Jonson, Shakespeare and the Italian theorists

Abstract

Ben Jonson's poem introducing the 1623 Folio of Shakespeare's plays is one of the finest tributes ever penned to the friend and colleague he calls 'my beloved [ ... ] Mr. William Shakespeare.' But during Shakespeare's lifetime Jonson was on occasions much less complimentary, criticizing the plays from the standpoint of neo-classical critical theory and in particular from the standpoint of such Italian theorists as Minturno, Giraldi Cinthia and Ludovico Castelvetro. Jonson's reference to the laws of time, place and 'persons' in the prologue to Volpone (1606), for instance, is a reference, either directly or indirectly, to Castelvetro's Commento sopra Aristotele (1570), for it was Castelvetro who added the demand for a unity of place to Aristotle's reference to keeping 'where possible to within a single circle of the sun.' Castelvetro turns Aristotle's permissive reference to a unity of time to firm rules governing time and place: Nella tragedia lo spatio del luogo, per lo quale essa si mena a fine, e ristretto non solamente ad una citta o villa o compagna o simile sito, ma anchora a quella vista che sola puo apparere agli occhi di una persona.