THE SMITH COLLEGE MONTHLY is published at Northampton, Massachu- setts, on the 15th of each month, during the year from October to June, inclu- sive. Terms, $1.50 a year, in advance. Single numbers, 20 cents. Contri- butions may be left at 3 Gymnasium Hall. Subscriptions may be sent to E. M. deLong, 58 High Street, Northampton. Entered at the Post Office at Northampton, Massachusetts, as second class matter. FURNESS PRIZE ESSAY, CLASS OF 1901 There are certain aspects of Shakespeare's poetry in which the nineteenth century is especially interested. They are those which in every department of philosophy are at present engaging the attention of thinking people: the practical problems of life. Therefore we have volumes written discussing Shakespeare's views on religion, his political theories, and his philosophy of life for the individual. Another test of Shakespeare's usefulness as a guide in modern practical problems ought surely to be his teachings on questions of sociology as represented in the only aspect of it that can be seen in his works,-his attitude towards the plain people. An inquiry into such a question has many difficulties, the chief of which is that the poet's opinion on this subject must be gathered wholly from an inductive study of the characters themselves, without aid from explicit or abstract statements. But there is a compensation in the certainty of the result when it is found, for the fact that the great majority of Shakespeare's plain people are characters entirely original with him is a proof that the attitude displayed towards them as a whole is a genuine expression of the poet's own opinion. In looking at the lists of characters of the plays, one is at the first struck with the comparatively small number of those that can properly be called "plain people," and a further study makes it evident that even of these only a part can be taken as representing the poet's serious opinions. For Shakespeare's delineations of plain people fall naturally into two classes: the seriously drawn portraits, and the caricatures. Although in general the latter are not so valuable for study as the former, yet in many cases they furnish indirect or negative evidence that is not found in the serious representations, and which adds much to the sum total of our understanding of Shakespeare's conception of plain people. Besides these typical plain people, shown either in caricature or in their actual proportions, there are many characters in the plays that seem on the border-land of both the middle and the higher or the middle and the lower classes of society. This confusion is due to Shakespeare's tendency to disregard outward circumstances and position in order to lay more emphasis on the development of the mind, and in some cases he has carried this so far that the result is a partial contradiction. Some of his most original characters are conceived in this manner, of which Falstaff is a good example. How can this notorious drunkard be of the same social class with Shakespeare's refined gentlemen ?-and, on the other hand, how can the unrivaled humorist and chosen companion of Prince Henry belong to the lowest class, with whom he is seen in fellowship? There are many characters such as this, some of whom may seem by outward circumstances to belong with Shakespeare's plain people, but who have inner qualities so widely different that an immeasurable distance severs them from the real plain people. It is therefore better to exclude these entirely from our study, and to consider only those whom Shakespeare himself unmistakably regarded as of this type. The only plays of Shakespeare in which the principal actors are plain people,-The Merry Wives of Windsor and The Comedy of Errors,―contain, as we should expect, the most typical and the most complete portraits of this class. The characters in these plays are also, for the most part, seriously drawn, and it is these rather than the caricatures that give the most complete portraits. The value of the caricatures in this study is in supplementing the general impression by adding minor traits, and in making clear certain characteristics by means of the over-emphasis and exaggeration in which the caricature con sists. In The Merry Wives of Windsor, the atmosphere is unmistakable. We are transported to an English country town, and much of the action takes place out of doors. Against this background of simple, rural life the characters of the play stand out distinctly, themselves the representatives of English rustic simplicity. This play gives us the best picture of family life that Shakespeare has drawn, and this fact, necessitating as it does that each member of the family should be shown in many different relations, gives to these country people a certain quality of reality and concreteness that is not found even in Shakespeare's greatest characters. Here are treated the relations of husband and wife, of parents and children, and of friends and neighbors, besides the more slightly sketched love story of Anne Page and Fenton. It is noticeable that the boy William Page, incompletely as he is drawn, is Shakespeare's only portrait of a child of the middle class. Although, contrary to the usual rule, in this play fully as much emphasis is laid on the action as on the characterization, yet some of the principal actors are drawn with much skill and distinctness. The "merry wives," Mrs. Page and Mrs. Ford, are perhaps the least differentiated. They are alike in their sturdy common sense, their ingenuity, their high moral principles, and their appreciation of the humorous side of life. Mrs. Page is shown in more relations than Mrs. Ford, for she is concerned for the welfare of her daughter and her little son. In the scene in which young William appears, we see the ambition of the plain woman to give her son a better education than she herself enjoyed, and her complacent pride in his rather doubtful progress. In her relation to her daughter she is shown in a less favorable light, for, although she is not so blind to Anne's welfare as is Mr. Page, who considers nothing but money, she shows her lack of insight and sympathy by attempting to force the marriage with Dr. Caius. Mr. Page and Mr. Ford are more carefully depicted than their wives. The hospitable, easygoing, and jovial Page is contrasted with the suspicious Ford, who alone in this merry company has a morbid moral sense. This characteristic is emphasized by his corresponding lack of humor, which is so important an element in most of the other characters. The difference between the two men in this respect |