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The Authorship of Anything for a Quiet Life

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 February 2021

W. D. Dunkfl
W. D. Dunkfl*
Affiliation:
University of Rochester
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Extract

In an article entitled “A Webster-Middleton Play: Anything for a Quiet Life”1 Mr. Sykes asserts “That this play is partly Middleton's there is no reason to doubt, but most of it is Webster's.”1 The purpose of the present paper is to show that Mr. Sykes has greatly overstated the case for Webster. Whether Webster or Shirley* be regarded as the collaborator or reviser, the work of Thomas Middleton is recognizable to such a considerable extent that the principal share in writing this play may hardly be ascribed to another. Surely there is an important difference between the work of the dramatist who organizes the plot and sketches the characters, and the contribution of another who by means of dialogue more closely individualizes the characters. Such seems to be the differentiation between the shares of Middleton and Webster in writing this play.

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Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 43 , Issue 3 , September 1928, pp. 793 - 799
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1928

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References

page 793 note 1 H. Dugdsle Sykes, Notes and Queries, T-adfth Series, IX (1921), London' pp. 181 ff, 220 ff, 225 ff. The article is reprinted in Sidelights on Elizabdhon Drama. Oxford, 1924, pp. 159-172. For convenience I shall refer to the pagination of the second printing of Mr. Sykes' article.

page 793 note 2 Op. cit., p. 159.

page 793 note 3 “The characterization of Lady Cressingham is drawn very much in the manner of Shirley, who delighted to ridicule the whims and extravagances of highbred ladies. Perhaps Middleton left the play unfinished and Shirley completed it.” A. H. Bullen, “Introduction,” The Worts of Thomas Middleton, London, 1885-86. pp. lxxxvii-iii. A. C. Swinburne observes, “Mr. Bullen ingeniously and plausibly suggests the partnership of Shirley in this play (Anything for a Quid Life),” “Intrduction,” The Best Plays of Thomas Middleton, Mermaid Edition, edited by H. Ellis. London, 1887, p. xviii. On the other hand, another investigator has observed differences in the characterization of women and their importance to the plots in the plays by Middleton and those by Webster. See G. Bradford, “The Women of Middleton and Webster,” Sewanee Review, XXIX (1921), pp. 14-29.

page 793 note 4 The title page, as reprinted by A. H. Bullen, Op. cit., vol. V, p. 239, reads as follows: Anything for a Quid Life. A Comedy, Formerly Acted at Black-Fryers, by His late Majesties Servants. Never before Printed. Written by Tho. Middleton, Gent. London: Printed by The. Johnson for Francis Kirkman and Henry March, and are to be sold at the Princess Arms in Chancery Lane. 1662 . 4to.

page 794 note 5 J. Genest, Some Account of tke Englisk State from tke Restoration in 1660 to 1830, Bath, 1832, 10 vols.

page 794 note 6 Betterton, of course, plsyed the role of De Flores in The Changeling with great success (Ibid., I, 31; II, 458), but as Tke Changeling was written in collaboration with William Rowley, Rowley rather than Middleton may have been responsible for the elements in this play that appealed to the taste of the Restoration audiences. (See, P. G. Wiggin, An Inquiry into tke Authorship of the Middleton-Rowley Plays, Boston, 1897, pp. 49-50.) Other plays referred to by Genest are: Tke Widow (Pp. cit., I, 340), A Trick to Catch the Old One (Ibid., I, 62), The Witch (Ibid., I, 141-2), No Wit No Help like a Woman's (Ibid., 1,212-3), A Mad World My Masters (Ibid., TV, 95-6), The Mayor of Quinborough (Ibid., IV, 113-4), and The Roaring Girt (Ibid., TV, 176).

page 794 note 7 A. Nicoll, Restoration Drama (1660-1700), Cambridge, 1923, pp. 84, 111, 120, 134,138,144,150,152.

page 794 note 8 Mr. Sykes declares that “To me the evidence of Webster's authorship is conclusive,” Op. cit., p. 159.

page 794 note 9 Op. cit., p. 168.

page 794 note 10 Bullen, op. cit., Vol. V, p 304.

page 794 note 11 Op cit. 159.

page 795 note 12 Ibid.

page 795 note 13 Op. cit., p. 159.

page 795 note 14 F. E. Schelling, Elisabethan Drama, Boston, 1908,1, 587.

page 795 note 15 W. Hailitt, The Dramatic Works ofjokn Webster, London, 1857,4 vols.

page 795 note 16 Op. cit., II, i, l. 109.

page 795 note 17 Bullen, op. cit., Vol. VIII, pp. 4-15.

page 796 note 18 In Michaelmas Term, Quomodo, a draper, assisted by his apprentices, Falselight and Shortyard, tries to cheat Easy, a country gull; in Anything jar a Quiet Life, Water-Camlet, a mercer, assisted by his two apprentices, George and Ralph, tries to cheat George Cressinghaxn. Moreover, the treatment of the wives of these shopkeepers in the two plays is very similar.

page 796 note 19 A Trick to Catch the Old One.

page 796 note 20 A Mad World My Masters.

page 796 note 21 A Chaste Maid in Cheapside.

page 796 note 22 The Family of Love.

page 796 note 23 Michaelmas Term.

page 796 note 24 Your Fins Gallants.

page 796 note 25 W. D. Dunkel, The Dramatic Technique of Thomas Middleton in His Comedies of London Lift, Chicago, 1925. In my study no evidence from Anything for a Quiet Life is used. See p. 55.

page 796 note 26 Ibid., pp. 87-90.

page 796 note 27 Cf. A Trick to Catch the Old One, I, iv, 63 ff; Your Five Gallants, throughout, but particularly I, iii, 21-46; V, U, 40-46; The Family of Late, I, i, 4-8; I, iii, 21-46 II, i, 13 ff; HI, iv, v, vL

page 796 note 28 Cf. A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, I, i, 52-97; in, ii; IV, i, 1-21, 100 ff; V, i 82 ff.

page 796 note 29 Cf. Michaelmas Term, I, i, 27-33; A Trick to Catch tke Old One (Dampit), I, iv; UI, iv; IV, v; A Mad World My Masters, III, iii, 148; Tke Family of Love, V, iii, 1-29; and The Phoenix, I, iv; II, iii.

page 797 note 30 Op. cit., V, i, 11.17-19.

page 797 note 31 Cf. Anything for a Quiet Life, II, i, and A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, III, iii.

page 797 note 32 III, iii, 48 ff.

page 797 note 33 Op. cit., p. 165.

page 797 note 34 Ibid.

page 797 note 35 Ibid.

page 797 note 36 See The Family of Love throughout, but particularly, I, iii, 101-113; III. iii, 100-132; IV, i, 81-83; A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, I, i, 109-110; II, iii, 13 ff, iv; III, i, ii, iii; Your Fit* Gallants, I, i, 253; A Mad World My Masters, I, ii, 73.

page 797 note 37 Op cit.,p. 166.

page 798 note 38 Op. cit,pp. 166-7.

page 798 note 39 Bullen, op. cit., Vol V, p. 304.

page 798 note 40 A. Dyce, Tke Works of Tkemas Middleton, London, 1840, 4 vol..

page 798 note 41 Op. cit., p. 169.

page 798 note 42 Dunkel, op. cit., pp. 24-26.

page 798 note 43 IV.iv, 1-15.

page 798 note 44 Dunkel, op. cit., pp. 69-71.

page 798 note 45 LL 382-7.

page 799 note 46 Mr. F. L. Lucas, the most recent editor of the Works of Webster (Lond., 1927) Includes the text of A nytkine for a Quiet Life. In his discussion of the question of iu authorship he resUtes the theory put forward by Mr. Sykes, and adds: “I have nothing to subtract from his conclusions and only a couple of dozen new parallel passages to add to his evidence for Webster's share” (TV, 66). The additional evidence does not, I believe, affect any point made in the present paper.