Part 5 (1/2)
The earliest known mention of the play is by a contemporary, Thomas Lorkin, in a letter of the last day of June, 1613. He writes that the day before, while Burbage and his company were playing ”Henry VIII.” in the Globe Theatre, the building was burnt down through a discharge of ”chambers,” that is to say of small pieces of cannon. Early in the month following Sir Henry Wotton writes to his nephew giving particulars of the fire, and describing the pageantry, which was evidently an important feature of the play:
”The King's players had a new play called 'All is True,' representing some princ.i.p.al pieces of the reign of Henry the Eighth, which was set forth with many extraordinary circ.u.mstances of pomp and majesty, even to the matting of the stage; the Knights of the Order with their Georges and Garter, the guards with their embroidered coats, and the like; sufficient in truth, within a while, to make greatness very familiar if not ridiculous.”
Now, if Sir Henry Wotton is correct in his a.s.sertion that the play was a _new_ one in 1613, it was probably the last play written by Shakespeare: although some commentators contend that there is internal evidence to show that the play was written during Elizabeth's reign, and that after her death it was amended by the insertion of speeches complimentary to the new sovereign, King James. In 1623 the play appears in print inserted in the first collected edition of Shakespeare's dramas, by Heminge and Condell, who were the poet's fellow-actors, and who claim to have printed all the plays from the author's ma.n.u.scripts. If, then, this statement were trustworthy, there could be no reason to doubt the genuineness of the drama. But the copies in the hands of Heminge and Condell were evidently in some cases very imperfect, either in consequence of the burning of the Globe Theatre, or by the necessary wear and tear of years. And it is certain that, in several instances, the editors reprinted the plays from the earlier quarto impressions with but few changes, sometimes for the better, and sometimes for the worse. It has also been ascertained that at least four of the plays in the folio were only partially written by Shakespeare, while no mention is made of his possible share in ”Pericles,”
the play having been omitted altogether. So that it is presumed that if ”Henry VIII.,” in its present form, was a play rewritten by theatre-hacks to replace a similar play by Shakespeare that was destroyed in the fire, the editors would not be unlikely to insert it in the folio instead of the original.
So long as Shakespeare's authors.h.i.+p was not doubted there seems to have been no desire on the part of commentators to call attention to faults which are obvious to every careful reader of the play. Most of the early criticisms are confined to remarks on single scenes or speeches irrespective of the general character of the drama and its personages.
Comments such as the following of Dr. Drake fairly represent those of most writers until the middle of the last century. He writes in 1817: ”The entire interest of the tragedy turns upon the characters of Queen Katherine and Cardinal Wolsey, the former being the finest picture of suffering and defenceless virtue, and the latter of disappointed ambition, that poet ever drew.” Dr. Johnson, who ranks the play as second cla.s.s among the historical works, had previously a.s.serted ”that the genius of Shakespeare comes in and goes out with Katherine. Every other part may be easily conceived and easily written.”
When, however, the play is judged as a work of art in its complete form, the difficulty of writing favourably of its dramatic qualities becomes evident by the apologetic modes of expression used. Schlegel remarks that ”Henry VIII.” has somewhat ”of a prosaic appearance, for Shakespeare, artist-like, adapted himself to the quality of his materials. While others of his works, both in elevation of fancy, and in energy of pathos and character tower far above this, we have here, on the other hand, occasion to admire his nice powers of discrimination and his perfect knowledge of courts and the world.” Coleridge is content to define the play as that of ”a sort of historical masque or show play”; and Victor Hugo observes that Shakespeare is so far English as to attempt to extenuate the failings of Henry VIII., adding, ”it is true that the eye of Elizabeth is fixed upon him!”
In an interesting little volume containing the journal of Emily Sh.o.r.e, who made some valuable contributions to natural history, are to be found some remarks upon the play written in the year 1836. The criticism is the more noteworthy since Miss Sh.o.r.e was only in her sixteenth year when she wrote it, and she then showed no slight appreciation of literature, especially of Shakespeare:
”This evening my uncle finished reading 'King Henry VIII.' I must say I was mightily disappointed in it. Whether it is that I am not capable of understanding Shakespeare and cannot distinguish his beauties, I do not know. There is no effort in Shakespeare's works; he takes so little pains that what is interesting or n.o.ble or sublime or finely exhibiting the features of the mind, seems to drop from his pen by chance. One cannot help thinking that every play is executed with slovenly neglect, that he has done himself injustice and that if he pleased he might have given to the world works which would throw into the shade all that he has actually written. To be sure this gives one a very exalted idea of his intellect, for even if the mere unavoidable overflowings of his genius excel the depths of other men's minds, how magnificent must have been the fountain of that genius whose very bubbles sparkle so beautifully! But to speak of 'Henry VIII.' in particular. Henry himself, Katherine and Wolsey, though they display a degree of character, are not half so vigorously drawn as I had expected, or as I would methinks have done myself. The character of Cranmer exists more in Henry's language about him than in his own actions.”
To come now to the opinion of the German commentators. Gervinus observes:
”No one in this short explanation of the main character of 'Henry VIII.' will mistake the certain hand of the poet. It is otherwise when we approach closer to the development of the action and attentively consider the poetic diction. The impression on the whole becomes then at once strange and unrefres.h.i.+ng; the mere external threads seem to be lacking which ought to link the actions to each other; the interest of the feelings becomes strangely divided, it is continually drawn into new directions and is nowhere satisfied. At first it clings to Buckingham, and his designs against Wolsey, but with the second act he leaves the stage; then Wolsey attracts our attention in an increased degree, and he, too, disappears in the third act; in the meanwhile our sympathies are more and more strongly drawn to Katherine, who then likewise leaves the stage in the fourth act; and after we have been thus shattered through four acts by circ.u.mstances of a purely tragic character, the fifth act closes with a merry festivity for which we are in no wise prepared, crowning the King's loose pa.s.sion with victory in which we could take no warm interest.”
Ulrici is even more severe in his remarks upon the play:
”The drama of 'Henry VIII.' is poetically untrue, devoid of real life, defective in symmetry and composition, because wanting in internal organic construction, _i.e._, in ethical vitality.”
So also is Professor Hertzberg:
”A chronicle history with three and a half catastrophes varied by a marriage and a coronation pageant, ending abruptly with the baptism of a child in which are combined the elements of a satirical drama with a prophetic ecstasy, and all this loosely connected by the nominal hero whom no poet in heaven or earth could ever have formed into a tragic character.”
And Dr. Elze, who is a warm supporter of Shakespeare's authors.h.i.+p, admits that the play--
”measured by the standard of the historical drama is inferior to the other histories and wants both a grand historical substance and the unity of strictly defined dramatic structure.”
But it is not only with the general design of the play and its feeble characterization that fault is found, but also with the versification. The earliest criticism on the peculiarity of the metre of the play appeared about 1757. It consists of some remarks, published by Mr. Thomas Edwards, which were made by Mr. Roderick on Warburton's edition of Shakespeare. Mr.
Roderick, after pointing out that there are in the play many more lines than in any other which end with a redundant syllable, continues:
”This Fact (whatever Shakespeare's design was in it) is undoubtedly true, and may be demonstrated to Reason, and proved to sense; the first by comparing any number of lines in this Play, with an equal number in any other Play, by which it will appear that this Play has very near _two_ redundant verses to _one_ in any other Play. And to prove it to sense, let anyone read aloud an hundred lines in any other Play, and an hundred in this; and if he perceives not the tone and cadence of his own voice to be involuntarily altered in the latter case from what it was in the former, I would never advise him to give much credit to the information of his ears.”
Later on we find that Emerson is also struck with the peculiarity of the metre, and in his lecture on ”Representative Men,” observes:
”In 'Henry VIII.' I think I see plainly the cropping out of the original rock on which his (Shakespeare's) own finer structure was laid. The first play was written by a superior thoughtful man, with a vicious ear. I can mark his lines and know well their cadence. See Wolsey's soliloquy, and the following scene with Cromwell, where, instead of the metre of Shakespeare, whose secret is that the thought constructs the tune, so that reading for the sense will best bring out the rhythm; here the lines are constructed on a given tune; and the verse has even a trace of pulpit eloquence.”
Now these quotations, it may be urged, were picked out with a view to prejudice a favourable opinion of the play. But disparagements are, none the less, important links in a question of authors.h.i.+p. In fact it was because Shakespearian critics, of undisputed authority, declared that ”Henry VIII.” was not a play worthy of the poet's genius that a few advanced scholars were encouraged to come forward and p.r.o.nounce that no part of the play had been written by Shakespeare.
In the autumn of 1850 Mr. Spedding, the able editor of Bacon's works, published a paper in the _Gentleman's Magazine_ in which he stated it to be his belief that a great portion of the play of ”Henry VIII.” was written by Fletcher; a conjecture that indeed had been antic.i.p.ated and was at once confirmed by other writers. Tennyson, on Mr. Spedding's authority, had pointed out many years previously the resemblance of the style in some parts of the play to Fletcher's. In fact, the conclusion arrived at by the advanced critics was that the play has two totally different metres which are the work of two different authors. On this point Mr. Spedding wrote:
”A distinction so broad and so uniform running through so large a portion of the same piece cannot have been accidental, and the more closely it is examined, the more clearly will it appear that the metre in these two sets of scenes is managed upon entirely different principles and bears evidence of different workmen.”
This conclusion, however, was not endorsed by all commentators. It was acknowledged that metrical evidence must not be neglected, and that ”there is no play of Shakespeare's in which eleven syllable lines are so frequent as they are in ”Henry VIII.”; and even Swinburne, whose faith in Shakespeare's authors.h.i.+p was unwavering, a.s.serted ”that if not the partial work it may certainly be taken as the general model of Fletcher, in some not unimportant pa.s.sages.” It was contended besides that the poet's hand was hampered by a difficulty inherent in the subject, since of all Shakespeare's plays, ”Henry VIII.” is the nearest in its story to the poet's own time, and that the elliptical construction and the licence of versification, which are peculiar to this play, are necessary in order to bring the dialogue closer to the language of common life. In fact, Mr.
Spedding's opponents, while admitting an anonymous hand in the prologue and epilogue, rejected the theory as to the manner in which the collaboration was carried out, and a.s.serted that the structure of the play, the development of the action and the characters showed it to be the work of one hand, and that Shakespeare's.
Another challenger of the metre was Mr. Robert Boyle, who endeavoured to show, from a careful and elaborate study of Elizabethan blank verse, that Shakespeare had no share whatever in the composition of the play, and that whoever was the author who collaborated with Fletcher (in Mr. Boyle's opinion it was Ma.s.singer) he certainly did not write before 1612, for the metrical peculiarities of the verse are those of the later dramatic style, of which the earliest characteristics did not make themselves felt in the work of any poet till about 1607. It was after reading this paper that Robert Browning, then the president of the New Shakspere Society, wrote his final judgment on the play which was published in the Society's ”Transactions.”
”As you desired I have read once again 'Henry the Eighth'; my opinion about the scanty portion of Shakespeare's authors.h.i.+p in it was formed about fifty years ago, while ignorant of any evidence external to the text itself. I have little doubt now that Mr. Boyle's judgment is right altogether; that the original play, presumably Shakespeare's, was burnt along with the Globe Theatre; that the present work is a subst.i.tution for it, probably with certain reminiscences of 'All is true.' In spite of such huff-and-bullying as Charles Knight's for example, I see little that transcends the power of Ma.s.singer and Fletcher to execute. It is very well to talk of the tediousness of the Chronicles, which have furnished pretty well whatever is admirable in the characters of Wolsey and Katherine; as wisely should we depreciate the bone which holds the marrow we enjoy on a toast.