" Such physical portraiture alone would convince me that there
was a living model for Falstaff. But there are more obvious arguments:
the other humorous characters of Shakespeare are infinitely inferior to
Falstaff, and the best of them are merely sides of Falstaff or poor
reflections of him. Autolycus and Parolles have many of his traits, but
they are not old, and taken together, they are only a faint
replica of the immortal footpad.
Listening with my heart in my ears, I catch a living voice, a round, fat
voice with tags of "pr'ythee," "wag," and "marry," and behind the
inimitable dramatic counterfeit I see a big man with a white head and
round belly who loved wine and women and jovial nights, a Triton among
the minnows of boon companions, whose shameless effrontery was backed by
cunning, whose wit though common was abundant and effective through long
practice--a sort of licensed tavern-king, whose mere entrance into a
room set the table in a roar. Shakespeare was attracted by the
many-sided racy ruffian, delighted perhaps most by his easy mastery of
life and men; he studied him with infinite zest, absorbed him wholly,
and afterwards reproduced him with such richness of sympathy, such magic
of enlarging invention that he has become, so to speak, the symbol of
laughter throughout the world, for men of all races the true Comic Muse.
Pages:
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229