Shakespeare's Secret Schemers: The Study of an Early Modern Dramatic Device by Richard A.LevinReview by: Janet M. SpencerThe Sixteenth Century Journal, Vol. 34, No. 2, Marriage in Early Modern Europe (Summer,2003), pp. 595-597Published by: The Sixteenth Century JournalStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20061505 .

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Book Reviews 595

the problem; without demons, there would be no reason for upholding the reality of

angels?the consequences were tremendously disturbing. In this respect, the witch became

a highly welcomed witness when it came to defending the case against skeptical thinkers who

had taken Aristotle too much to heart. Demonic copulation was not the only argument; pal

pable demonic activity also expressed itself through the "transvection" of witches, i.e., the

idea that witches were carried bodily by demons to the sabbat, and through their alleged

doing of harm, which was in reality caused by demons.

The witches', or to be more theologically precise, the demonic maleficia could be

understood as the perverted inversion of beneficia. As this term designates the benefits of

receiving the sacraments, demonic activity got a sacramental dimension, which Stephens

puts into the context of anxiety about the efficacy of sacraments. Stories about sacramental

miracles, for instance, the attempted but unsuccessful desecration of the host?also a stock

piece of the contemporary anti-Jewish discourse?could be exploited as a proof of the tran

substantiation and the real presence of Christ. This narrative tradition reminds this reviewer

of a witchcraft trial in Lausanne in 1461 in which several days of interrogation and heavy torture moved the accused man to confess to roasting a host; however, the Eucharist

remained unharmed (see G. Modestin, Le diable chez l'?v?que. Chasse aux sorciers dans le dioc?se

de Lausanne (vers 1460) [1999], 250-51)! The "crisis of belief" that Stephens alludes to in the subtitle of his study was the result

of unsettling doubts about sacramental efficacy and the existence of demons and, therefore,

angels. The author links these doubts with the period of calamities, by the end of which, i.e.

in the 1430s, the first writings carrying the new witch-stereotype came up. Proceeding in

this way, Stephens remains cautious; he does not claim that disasters such as the Great Fam

ine, Black Death, the Hundred Years'War, and the Great Schism caused witchcraft theory to

emerge. Yet, "the vast disasters of the fourteenth century came after Scholastic theologians had been wrestling for more than a century with the problems of evil and its origins, the

existence of God, whether he was both all-powerful and perfectly just, whether the existence

of angels and demons could be proved, and problems of sacramental efficacy" (267). While suggesting a wide chronological framework for the gestation of the classical

witch-stereotype, Stephens is much less interested in space. One still wonders why the ste

reotype first emerged in the Alpine arc, especially in the Savoyard possession around the Lake

of Geneva, and in Northern Italy. Walter Stephens convincingly argues from a demonological point of view that the

witch was (mis-)used as the only possible witness for establishing the palpable existence of

demons. Still, the witch served other purposes too: she was a scapegoat in village affairs, and

she was at hand when struggling parties needed a "case" in order to delimit their political and jurisdictional prerogatives. These, however, are other aspects, which do not lessen the

intrinsic interest of Demon Lovers.

Shakespeare's Secret Schemers: The Study of an Early Modern Dramatic Device.

Richard A. Levin. Newark: University of Delaware, 2001. 172 pp. $35.00. ISBN

0874137171.

Reviewed by: Janet M. Spencer, Wingate University

Taking an important cue from Maurice Morgann's famous Essay on the Dramatic Char

acter of Sir John Falstaff (1777), Richard Levin argues that characters in early modern drama

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596 Sixteenth Century Journal XXXIV/2 (2003)

frequently engage in secret scheming that is never acknowledged verbally. The introduction

summarizes Morgann's analysis of Falstaff as a complex character who generates conflict

between our emotions and intellect. Levin supplements Morgann's analysis by explaining how Falstaff schemes to reverse the direction of Poins and the prince's jest after the Gadshill

robbery in I Henry /ITThough Levin rarely considers performance issues other than printed

stage directions or speech prefixes, his subtle reading of these scenes can be acted readily: a

characteristic gesture?a flick of the wrist, a tilt of the head?enables Falstaff to identify, and

then multiply, the two thieves in buckram.

Levin's argument that secret scheming constitutes an identifiable dramatic device

depends on the conviction that original audiences recognized character complexity and

unspoken motivations, elements central to Morgann's analysis. Though influential through out the nineteenth century, the critical fortunes of Morgann's Falstaff and its emphasis on

character wane during the first two of three waves of "historicisms" of the twentieth century.

The first wave, led by Elmer Stoll, reduces dramatic characters to popular traditions easily

grasped by an unsophisticated audience, dieting Falstaff down to the flat role of the miles glo

riosus. The second historicist movement, led by Hardin Craig and Lily Bess Campbell in the

1930s, privileges traditional religious and intellectual content revealed in the drama. New

Criticism, gaining prominence at the same time, emphasizes stylistic analysis at the expense

of character study. New Historicism, inaugurated by Stephen Greenblatt in the 1980s, has

restored the political dimension to analysis of early modern culture and its byzantine rela

tionships of clientage and faction. The movement's fragmentation over theories of resistance

and containment finds a parallel conflict between concepts of inwardness in the work of

Katherine Maus and Elizabeth Hanson and accounts of subjectivity by Francis Barker and

Catherine Belsey However, taken together, these scholarly emphases recover political and

psychological milieu sufficiently complex to sustain a drama enriched by patterns of nonver

balized scheming.

Chapters on Richard II, Hamlet, All's Well That Ends Well, Anthony and Cleopatra, and The

Duchess ofMalfi focus on the scheming of supporting characters. Gaunt's careful self-presen

tation of impartiality in his early dealings with Richard and the Duchess of Gloucester offers

a politically adept representation of loyalty motivated by the very real dangers at court, dan

gers evidenced by his brother's murder and Mowbray's confessed plot against his life. In the

volatile political climate of the play, argues Levin, Shakespeare's audience would be alert to

the manipulations of schemers who, unlike lago or Richard III, keep their own counsel.

Levin reads Gaunt's parting advice to his son as urging his return to overthrow Richard, his

dying counsel to the king as provoking Richard's fatal mistake of seizing Bolingbroke's inher

itance. Here, as throughout the book, Levin buttresses his argument with archaic usages of

words that create patterns of ambiguity and intrigue.

Levin's brief chapter on Fortinbras demonstrates that Claudius and Hamlet are equally

unable to uncover the extent of Norway's threat. An astute reading of Hamlet's encounter

with the Norwegian captain and his final soliloquy in the Second Quarto shows us a prince

as easily distracted by personal issues as his adulterous, murderous uncle. Levin's reading

increases our sense of the value of the often neglected Fortinbras material, both in terms of

theme and character development. His longer chapter on All's Well explicates Lafew's secret

scheming to tame Parolles and aid Helena. He builds his case on careful attention to bawdy

language; the movements of the two unnamed French gentlemen; and the unexplained

knowledge Lafew, Helena, and the countess frequently possess concerning others' actions

and itineraries. However, one wonders whether Levin concludes that "the freedom Lafew

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Book Reviews 597

has to plot secretly gives him the freedom to indulge sinister desires" problematizes the play s

"portrayal of the ruling elite" (93) because Lafew uses Parolles cruelly or because he desires

to use him sexually. Levin argues that Cleopatra bases her tragic and ennobling suicide on a misjudgment

of Caesar's intent; a sensitive reading of the last half of the play pits the secret scheming of

Caesar against that of Cleopatra, turning on the indiscernible allegiances of minor characters

Proculeius, Dolabella, and Seleucus. Caesar's secret goal, Levin claims, is not to humiliate

Cleopatra but to provoke her suicide, which would legitimate his territorial expansion. He

effects his goal by rejecting her sexual overtures, perhaps his ultimate triumph over her. The

discussion of The Duchess of Malfi usefully demonstrates that the presence of nonverbalized

scheming is not unique to Shakespeare.The world of Malfi is treacherous, rendering alliances

untrustworthy and motivations opaque. Levin explores the possible secret schemes of Delio

and Pescara, noting their support of Antonio's son as rightful heir as evidence that politics, not providence, rules even in the deaths of tyrants.

Levin's attention to possible secret schemes in plays replete with overt plots and coun

terplots enriches the sense of dramatic intrigue that permeates the political plays of the late

Tudor and early Jacobean eras. By opening up the possibility that comparatively minor char

acters influence the action of plays, sometimes decisively, on the basis of unarticulated moti

vations, Levin presents a dramatic world as complex and full of moral compromise as our

own. As a critic, my test of Levin's readings is simple: since the claim to secrecy precludes the

presence of verbal traces of the scheme in dialogue or soliloquy, can actors convey the sense

of intrigue Levin locates in ambiguous language, silence, unremarked political realignments on stage? If so, is the performance enriched in terms of plot, character complexity, or the

matic force? When the answer is yes, as it is in Levin's analyses, the concept of the secret

schemer merits the attention of not only scholars but also of directors and actors.

Dramatic Difference: Gender, Class and Genre in the Early Modern Closet

Drama. Karen Raber. Newark: University of Delaware, 2001. 338 pp. $49.50. ISBN

0874137578.

Reviewed by: Susan Hrach Georgecink, Columbus State University

Closet drama has attracted an underwhelming amount of critical attention in the mod

ern era; decades ago, some work was done on figures like Thomas Killigrew and Samuel

Daniel, and then almost nothing happened until the 1990s when the recuperation of women

writers demanded a new look at the genre. Raber accounts for this lack of attention by

claiming that the neo-Senecan, moralizing style of much closet drama, its frequently conser

vative political orientation, and the aristocratic origin of its writers have made for unfash

ionable topics in our current critical climate. Raber is quite right that a cultural studies

approach to the period that neglects closet drama is missing important threads in the tapestry. Raber sets out to redress the oversight by examining the role this genre played in cultural and

political currents of the early modern period. She chooses to work with both male and

female dramatists in order to investigate how gender operates within the context of class pol itics. As household entertainment, Raber posits, the reading of such dramas "represented the

negotiation of power between aristocracy and monarchy" (35). The fact that Fulke Greville

notoriously burned his Antony and Cleopatra indicates that authors considered their writing

politically sensitive and that writers ran the risk of dangerous misinterpretations. As Raber

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