A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 09 — Reading Companion

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In Category - Fantasy Juvenile Worlds

Authors: Dodsley, Robert, 1703-1764 [Compiler], Hazlitt, William Carew, 1834-1913 [Editor] Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2003 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: English drama Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 133,162

Reading time 579 min

Text sections 15

For A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 09 — Reading Companion, the stored edition analysis reports 133,162 words, 9 hr 39 min estimated reading time, and 15 detected text sections.

The text analysis averages about 16.3 words per sentence, while the detected sections provide another way to judge how the source is divided.

Project Gutenberg metadata also associates the work with “English drama,” connecting these edition facts with the source record’s subject description.

Source: Project Gutenberg record #10550

This volume collects five Elizabethan plays, including 'How a Man May Choose a Good Wife from a Bad' and 'Lingua,' showcasing varied narrative voices—from broad comic drollery to allegorical debate—and shifts in pace between rapid dialogue and extended soliloquy.

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You did admire her beauty, prais'd her face, Were proud to have her follow at your heels Through the broad streets, when all censuring tongues Found themselves busied, as she pass'd along, T'extol her in the hearing of you both. Tell me, I pray you, and dissemble not, Have you not, in the time of your first-love, Hugg'd such new popular and vulgar talk, And gloried still to see her bravely deck'd? But now a kind of loathing hath quite chang'd Your shape of love into a form of hate; But on what reason ground you this hate?

Y. ART. My reason is my mind, my ground my will; I will not love her: if you ask me why, I cannot love her. Let that answer you.

Y. LUS. Be judge, all eyes, her face deserves it not; Then on what root grows this high branch of hate? Is she not loyal, constant, loving, chaste: Obedient, apt to please, loath to displease: Careful to live, chary of her good name, And jealous of your reputation? Is she not virtuous, wise, religious? How should you wrong her to deny all this? Good Master Arthur, let me argue with you.

_Enter_ MASTER ANSELM _and_ MASTER FULLER.

FUL. O Master Anselm! grown a lover, fie! What might she be, on whom your hopes rely?

ANS. What fools they are that seem most wise in love, How wise they are that are but fools in love! Before I was a lover, I had reason To judge of matters, censure of all sorts, Nay, I had wit to call a lover fool, And look into his folly with bright eyes. But now intruding love dwells in my brain, And franticly hath shoulder'd reason thence: I am not old, and yet, alas! I doat; I have not lost my sight, and yet am blind; No bondman, yet have lost my liberty; No natural fool, and yet I want my wit. What am I, then? let me define myself: A dotard young, a blind man that can see, A witty fool, a bondman that is free.

FUL. Good aged youth, blind seer, and wise fool, Loose your free bonds, and set your thoughts to school.

_Enter_ OLD MASTER ARTHUR _and_ OLD MASTER LUSAM.

O. ART. 'Tis told me, Master Lusam, that my son And your chaste daughter, whom we match'd together, Wrangle and fall at odds, and brawl and chide.

O. LUS. Nay, I think so, I never look'd for better: This 'tis to marry children when they're young. I said as much at first, that such young brats Would 'gree together e'en like dogs and cats.

O. ART. Nay, pray you, Master Lusam, say not so; There was great hope, though they were match'd but young, Their virtues would have made them sympathise, And live together like two quiet saints.

O. LUS. You say true, there was great hope, indeed, They would have liv'd like saints; but where's the fault?

O. ART. If fame be true, the most fault's in my son.

O. LUS. You say true, Master Arthur, 'tis so indeed.

O. ART. Nay, sir, I do not altogether excuse Your daughter; many lay the blame on her.

O. LUS. Ah! say you so? by the mass, 'tis like enough, For from her childhood she hath been a shrew.

O. ART. A shrew? you wrong her; all the town admires her For mildness, chasteness, and humility.

O. LUS. 'Fore God, you say well, she is so indeed; The city doth admire her for these virtues.

O. ART. O, sir, you praise your child too palpably; She's mild and chaste, but not admir'd so much.

O. LUS. Ay, so I say--I did not mean admir'd.

O. ART. Yes, if a man do well consider her, Your daughter is the wonder of her sex.

O. LUS. Are you advis'd of that? I cannot tell, What 'tis you call the wonder of her sex, But she is--is she?--ay, indeed, she is.

O. LUS. Even what you will--you know best what she is.

ANS. Yon is her husband: let us leave this talk:[3] How full are bad thoughts of suspicion; I love, but loathe myself for loving so, Yet cannot change my disposition.

FUL. _Medice, cura teipsum_.

ANS. _Hei mihi! quod nullis amor est medicabilis herbis_.

[_Exeunt_ ANSELM and FULLER.

Y. ART. All your persuasions are to no effect, Never allege her virtues nor her beauty, My settled unkindness hath begot A resolution to be unkind still, My ranging pleasures love variety.

Y. LUS. O, too unkind unto so kind a wife, Too virtueless to one so virtuous, And too unchaste unto so chaste a matron.

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The ninth volume of Dodsley's Old English Plays brings together five works from the turn of the seventeenth century, each displaying a distinct approach to language and dramatic tempo. In How a Man May Choose a Good Wife from a Bad, the opening exchange between Young Arthur and Young Lusam establishes a pattern of swift, stichomythic argument, where Arthur's bitter loathing of his wife is countered by Lusam's measured reproach. The play's preface promises 'broad and strongly marked' humour, and the dialogue indeed moves between blunt assertions and moralizing retorts. By contrast, Lingua opens with a leisurely, ornate soliloquy by the titular character, who recounts a contest of orators with balanced clauses and classical allusions, before shifting to a comic scene of trickery involving a crown and robe. These contrasting openings signal the range of narrative voices within the collection.

Rapid Exchanges and Moral Framing

In How a Man May Choose a Good Wife from a Bad, the dialogue often proceeds in short, clipped lines that accelerate the pace and heighten emotional tension. Young Arthur's repeated declarations—'Not in mine eye'—are met with Lusam's proverbial warnings about being 'cloy'd with dainties.' The rhythm mimics a quarrel, each line a thrust and parry. This speed is occasionally broken by longer speeches, such as Arthur's description of his wife as 'the most hated / And loathed object,' which slows the tempo to allow a fuller expression of grievance. The play's moral framework is embedded in these exchanges: the characters argue not just about marriage but about perception and judgment, with the rapid-fire format underscoring their stubbornness.

Allegorical Soliloquy and Comic Interruption

Lingua employs a markedly different pacing. The play opens with Lingua's extended soliloquy, where she describes the orators' contest in balanced, periodic sentences: 'if his were witty, / His was as wise; the third's fair eloquence / Did parallel the fourth's firm gravity.' The measured rhythm creates a stately, almost ceremonial tone. This is abruptly undercut by the entrance of Mendacio, whose short, colloquial lines—'Have I not hied me, madam?'—introduce a faster, more conspiratorial pace. The subsequent scene with Tactus shifts again: his soliloquy on the morning is interrupted by a sneeze and a stumble, and Mendacio's asides ('O, are you taken?') inject a comic, metatheatrical layer. The play thus oscillates between high-flown rhetoric and low comedy, with pace changes marking the boundary between allegory and farce.

Stage Directions and Visual Pacing

Both plays use stage directions to control tempo. In How a Man May Choose a Good Wife from a Bad, the direction 'He goes out, and comes in presently' signals a quick, farcical turn, compressing time for comic effect. In Lingua, the elaborate description of Tactus's costume—'a dark-coloured satin mantle over a pair of silk bases, a garland of bays'—pauses the action, inviting the audience to dwell on visual detail before the character speaks. The stage direction 'TACTUS stumbleth at the robe and crown' then triggers a rapid sequence of exclamations and asides. These visual cues work alongside the dialogue to create a rhythm of expectation and surprise, with the physical comedy of the stumble providing a sudden jolt after the descriptive pause.

Readers approaching this volume will benefit from attending to the interplay between speech and silence—the moments when characters pause to reflect or when stage directions dictate a change in tempo. The collection rewards those who listen for shifts in register, from the blunt prose of marital dispute to the ornate verse of allegorical debate. Each play offers a distinct experiment in dramatic pacing, and comparing them reveals how early modern playwrights manipulated language and stagecraft to control audience attention.

Leafing through these old plays, I noticed how a comic squabble could dissolve into long, thoughtful speeches, and somehow that reminded me of The Pigeon: A Fantasy in Three Acts — Reading Companion. There’s a similar way it lingers on a quiet, worried feeling after a bit of stage business, content to let the characters simply think aloud for a while.