that the evidence that Shakespeare got the name from a previous bed-trick play is so strong that no other explanation is even thinkable, then you still have to address the merits of the Juan de Mariana argument.
“On a lighter note, I can report that I have not come to a conclusion over the knotty problem of whether Lyford Grange still had a moat in the late sixteenth century – nor, indeed, whether it was even called Lyford Grange, rather than More Place, its previous name. I have, however, located a chapel of St Luke, but it is three miles away from Lyford, is not in the same parish, and is not in the villages nearest to Lyford. Its precise location is left as an exercise for the credulous!”
Simpson calls it “the moated grange at Lyford” (p. 310, 1907 edition) and refers to events occurring on the drawbridge in connection with Campion’s visit (e.g. p. 315). Waugh calls it “Lyford Grange” and refers to both the moat and the drawbridge. I think we have to presume that these authors would have told us if the place was not named Lyford when Campion was there; perhaps the name was changed after Thomas More was executed. Or is the onus on me to produce a contemporary document that proves this as well?
Nice find on the chapel of St. Luke – assuming that Lyford Grange is the “moated grange,” then it’s certainly possible that parishioners from St. Luke’s attended Campion’s last mass there, and that this was the St. Luke’s Shakespeare was referring to. Before anyone jumps on me from changing horses from Luke Kirby to St. Luke’s, understand – as I’ve said before – that the debasement theory has a lot of flexibility in the margins.
Holofernes also writes:
“What worries me about the attribution of revision to Middleton is that John Jowett has now come out and declared “Timon of Athens” (1605) to be a collaboration between Shakespeare and Middleton. If that is indeed the case, why should the putative Middleton revisions to “Measure for Measure” (1603/4) and “Macbeth” (1606), be revisions rather than the result of collaboration, and thus contemporaneous?”
I think Taylor and Jowett’s answer would be that they believe they have found a clear contemporary reference to a 1621 event, as described in my post (i.e. the attack on Vienna by the King of Hungary). Thanks for your response on the other aspects of my Taylor summary; I’ve run out of time tonight and will have to let Mr. Taylor’s work speak for itself.
Lodovico writes:
“I probably did not pay attention enough to the whole debate and assumed you considered the allegory to be more central. If the allegory is only slightly related to the plot Shakespeare chose and has little impact on the play’s meaning, then it does seem to be a pretty marginal issue even in your account of it.”
Well, you’d have to read the essay (which is still posted on the site) to see how “central” or “marginal” it is. My point was that it was easily added on top of the source play – it mostly appears in the dialogue that Shakespeare wrote and the plot elements that Shakespeare added – and the source play gave Shakespeare fodder for a plenty of other issues addressed by MFM.
Lodovico also writes:
“Most allegories of the period (and after) have original plots, since it would be highly unlikely to find an existing story that would carry an analogy. But you say the allegory is not strongly connected to the main plot of Measure.”
Maybe part of what is troubling people is my use of the word “allegory.” I mean it in the sense of an extended metaphor; not in the sense that each and every action by a particular character in the play must be explained by what I say that character represents, which seems to be the way you are interpreting it.
“It still seems odd for a writer to take trouble to insert allegorical elements into an existing plot structure.”
What’s so “odd” about it? If Shakespeare wanted to say something about debasement in a play, adding it to his sources was a pretty easy way to do it. Most of what he had to say to us throughout his plays was inserted onto a preexisting plot structure.
“Even odder not to make bolder connections in the analogy and more clearly signaling intent.”
Actually, I think the very beginning of the play does a pretty good job of “clearly signaling intent” The following are a series of quotations from R.J. Kaufman, “Bond Slaves and Counterfeits: Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure,” In Shakespeare Studies III, p. 85, for whom the signal is loud and clear:
“. . . . this is a branching variant of a more basic habitual connection: that made between man’s “mettle” and the terminology of coinage.”
“Thus we find that the opening speeches of Act I tightly incorporate the tone and theme of the play. The Duke’s opening speech is heavily imprinted with the imagery of economics.”
“The words ‘figure’ and ‘bear’ in line sixteen provide a substantial continuation of the metaphor; as J.W. Lever points out, the words suggest ‘the ducal stamp on the seal of the commission. Shakespeare further integrated Angelo into the coinage metaphor, for, ‘They have in England / A coin that bears the figure of an angel Stamped in gold.’ (MV, II.vii.56-57).”
“As the Duke continues his opening remarks to his old counselor, Escalus, the imagery of coinage comes to a fuller fruition.”
“The Duke notes, ‘spirits are not finely touch’d/but to fine issues. . . .’ (I.i.35-36). Lever points out, ‘”Touched” and “issues”, with “fine” (= refined) suggest the “touch” placed on gold coins of standard fineness before they were passed into circulation.'”
“Finally we see the culmination of the metaphor in the self-confident remark of Angelo” [i.e. the remark about testing his metal/mettle]
“Ernest Leisi comments on the use of the word ‘test’ in this context: ‘Originally “melting pot” (Latin testa) . . . the word acquired the force of a nomen actionis “examination of precious metals by melting.'”
“In Elizabethan usage ‘metal’ was interchangeable with the spelling and meaning of mettle. There are reinforcing usages in Timon of Athens: ‘They have all been touch’d and found base metal’ (III.iii.6), and in King John: ‘Which, being touch’d and tried, Proves valueless.’ (III.i.101).
“The first fifty-one lines of Measure for Measure establish the basic terms of the play.”
Thus, Kaufman reads these lines through an economic lens, as do I. While Kaufman does not propose that “Mariana” represents Juan de Mariana, his interpretation of these lines is fully consistent with that interpretation.
My Sept. 10 post gave a little presentation on how the play might have struck a pair of playgoers, and how they could have seen the allegory. If you suspend disbelief for a moment and accept my premise that these playgoers would have heard of Mariana’s views on debasement, then I think you’ll see that the allegory would have been quite apparent.
Lodovico continues:
“While I am sensitive to the fact that there is much we do not understand about the first audiences’ understanding of the work and the signals embedded therein, the type of connections you make are not referred to in any documents that I know of from the period. Plays taken as analogies to contemporary issues (such as Richard II or A Game at Chess) more bluntly connect to the issues they were thought to be speaking about.”
I don’t think you are being specific enough here. What “type of connections” are you talking about? What kind of documents are you envisioning?
And again, if you assume that Mariana was Juan de Mariana, isn’t the debasement allegory at least as “blunt” as the allegory in Richard II?
Lodovico goes on:
“No writer that I can think of that era refers to secret or covert meanings in contemporary drama, which would support this debasement allegory theory. They only refer to more overt meanings, even in plays though to use allegory or analogy. I know that in other writing of the period had a range of allegorical writing, but I cannot identify the sort of allegory you propose in drama of the period or in documents referring to the theater.”
I think the meaning would have been quite “overt” to anyone who knew that Mariana had written against debasement, and caught the extended economic metaphor at the outset of the play. And even if it’s “covert”, since when do we have to assume that Shakespeare wasn’t sometimes covert? What about the sonnets?
Lodovico writes:
“While it is possible that you are correct, there seems to be little evidence that supports your theory.”
You’re being vague and conclusory again. I’ve put plenty of “evidence” in the essay and in these posts, so it’s hard for me to understand what you mean by “little evidence.” Here is some of the evidence, much of which is indisputable.
1) The English in 1603-04 were concerned about debasement.
2.) Shakespeare, as a middle-class businessman, was concerned about debasement.
3) Shakespeare sometimes inserted references to things that concerned him into his work (e.g. the death of his son/father in his plays, or his love affairs in the sonnets).
4) In fact, several of Shakespeare’s other plays show a concern with economic issues, including debasement.
5) Shakespeare kicks off MFM with an extended economic metaphor.
6) Shakespeare employs coinage, weighing and testing imagery throughout MFM.
7) Coinage, weighing and testing are all closely tied to debasement. [note that 1-7 here are more or less untouched by Armado, although they’ve been part of the argument all along. In other words, the external evidence that might lead one to believe that MFM has to do with coinage and debasement – and which gives the reader a framework from which to intelligently gauge whether the presence of the apparent allegory is coincidence or intentional – is simply not considered by Armado, who starts and ends with the belief that it’s all coincidence]
8) Shakespeare intentionally named Angelo after a coin, the English Angel.
9) The Duke is a monarch figure.
10) One can “map” the elements of the play onto a debasement metaphor, where the monarch figures plus a character named Mariana work together to prevent a “coin” character from becoming debased.
11) The character that does the most to save the coin and is in fact married to the coin at the end is named Mariana.
12) Mariana was the name of a Spanish Jesuit historian and theologian who wrote against debasement.
13) MFM contains a good number of contemporary references.
14) In the play, Mariana’s brother Frederick was a great soldier who died at sea.
15) A great soldier who had recently died at sea when the play was written and who would have been known to Shakespeare’s audience was Federico Spinola.
16) There are various links between Federico Spinola and Juan de Mariana, in that (1) they both supported the Spanish cause; (2) they both were concerned with Spanish finances, and (3) they had similar views on privateering.
17) In the play, Mariana lives in a “moated grange”
18) The Jesuit Edmund Campion was captured at a “moated grange.”
19) There is a connection between Edmund Campion and Juan de Mariana because they were both famous Jesuits.
I believe that all 19 of the above are true statements, and I have provided support for each of them in the essay and in these posts. They are all evidence pointing in the direction of the debasement theory. The essay sets forth a number of aspects of the play that the debasement theory explains, such as the name Isabella, the name Claudio, the periods that the law was not enforced, the period that Mariana has been separated from Angelo, why Angelo is forgiven, why Mariana still loves Angelo, why Isabella refuses to save Claudio, what the Duke’s proposal to Isabella is all about, and the reason that the Valladolid copy of the second folio has its copy of MFM ripped out. All of these things that the theory can explain work to support the theory itself (i.e. the more it explains, the stronger it is), and it’s all evidence. As I said at the outset, it’s really just a question of whether we give Shakespeare credit for inserting the allegory or not. Why not give him credit – or at least acknowledge that there’s a good chance that it was intentional?
Lodovico goes on:
“There is no strong or definite context of similar work to place an allegorical Measure in, so the theory relies on our lack of knowledge about how writing was written and understood in Renaissance England.”
I don’t think I’m relying on any “lack of knowledge” here. See above.
Lodovico also writes:
“This theory cannot be specifically disproved since there is so little outside of your reading of the play support it. I think that is ultimately the source of the frustration here. The whole theory is based on elements of the text that seem ambiguous proofs at best to most readers and there is nothing strong enough outside the play to tip the balance. The even more arguable references to angels in R&J seem to weaken the argument rather than strengthen it, because there the analogy would have even less point in most readers’ view. The allegory has little context in drama of the period and no strong evidence to indicate Measure is a unique case.”
Since when is the “disprovability” (i.e. falsifiability) of a textual interpretation a refutation of that interpretation? Very little that anyone says about Shakespeare can be disproved (and for that matter, very little can be proved). Why are you frustrated with my essay, but not with all other Shakespeare scholarship?
I can’t tell if you have actually read the essay, or are relying on Mr. Armado’s critique. The one piece of evidence that you cite is the Juliet-angel point, which Mr. Armado makes a big deal of, but which is (as usual) on the fringe of my argument. Since you’ve raised it though, I suppose I can respond briefly here: It’s not necessary to my argument to assume that Juliet in R&J was specifically associated with the “angel” coin in that play (although Rosaline made the good point on Sept. 17 that this association would have been automatic). The main point is that (1) Juliet in R&J was considered an “angel”; (2) apart from R&J, an angel was a coin; (3) the name Juliet is thus associated with angels and thus with coins, and thus is a good name for a woman in a debasement metaphor. That’s it.
Lodovico concludes:
“You can respond if you like and I would very much hope there is something I am missing to document the existence of work such as you suggest Measure is. I will let you have the last word and not respond back since I know this whole can of worms is irksome to many. I only re-opened it this far because the issue of context was one I looked for in the earlier thread and did not see addressed.”
I don’t think you should be shy about responding. I think the reason people were getting tired of this thread was the tone and the length of some of the posts. If we can keep our posts civil and to the point, I think the rest of the world will indulge us. If you have the time to respond, I would be interested to hear your reactions.
Tom Krause
The below is from a different thread
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1926 Thursday, 21 October 2004
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Thursday, 21 Oct 2004 8:53:07 -0400
Subject: 15.1916 Billy Bob on the Bard
Leonato writes:
“It could take place in Vienna, Virginia and Billy Bob could be wound up about the debasement of Confederate currency.”
Sounds good to me. Actually, at this year’s Illinois Shakespeare Festival Hamlet showed his mother coins in the two pictures scene, so the theory is spreading.
Tom Krause
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1940 Monday, 25 October 2004
[1]
From: Polonius
Date: Friday, 22 Oct 2004 12:26:06 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1924 Question on Measure for Measure
[2]
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Friday, 22 Oct 2004 20:08:47 -0400
Subj: SHK 15.1924 Question on Measure for Measure
[3]
From: Kent
Date: Saturday, 23 Oct 2004 10:29:39 -0400
Subj: Question on Measure for Measure
[4]
From: Holofernes
Date: Monday, 25 Oct 2004 01:43:27 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1924 Question on Measure for Measure
[1]—————————————————————–
From: Polonius
Date: Friday, 22 Oct 2004 12:26:06 -0400
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1924 Question on Measure for Measure
Rosaline
“Yeah, most writers that we know from that period were What You See Is WhatYou Get, WYSIWYG. Shakespeare wasn’t. That’s why we still study him, still discover new in his 400-year-old wordplay. He wasn’t ordinary and comparing him to ordinary talented writers is apples and oranges and always will be.”
This is rank bardolatry, so clean you could eat off it, and so extreme that, were it applied to Christ Jesus Himself, it would be condemned as Apollinarian heresy. [a rather pointless interjection]
[2]————————————————————-
From: Tom Krause <tkrause@cox.net>
Date: Friday, 22 Oct 2004 20:08:47 -0400
Subject: SHK 15.1924 Question on Measure for Measure
Nathaniel wrote:
“Mr Krause’s single-mindedness is stunning. . . .”
No, what’s stunning is how you’ve managed to construe what was essentially a joke on my part as evidence of my “single-mindedness,” and then — disregarding my warning not to go there — turned around and “refuted” my “point” with a stunningly single-minded (if derivative) theory of your own.
To get back on track and help get this thread out of The Moderator’s hair, here is what you can do: Read the quotes from Kaufmann from my last post (the ones that explain how the opening lines of the play set us up for an extended economic metaphor). Then, assume that everyone watching the play was worried about debasement, had heard of Juan de Mariana, and knew that he was against debasement. Then tell me what you think of the debasement theory. [we never heard from Nathaniel again]
I actually have a lot of hope for you, because you have shown yourself to be someone who believes that Shakespeare might have put allegories and contemporary references into his plays. Obviously, this exercise will be difficult if you are POSITIVE that nobody in England at the time knew of Juan de Mariana. But remember what Fitzgerald said (approximately): “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.” I’m sure you can do it, and I promise you it will move the ball forward — if you accept those premises, any flaws in the theory that you identify will probably be flaws that I truly need to address.
Maria writes:
“Did Shakespeare put a debasement allegory in Measure for Measure? I don’t know. If he did, his audience would have caught it. But if he did not, his audience might have caught it anyway!”
The voice of reason!
Tom Krause
[3]————————————————————-
From: Kent
Date: Saturday, 23 Oct 2004 10:29:39 -0400
Subject: Question on Measure for Measure
In an earlier post, Holofernes wrote:
“I do, however, find the correlation of Marianas to bed-tricks intriguing, and would suggest that Shakespeare (possibly unconsciously) picked up the name ‘Mariana’ while studying other bed-trick plays, preparatory to writing one of his own – probably “All’s Well That Ends Well”.”
To which Tom Krause replied the next day:
“What correlation? Why are you so eager to accept a “correlation” without proof (i.e. number of plays, number of Marianas, number of bed tricks, variance, etc.) but insist on more and more proof as to Federico?”
Or more and more proof that Mariana was well known to many English by the early 1600’s, and that his views on currency and debasement had “circulated,” so to speak? Holofernes’s position now is not one of the reasonable skeptic but the obstructionist, out at all costs to demand more and more proof without ever considering what is “probable,” – the only real criterion in arguments like this, where the quantity and quality of evidence will never amount to what, ideally, we would all like.
Tom has an obligation – which he has amply fulfilled – to persuade with arguments and evidence. Doesn’t Holofernes also have an obligation to eschew obstructionism and, at the very least, admit that Krause has made a reasonable case that persuades others, if not Holofernes himself?
Kent
[4]————————————————————-
From: Holofernes
Date: Monday, 25 Oct 2004 01:43:27 +0100
Subject: Re: SHK 15.1924 Question on Measure for Measure
The Moderator wrote:
[Editor’s Note: I would appreciate it if contributors to this thread would make an effort to bring it to a conclusion soon.]
Obviously, nothing much more would be achieved by further discussion of the alleged allegory, [yes, since your contributions have degenerated into mere obstructionism] but I would have hoped that further discussion of issues such as the extent of the involvement of Middleton as a reviser or collaborator might be permitted?
Nathaniel wrote:
“WS’s collaborator on Pericles was the Catholic recusant George Wilkins.”
I have seen Wilkins described as a drunkard and as a brothel-keeper, but not, I think, as a recusant.
In 1609 Pericles was included in a season of religious mystery plays staged by a troupe of Catholic recusant actors that toured the Yorkshire Dales.
They also performed King Lear!
Rosaline wrote
“Mr. Holofernes, Shakespeare was very particular in his character’s names. If that hasn’t been amply proven by now, I dunno, I just dunno.”
This is a truly baffling statement! There must be some examples – but I can’t, at the moment, think of any character names that have any significance whatsoever.
Maria wrote:
“Certainly enough of these people existed in contemporary theatre audiences for Ben Jonson to make fun of them in his Induction to Bartholomew Fair:”
I would suggest that the Induction to Bartholomew Fair is not meant to be taken at face value, and thus that it would be very dangerous to draw any conclusions about anything from it (and certainly not the production date of Titus Andronicus!)
Tom Krause wrote:
“I’m baffled by your apparent belief that the Spinola example demonstrates a defect in my “style of reasoning.” The last time you raised this point (your Aug. 24 post), I explained to you that Spinola had been a prominent member of Spain’s military force from 1593-1603, and that his death in a naval battle off Ostend would certainly have been widely reported (see my Aug. 25 post). Now you seem to be insisting that I prove (beyond this obvious inference) that the English had heard of him. Of course they had.”
This is exactly what I am complaining about. I was asking for quotations from contemporary sources to illustrate the point, not assumptions about significance and quotations from modern historians. [even now, he demands contemporary references to show that the English had heard of a Spanish leader who for years had preyed on their shipping, harried their coast, engaged their warships, and been rumored to be planning an invasion for which an organized defense as instituted. And specifically telling him which contemporary sources were cited by Wernham apparently isn’t enough]
“I don’t have a citation to an exact contemporary source about Federico’s death, but I assure you it was a big deal. An account of it appears in Edward Grimeston’s “A Generall History of the Netherlands” (London 1608), and I’d be willing to bet, though I can’t prove just now, that Federico’s death is mentioned in Grimeston’s “A True Historie of the Memorable Siege of Ostend” (London 1604). Does that satisfy my onus?”
That’s much more like it – but quotations, please. [does one need to quote Shakespeare’s marriage record every time one asserts that he married Ann Hathaway? Holofernes seems to consider my failure to provide contemporary citations to establish uncontroversial facts to be on a par with the legitimate if overblown by Armado issue of the fact that I must infer that Mariana’s knews were known before their first known publication date]
“And where exactly do you draw the line on your “work of fiction” argument? Do you take a position on what the plague, the war, the peace, the sweat, the gallows, and the King of Hungary refer to? If you say they don’t refer to anything (it’s fiction, after all), then you are taking a position, but it’s a position that most critics disagree with.”
My ‘position’ is that they don’t refer to anything specific: Shakespeare (or Middleton!) put them in as ‘local colour’ – something that his audience could relate to from their own experience, and would thus find plausible for the time and place of the play’s action. This is not a particularly original position: even if ‘most critics’ disagree with different parts of it, they are unable to agree amongst themselves (as you yourself have shown) as to what elements, if any, refer to which specific events of 1603, 1604 or 1621.
“see Hendrik Dijkgraaf, The Library of a Jesuit Community at Holbeck, Nottinghamshire, 1679 (2003) isbn 0951881175. Interesting, and this could be helpful if it tells us that the library was in existence in 1603-04 and what its collection contained then (does the book address these questions?).”
You misunderstand my purpose: I am supplying the reference in order that you might check it – I was not proposing to do the work myself!
“I think Taylor and Jowett’s answer would be that they believe they have found a clear contemporary reference to a 1621 event, as described in my post (i.e. the attack on Vienna by the King of Hungary).”
I propose to draw a discreet veil of silence over the question of whether (or not!) there might have been a ‘King of Hungary’ in 1621! [I’m not sure what this cryptic comment is supposed to mean, and I haven’t gone back and looked at Taylor and Jowett, but the internet tells me that Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II of the House of Habsburg was “the King of Hungary” from 1618 to 1637].
Holofernes
This was the end of the thread.