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Fairies, Fractious Women and the Old Faith: Fairy Lore in Early Modern British Drama and Culture
By Regina Buccola
Susquehanna University Press, 2006. 293 pp.
Regina Buccola begins her study of the role fairy lore plays in early modem drama and culture by discussing how strong a presence it had in the consciousness of the Renaissance theatergoer. She then shows how fairy lore portrayed and empowered) women; how fairies were a medium through which the desires of the lower classes were expressed, particularly those of women. She goes on to outline the link between fairy lore and Catholicism, which was a view held by prominent Protestant critics of the period. She describes how fairies were a prevalent part of the early modem public consciousness and "the ways in which they served as touchstones for shifting early modern attitudes with respect to gender roles, class positions, and state-sponsored institutions such as the church" (21). In her Introduction, Buccola shows that fairies and fairyland were most closely associated with the female gender, while fairies themselves were sexually ambiguous creatures that were considered most active in times of change and instability. For example, fairies interrupted the lives of mortals (particularly women) at transitional periods of their lives such as childbirth, sleep and marriage. Fairies were also considered to inhabit a realm outside of earth, heaven, and hell; they were morally ambiguous creatures who were neither considered angels nor demons in the public's imagination. Despite their ambiguous status, English Protestants ultimately linked fairies with the desires of the female gender and the Catholic faith, which was considered an effeminate religion that promulgated superstition among its practitioners.
With this context in mind, Buccola approaches the texts in question: Shakespeare's A Midsummer Nights Dream, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Cymbline, and All's Well that Ends Well; and Ben Jonson's The Alchemist. She recasts some previously held assertions of the female characters within these plays and sheds a refreshing and informative light on this neglected yet essential area of cultural study. By reading the plays through the spectacles of contemporary fairy lore (a point of view that was culturally ingrained, and thus came very naturally to an early modern audience), Buccola adroitly tackles problems and misreadings previous critics have had with characters such as Imogen from Cymbeline or Helena from A Midsummer Night's Dream, and gives invaluable insight into the role female characters played within the world of the text as well as the implications they had on early modern culture.
In the first chapter Buccola discusses the social implications and criticisms of Shakespeare's most overtly fairy-laden play, A Midsummer Night's Dream. Buccola shows how the action of the play takes place in a luminal realm (the forest just outside Athens) which allows for the initially pathetic character of [lelena to invert her position, with the aid of Oberon, by the end of the play. Hermia is granted her desire to marry Lysander. Thus "the lovers in A Midsumrner Night's Dream are ultimately united by a fairy force aligned with the female desires of both Helena and Hermia" (81). Although fairies are not present in the Merry Wives of Windsor, their images are evoked in the final act in which Falstaff is publicly humiliated at the hands of Mistress Page and Mistress Ford. Buccola shows that through the efforts ol the Windsor wives, Falstaff is rendered effeminate in the play (he dons the disguise of the Witch of Benford) and through the fairy disguises, The Page's daughter Anne marries the man she desires rather than the grooms chosen by her parents. Anne, in many ways, is the next generation of the Windsor wives who get their way despite the patriarchal influences within their household and community. Buccola also clears up why the Parson Hugh Evans wears a fairy costume to help Mistress Page and Mistress Ford ensnare Falstaff. She points out that most fairy lore came out of Wales, and many Welsh priests were tolerant of the fairy belief of their parishioners to the dismay of Puritans in London. Therefore, it is natural for the well-intentioned yet "uncouth" Welsh priest tc wear a fairy costume and take part in unchristian rituals.
In the third chapter, Buccola shows how Ben Jonson used fairy lore in association with the character of Dol Common to satirize hypocritical and anti- theatrical Puritans like Tribulation Wholesome and superstitious Londoners like Dapper. All of the characters constantly change their shapes in the play, an ability commonly attributed to fairies. In addition, Dol dresses as the Queen of the Fairies in order to dupe Dapper out of his money. Buccola asserts that Jon- son sprinkles his play with fairy references because he "makes his rogues more palatable and his religious satire easier to swallow by seasoning his play well with fairy parodies, allusions, and theatrics" (132). The addition of popular superstitions in his play makes Jonson's satire that much more effective. In addition to this, Buccola argues that the ambiguous world of the fairies fits right into the confusion associated with the religious, political and socioeconomic changes occurring in the early modem period. This is a welcome perspective into the drama of Ben Jonson that adds to the wealth of interpretive possibilities offered by his plays.
In the fourth chapter, Buccola argues that Imogen is not as feeble a heroine as many critics make her out to be when one considers the fairy references spread throughout the play. She first shows that Imogen is a rather assertive and rebellious at the onset of the play in that she goes against her father's wishes to marry Posthumus and go into Milford Haven. It is only when she dons the outfit of the boy page Fidele that she becomes more feeble and effeminate. Thus gender roles are reversed in Cymbeline, an inversion most closely associated with fairyland. In addition to this, Buccola shows that Milford Haven was a place widely coupled with fairyland and that Imogen's estranged brothers, Guiderius and Arviragus, are changelings whose empty place was taken up by the adopted Posthumus thanks to the efforts of Belarius. They also live in a cave in Wales, a milieu associated with fairyland. Although the play has only a few (but important) direct references to fairies, the actions and settings which propel most of the action in the play are linked to fairy lore. There is also a Catholic link in the play. Because fairy lore was closely associated with Roman Catholicism, and the romance genre in general is steeped in Catholic nostalgia, Shakespeare makes ambiguous and uneasy implications in a play that ends with the Roman conquest of England. I feel Buccola does not venture to say what these religious implications are because Shakespeare's stance on religion is toe indefinite to pin down, but she makes the connection between Catholicism and fairy lore that complicates these ambiguities.
In the last chapter, Buccola takes on the second Helena of her study: Helena from All's Well that Ends Well. Buccola first shows how attitudes towards fairy belief and witchcraft waned into the mid-seventeenth century. She shows that practitioners of witchcraft, and those who were thought to consort with fairies, were often legally persecuted and sometimes sentenced to death in the late l5OOs, but by the time of the Interregnum such acts were considered innocuous offences. Buccola also discusses how Paraclesian medicinal practices-which aimed to cure ailments with medicines specific to an illnesses rather than attempting to balance the four humors with herbal treatment-came into prominence in the late Renaissance whereas they were looked down upon in the mid to late 1 500s. Within this historical context, Buccola not only argues how Helena has fairy or witchlike qualities, but how her character prefigures such historical events. She also argues that by reading the character of Helena with a fairy context in mind, many of the problems previous critics have faced with regard to her are resolved.
Buccola makes it a point to tell the reader her study is not concerned with the existence of fairies, but rather how fairy lore was a point of departure for playwrights who wished to question the gender, moral and social norms of their day. She concludes her study by encouraging scholars to take the fairy approach to other problematic texts and characters in order illuminate misunderstandings regarding early modern literature and society. The ultimate result of the book is a more complete portrait of the female characters in the plays in question, as well as a more complete understanding of early modern culture in general.
With this context in mind, Buccola approaches the texts in question: Shakespeare's A Midsummer Nights Dream, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Cymbline, and All's Well that Ends Well; and Ben Jonson's The Alchemist. She recasts some previously held assertions of the female characters within these plays and sheds a refreshing and informative light on this neglected yet essential area of cultural study. By reading the plays through the spectacles of contemporary fairy lore (a point of view that was culturally ingrained, and thus came very naturally to an early modern audience), Buccola adroitly tackles problems and misreadings previous critics have had with characters such as Imogen from Cymbeline or Helena from A Midsummer Night's Dream, and gives invaluable insight into the role female characters played within the world of the text as well as the implications they had on early modern culture.
In the first chapter Buccola discusses the social implications and criticisms of Shakespeare's most overtly fairy-laden play, A Midsummer Night's Dream. Buccola shows how the action of the play takes place in a luminal realm (the forest just outside Athens) which allows for the initially pathetic character of [lelena to invert her position, with the aid of Oberon, by the end of the play. Hermia is granted her desire to marry Lysander. Thus "the lovers in A Midsumrner Night's Dream are ultimately united by a fairy force aligned with the female desires of both Helena and Hermia" (81). Although fairies are not present in the Merry Wives of Windsor, their images are evoked in the final act in which Falstaff is publicly humiliated at the hands of Mistress Page and Mistress Ford. Buccola shows that through the efforts ol the Windsor wives, Falstaff is rendered effeminate in the play (he dons the disguise of the Witch of Benford) and through the fairy disguises, The Page's daughter Anne marries the man she desires rather than the grooms chosen by her parents. Anne, in many ways, is the next generation of the Windsor wives who get their way despite the patriarchal influences within their household and community. Buccola also clears up why the Parson Hugh Evans wears a fairy costume to help Mistress Page and Mistress Ford ensnare Falstaff. She points out that most fairy lore came out of Wales, and many Welsh priests were tolerant of the fairy belief of their parishioners to the dismay of Puritans in London. Therefore, it is natural for the well-intentioned yet "uncouth" Welsh priest tc wear a fairy costume and take part in unchristian rituals.
In the third chapter, Buccola shows how Ben Jonson used fairy lore in association with the character of Dol Common to satirize hypocritical and anti- theatrical Puritans like Tribulation Wholesome and superstitious Londoners like Dapper. All of the characters constantly change their shapes in the play, an ability commonly attributed to fairies. In addition, Dol dresses as the Queen of the Fairies in order to dupe Dapper out of his money. Buccola asserts that Jon- son sprinkles his play with fairy references because he "makes his rogues more palatable and his religious satire easier to swallow by seasoning his play well with fairy parodies, allusions, and theatrics" (132). The addition of popular superstitions in his play makes Jonson's satire that much more effective. In addition to this, Buccola argues that the ambiguous world of the fairies fits right into the confusion associated with the religious, political and socioeconomic changes occurring in the early modem period. This is a welcome perspective into the drama of Ben Jonson that adds to the wealth of interpretive possibilities offered by his plays.
In the fourth chapter, Buccola argues that Imogen is not as feeble a heroine as many critics make her out to be when one considers the fairy references spread throughout the play. She first shows that Imogen is a rather assertive and rebellious at the onset of the play in that she goes against her father's wishes to marry Posthumus and go into Milford Haven. It is only when she dons the outfit of the boy page Fidele that she becomes more feeble and effeminate. Thus gender roles are reversed in Cymbeline, an inversion most closely associated with fairyland. In addition to this, Buccola shows that Milford Haven was a place widely coupled with fairyland and that Imogen's estranged brothers, Guiderius and Arviragus, are changelings whose empty place was taken up by the adopted Posthumus thanks to the efforts of Belarius. They also live in a cave in Wales, a milieu associated with fairyland. Although the play has only a few (but important) direct references to fairies, the actions and settings which propel most of the action in the play are linked to fairy lore. There is also a Catholic link in the play. Because fairy lore was closely associated with Roman Catholicism, and the romance genre in general is steeped in Catholic nostalgia, Shakespeare makes ambiguous and uneasy implications in a play that ends with the Roman conquest of England. I feel Buccola does not venture to say what these religious implications are because Shakespeare's stance on religion is toe indefinite to pin down, but she makes the connection between Catholicism and fairy lore that complicates these ambiguities.
In the last chapter, Buccola takes on the second Helena of her study: Helena from All's Well that Ends Well. Buccola first shows how attitudes towards fairy belief and witchcraft waned into the mid-seventeenth century. She shows that practitioners of witchcraft, and those who were thought to consort with fairies, were often legally persecuted and sometimes sentenced to death in the late l5OOs, but by the time of the Interregnum such acts were considered innocuous offences. Buccola also discusses how Paraclesian medicinal practices-which aimed to cure ailments with medicines specific to an illnesses rather than attempting to balance the four humors with herbal treatment-came into prominence in the late Renaissance whereas they were looked down upon in the mid to late 1 500s. Within this historical context, Buccola not only argues how Helena has fairy or witchlike qualities, but how her character prefigures such historical events. She also argues that by reading the character of Helena with a fairy context in mind, many of the problems previous critics have faced with regard to her are resolved.
Buccola makes it a point to tell the reader her study is not concerned with the existence of fairies, but rather how fairy lore was a point of departure for playwrights who wished to question the gender, moral and social norms of their day. She concludes her study by encouraging scholars to take the fairy approach to other problematic texts and characters in order illuminate misunderstandings regarding early modern literature and society. The ultimate result of the book is a more complete portrait of the female characters in the plays in question, as well as a more complete understanding of early modern culture in general.
Sos Bagramyan, English, University of Toronto <Top>
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