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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
The late “Elizabethan” tragedy Andromana; or, The Merchant's Wife, probably written shortly after 1642 and first published in 1660, furnishes interesting evidence of the assimilation of certain material into the drama just as the Puritans were closing the London theatres. In its sources, in many of its ideas, in the way of presenting its problem, and in its mood, it reflects the influence of John Ford's studies of abnormal psychology, modelled on the case histories presented in Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy. The play allows a carefully documented study of this literary material and of the deepening interest in its dramatic presentation in that its story can be examined in three successive stages at three widely separated dates:
In the generally acknowledged source, the Plangus story in Sidney's Arcadia (1590).
In Beaumont and Fletcher's Cupid's Revenge (ca. 1611).
In Andromana (after 1642).
1 See Robert Dodsley, A Select Collection of Old English Plays, ed. by W. C. Hazlitt (London, 1875), xiv, 193 ff. Or Sir Walter Scott, The Ancient British Drama (London, 1810), iii, 242 ff.
2 See F. G. Fleay, A Biographical Chronicle of the English Drama, 1559–1642, ii, 173.—There is a reference in Andromana (iii. v) to the book of Denham's play The Sophy, which was printed in 1642; see The Poetical Works of Sir John Denham ed. by T. H. Banks, Jr. (Yale University Press, 1928), p. 354.
3 The play was entered in the Stationers' Register on 19 May, 1660. There is no record of its having been licensed for performance.
4 See unprinted dissertation by S. B. Ewing, John Ford's Tragedies and Tragicomedies, in Princeton University Library, 1934.
5 See C. M. Gayley, Beaumont, the Dramatist (New York, 1914), p. 111.
6 Bk. ii, Chap. 15.
7 The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia, ed. by Albert Feuillerat (Cambridge University Press, 1922), p. 244.
8 Andromana was ascribed to Shirley in the Stationers' Register, but the ascription has never been accepted. See Quarterly Review, vii (1812), 290; The Dramatic Works and Poems of James Shirley, ed. by William Gifford and Alexander Dyce (London, 1833), i, liv; Dodsley, op. cit., xiv, 194; A. W. Ward, D. N. B., s.v. “James Shirley”; Cambridge History of English Literature, vi, 451; F. G. Fleay, A Biographical Chronicle of the English Drama, ii, 173; A. H. Nason, James Shirley, Dramatist (New York, 1915), p. 445.
9 Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, ed. by A. R. Shilleto (London, 1893), i, 164, 167.
10 Burton, i, 193.
11 Sidney, p. 243.
12 The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, ed. by A. R. Waller (Cambridge University Press, 1910), ix, 231.
13 Dodsley, Old English Plays. Andromana, p. 198.
14 Ibid., p. 199.
15 Ibid.
16 Ibid., p. 200: “I do not like that youth should be thus melancholy.”
17 Ibid., p. 215: “What, sir, are you melancholy?”
18 Ibid., p. 238: “I am Strangely melancholy.” And p. 250: “Be short, for I am very melancholy.”
19 Ibid., p. 204: “Love is a childish evil, though the effects/Are dangerous.”—Burton has 295 pages on love-melancholy, a “disease.”
20 Ibid., especially pp. 216–218, 233–238.
21 Burton, iii, 303.
22 Ibid., pp. 321–322.
23 Ibid., p. 329.
24 Sidney, p. 246.
25 Andromana, p. 206.
26 Ibid., p. 200.
27 Ibid., p. 201.
28 Ibid., pp. 247, 267.
29 Ibid., p. 260.
30 Ibid., p. 263.
31 See above, p. 1009.
32 The Lover's Melancholy, p. 12, in The Works of John Ford ed. by William Gifford, Alexander Dyce, and A. H. Bullen (London, 1895).
33 See above, p. 1010.
34 The Lover's Melancholy, p. 39.
35 See above, p. 1009.
36 'Tis Pity, p. 115.
37 Andromana, p. 200. (See above, note 16.)
38 'Tis Pity, p. 127: “You see I have but two, a son and her;/And he is so devoted to his book,/As I must tell you true, I doubt his health.”
39 Andromana, p. 202.
40 'Tis Pity, p. 153.
41 The word husband.
42 Andromana, p. 209.
43 'Tis Pity, p. 114.
44 Andromana, p. 210: “Ephorbas cannot call him son that makes/Lust his deity.” And'Tis Pity, p. 122: “Giovanni O, that it were not in religion sin/To make our love a god, and worship it!”
45 The action of Leucippus, the corresponding character in Cupid's Revenge, affords an interesting contrast at this point: Leucippus boldly lies, to protect the lady's reputation, but is not the victim of his own casuistry. Plangus and Giovanni deceive themselves as well.
46 Andromana, p. 212.
47 'Tis Pity, p. 200.
48 Tis Pity, ii. v.
49 There is constant reference throughout the play to Plangus's obedience to his training. Note pp. 201, 213, 216, 235–238, 238–239, 242–243, 254, 256–257, 264, 266–267.
50 Burton, iii, 434.
51 Andromana, p. 262.
52 Thus Love's Sacrifice:
Duke It should not be:—Bianca! why, I took her
From lower than a bondage:—hell of hells!—(p. 69).
Fiormonda What is she but the sallow-colour'd brat
Of some unlanded bankrupt, taught to catch
The easy fancies of young prodigal bloods
In springes of her stew-instructed art?—(p. 74).
Bianca I am beholding to you, that vouchsaf'd
Me, from a simple gentlewoman's place,
The honour of your bed. (p. 93).
53 Andromana, p. 267; Love's Sacrifice, p. 84.
54 The Broken Heart, p. 219.
55 Ibid., p. 240.
56 Andromana, p. 212.
57 Ibid., p. 224.
58 Thus Andromana, p. 246:
Ephorbas I hope
I bad fair for a boy to-night. How happy
Should I count myself could I but leave
My kingdom something that had thy image in't.
59 Andromana, p. 201.
60 Ibid.
61 Ibid., pp. 227, 230.
62 Ibid., p. 249.
63 Ibid., p. 200.
64 The Fancies, p. 306.
65 Andromana, p. 258.
66 For example in The Broken Heart, i. i.
67 Ibid., ii. i.
68 Ibid., ii. ii.
69 Ibid., iii. ii.
70 See S. P. Sherman, Ford's Debt to his Predecessors and Contemporaries; and his Contributions to the Decadence of the Drama, ms. in Harvard University Library, 1906.
71 See above, note 8.
72 Gilchrist (?) in Quarterly Review, vii (1812), 290; Gifford and Dyce in The Dramatic Works and Poems of James Shirley (London, 1833), i, liv.