"Much Ado about Nothing"
A Critical Article by Charles Cowden Clarke
- The critic who is the author of this article is Charles Cowden Clarke.
- The source of this article is a book titled Shakespeare Characters: Chiefly Those Subordinate. It was published in London by Smith, Elder, & Co., Publishers in 1863. This article comes from pp. 295-316. About use: This article is in the public domain.
I never knew any one object to the nature and conduct of Beatrice in Much Ado about Nothing who was not either dull in faculty, ill-tempered, or an overweening assertor of the exclusive privileges of the male sex.
The late Thomas Campbell, in an edition of the poet, denounces her as "an odious woman." I never saw Mr Campbell, and knew nothing of him personally; I can say nothing, therefore, of his temper, or of his jealousy as regards the privileges claimed by the stronger party in the human world; and most certain am I that he was not a man of "dull faculty," for I do know his intellectual character. But I should be inclined to draw a conclusion from the epithet used by that elegant poet and cultivated scholar, that he was a man subject to strong impulses, and to a high degree of nervous irritability; and that he had risen from his task of editing this enchanting play, annoyed and excited by the sparring between Beatrice and Benedick, in which word-encounters she certainly is no "light weight" to him; but to call her "odious" was an injudicious comment, and only true as regards his own individual temperament and feelings. In the general estimation of the world, Beatrice is one of those who wear their characters inside out. They haveno reserves with society, for they require none. They may, perhaps, presume upon, or rather forget that they possess a mercurial temperament, which, when unreined, is apt to start from its course and inconvenience their fellow-travellers; but such a propensity is not an "odious" one. It is not hateful; and this is the only feature in the character of Beatrice that Mr Campbell could object to. She is warm-hearted, generous; has a noble contempt of baseness of every kind; is wholly untinctured with jealousy; is the first to break out into invective when her cousin Hero is treated in that scoundrel manner by her affianced husband at the very altar, and even makes it a sine quâ non--an essential thing--with Benedick to prove his love for herself by challenging the traducer of her cousin.
This last fact, by the way, leads to a natural digression when speaking of the career of Beatrice; and that is, that the very circumstance of her embroiling her lover in a duel for another person is of itself a proof that the sensual passion of love had no predominant share in her choice of Benedick for a husband; and in this insignificant, apparently insignificant, but momentous point of conduct, we again, and for the thousandth time, recognise Shakespeare's unsleeping sense of propriety in character. A woman, personally and passionately in love, has been known to involve her lover where her own self-love has been compromised; and even then I should question the quality of the passion; that, however strong it might be, it was weaker than her own self-worship; for the sterling passion of love, by the law of nature, is all-absorbing, all-engrossing, and admits no equal near the throne. But no woman, so enamoured, would place her lover's life in jeopardy for a third party; and this leads me to retrace my position and observe, that the union of Beatrice and Benedick was only a "counterfeit presentment" of ninety-nine hundredths of the marriages that take place in society, and which are the result of friendly concoction. There was no love, no sexual love, between Benedick and Beatrice; but the self-love of each being fanned into a flame from hearing, through the plot of their friends, that they were mutually, though unknowingly, an object of attachment to each other, this self-love, with an emotion of gratitude, exalted their reciprocal respect into the conventional love of every-day society; but there was not a spark of passion in the whole affair. The very discovery that each is an object of supposed interest with the other produced not one word in avowal of passion; and here again Shakespeare is on his guard; and in how masterly a manner has he sustained the several characteristic peculiarities of the two individuals upon that discovery. Bearice, with her lively demonstrativeness of nature, rushes from the arbour after hearing the conversation of Hero and Ursula respecting her being the object of Benedick's affection. She has fallen into the trap theyhave laid for her, and she exclaims:
What fire is in mine ears? Can this be true?
Stand I condemn'd for pride and scorn so much?
Contempt, farewell; and maiden pride, adieu!
No glory lives behind the back of such.
And, Benedick, love on: I will requite thee;
Taming my wild heart to thy loving hand.
If thou dost love, my kindness shall incite thee
To bind our loves up in a holy band.
(III. i. 107-16)
There is no avowal of passion, methinks, in that speech. It is merely an acquiescent one, if thou dost love, my kindness shall incite thee to tie the knot. On the other hand, Benedick, being a man of the world, a soldier, too, and not wholly a child to stratagems, comes forward sedately questioning the dialogue respecting himself and Beatrice, between Don Pedro, Claudio, and old Leonato. To give full force to the doubt and caution of Benedick, and at the same time to enrich the plausibility of the plot against him, he would have suspected his young companions, but old Leonato being of the party staggers him. He says to himself, I should think this a gull, but that the white-bearded fellow speaks it; knavery cannot sure hide himself in such reverence (II. iii. 118-20). And never was soliloquy more naturally penned than his communing with himself upon the dialogue he had just heard:
This can be no trick; the conference was sadly borne. [That is, sedately, seriously borne.] They have the truth of this from Hero. They seem to pity the lady. It seems her affections have the full bent. Love me! why, it must be requited. I hear how I am censured; they say I will bear myself proudly if I perceive the love come from her. They say, too, that she will rather die than give any sign of affection. I did never think to marry. I mustn't seem proud. Happy are they that can hear their detractions and put them to mending. They say the lady is fair: 'tis a truth, I can bear them witness; and virtuous; ' tis so, I cannot reprove it: and wise, but for loving me! by my troth, ' tis no addition to her wit; nor no great argument of her folly; for I will be horribly in love with her. I may chance to have some odd quirks and remnants of wit broken on me, because I have railed so long against marriage; but doth not the appetite alter? A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age. Shall quips and sentences, and these paper bullets of the brain, awe a man from the career of his humour? No! The world must be peopled. When I said I would die a bachelor, I did not think I should live till I were married. (II. iii. 220-44)
Will any one say that there is any expression of love in its exclusiveness in that speech?
I would devote a few more words upon the two characters of Benedick and Beatrice, and principally upon the latter, who is one of our favourites among the heroines in Shakespeare.
Beatrice is not without consciousness of her power of wit; but it is rather the delight that she takes in something that is an effluence of her own glad nature, than for any pride of display. She enjoys its exercise, too, as a means of playful despotism over one whom she secretly admires, while openly tormenting. Her first inquiries after Benedick show the sort of interest she takes in him; and it is none the less for its being veiled by a scoffing style; while what she says of their mutual wit-encounters proves the glory she has in out-taunting him (295-99).
The fact, is, like many high-spirited women, Beatrice possesses a fund of hidden tenderness beneath her exterior gaiety and sarcasm,none the less profound from being withheld from casual view, and very seldom allowed to bewray itself. As proofs of this, witness her affection for her uncle, Leonato, and his strong esteem and love for her, her passionate attachment to her cousin Hero, and the occasional, but extremely significant, betrayals of her partiality for Benedick; her very seeking out opportunities to torment him being one proof (especially in a woman of her disposition and breeding) of her perference; for women do not banter a man they dislike, they mentally send him to Coventry, and do not lift him into importance by offering an objection, still less a repartee, or a sarcasm. The only time we see Beatrice alone, and giving utterance to the thoughts of her heart, that is, in soliloquy, which is the dramatic medium of representing self-communion (already quoted) her words are full of warm and feminine tenderness, words that probably would not seem so pregnant of love-import, coming from another woman, more prone to express such feeling; but, from Beatrice, meaning much. It is the very transcript of an honest and candid heart. Then the poet has given her so potent an antagonist in her wit-fencing, that her skill is saved from being thought unbefitting. Benedick's wit is so polished, so manly, so competent, that her womanhood is spared the disgrace of bearing away the palm in their keen encounters. He always remains victor; for we feel that he voluntarily refrains from claiming the conquest he achieves; and he is ever master of the field, though his chivalrous gallantry chooses to leave her in possession of the ground that ground so dear to female heart, the last word. Benedick is a perfect gentleman, and his wit partakes of his nature; it is forebearing in proportion to its excellence. One of the causes which render Benedick's wit more delightful than that of Beatrice, is, that it knows when to cease. Like a true woman, (don't condemn me to everlasting redemption (IV. ii. 56-7), ladies!) Beatrice is apt to pursue her advantage, when she feels she has one, to the very utmost. She does not give her antagonist a chance; and if she could upset him, she would pink him when he was down: now, Benedick, with the generosity of superior strength, gives way first. (300-01)
One of Benedick's pleansantest as well as wittiest speeches is that wherein he complains of Beatrice's maltreatment at the masquerade. It is the only time when he seems to be earnestly irritated with her; and no wonder. He says of her behaviour:
Oh! she misused me past the endurance of a block; an oak, with but one green leaf upon it, would have answered her. My very vizor began to assume life, and scold with her. She told me (not thinking I had been myself) that I was the prince's jester, that I was duller than a great thaw, huddling jest upon jest, with such impossible conveyance upon me, that I stood like a man at a mark, with a whole army shooting at me. ... I would not marry her though she were endowed with all that Adam had left before he transgressed. (II. i. 239-47, 250-52)
Benedick, being a man of acknowledged wit, as well as of a blithe temperament, has no fancy to be considered a jester, "a professed jester." His brilliant faculties render him a favourite associate of the prince; but his various higher qualities, as a gentleman and a scholar, give him better claims to liking than those of a gay companion only. It is this that makes Beatrice's calling him the "prince's jester" so intolerable a gibe. She knew it, the hussy! with her woman's shrewdness in finding out precisely what will most gall the man she prefers; and he shows that it touches him to the quick, by reverting to it in soliloquy, and repeating it again to his friends when they come in. A man of lively humour who is excited by his native gaiety of heart to entertain his friends by his pleasantry, at the same time feeling within himself that he possesses yet stronger and worthier grounds for their partiality, has a peculiarly sensitive dread of being taken for a mere jester or buffoon. Benedick's buoyancy of spirit is no effect of levity or frivolity. His humour has depth of feeling as well as mirth in it. His wit has force and geniality, no less than intellectual vivacity. That little sentence, with all its sportive case, is instinct with moral sound sense. Happy are they that hear their detractions and can put them to mending (II. iii. 229-30). Benedick's wit has penetration and discernment in it. With all his mercurial temperament, too, yet in a grave question this fine character can deliver himself with gravity and a noble sedateness; as where he says, "In a false quarrel there is no true valour" (V. i. 120). And throughout the challenge-scene he expresses himself with gentlemanly dignity and manly feeling; while we find, from the remarks of the prince upon his change of colour, that he is as deeply hurt as he has temperately spoken. He characterises his own wit, in its gentleness and gallantry towards women, when he says to Beatrice's attendant, "A most manly wit, Margaret; it will not hurt a woman" (V. ii. 15-16). There is heart in Benedick's playfulness. His love-making, when he is love-taken, is as earnest as it is animated. That is a fine and fervent bit of his wooing-scene with Beatrice, where she asks him if he will go with her to her uncle Leonato's to hear the news, he answers, "I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thine eyes; and moreover, I will go with thee to thy uncle's" (V. ii. 102-04). Shakespeare has, with lustrous perfection, vindicated the sound sense and sweet heart that may accompany wit, in the character of Benedick. And after having discussed the mental sparrings and fit-fayings of the two creatures, turn to their first wooing (Act IV, scene i), and see them each displayed to the best advantage Beatrice, certainly; who in the course of it shows one of those genuine touches of womanly feeling that have been alluded to as redeeming her character from the unfounded as well as ungracious charge of unfeminine hardness. (302-04)
I am mistaken in my taste of true wit and of true feeling if there be not a charming display of both in this very natural, very easy, and very graceful little scene. I wished to urge some extenuation in behalf of Beatrice, because it is not unusual to designate her (as well as Portia (in The Merchant of Venice) as a "masculine woman." I can only say that every man who expresses this opinion commits a piece of egoism, for both women are endowed with qualities, moral and intellectual, that any man might be proud to inherit. And here again, it is impossible to forego a passing remark upon the generous, indeed, the chivalrous conduct of Shakespeare in portraying his heroines. Of all the writers that ever existed, no one ought to stand so high in the love and gratitude of women as he. He has indeed been their champion, their laureate, their brother, their friend. He has been the man to lift them from a state of vassalage and degradation, wherein they were the mere toys, when not the she-serfs, of a sensual tyranny; and he has asserted their prerogative, as intellectual creatures, to be the companions, (in the best sense,) the advisers, the friends, the equals of men. He has endowed them with the true spirit of Christianity and brotherly love, "enduring all things, forgiving all things, hoping all things" (1 Corinthians, I. vi); and it is no less remarkable, that with a prodigality of generosity, he has not unfrequently placed the heroes in his stories at a disadvantage with them. Observe, for instance, the two characters of Hero and Claudio in this very play. She is the absolute perfection of sweetness and generosity, quenching in forgiveness all the injuries she has received, and bestowing her heart and confidence where she had every reason to be mistrustful. Claudio, on the other hand, is a selfish manoeuvrer. He tells the prince that he is in love with Hero, but he opens the conversation about her by inquiring of him whether Signor Leonato has a son; he had an eye to the cash first, and then the girl, and the circumstance of her being an only child confirms him in his suit. Claudio is a fellow of no nobleness of character, for instead of being the last, he is the first to believe his mistress guilty of infidelity towards him, and he then adopts the basest and the most brutal mode of punishment by casting her off at the very altar. Genuine love is incapable of revenge of any sort, that I assume to be a truism, still less of a concocted and refined revenge. Claudio is a scoundrel in grain (305-06).
Again, therefore, Shakespeare is the writer of all others whom the women should most take to their hearts; for I believe it to be mainly through his intellectual influence that their claims in the scale of society were acknowledged in England, when, throughout what is denominated the civilised world, their position was not greatly elevated above that of the drudges in modern low life. And have not both parties been gainers by the reformation?" not but that much yet remains to be modified" nevertheless, the moral philosophy of Shakespeare, anticipated by another code, which I am perfectly sure he would have been the first to recognise and avow, has exalted our social system beyond that of the rest of the world.
Plotters, malignants, slanderers, among others, may derive advantage and instruction from the study of the play; most important advantage to them, seeing that it touches the vital principle of their vocation "that of working mischief during the night of men's senses, when observation and watchfulness are off their guard" of sowing tares among the corn of a man's peace and comfort while he sleeps in apparent security. If liars need long memories, slanderers, manoeuvrers, and workers in mystery require the watchfulness of Cerberus, and the hands of Briareus to keep all the strings, and springs, and wheels of their plot in full play; and be they wary as they may, some small unanticipated obstacle will intrude among the works, and blow up the plotter with all his mischief. That gratuitous villain, Don John, was triumphantly carrying on his scheme of treachery against the peace and happiness of poor Hero; she was driven from society; her whole family and friends were thrown into grief and dismay, and all were wretched, except Don John. Neither the prince, the father, nor the uncle, not even the quick-witted Beatrice, (and you may trust a woman to unearth a plot, if she set seriously to work,) could discern the mover in it. Benedick is the only one who casually hints at Don John. It was left to the drunken Borachio and his comrade to blab it by night in the hearing of the foolish watchmen. Dogberry was the man who "comprehended those arrant knaves" (III. v. 46, 32), and committed them upon the charge of "flat burglary" (IV. ii. 50). Borachio, in his confession to the prince, says: "I have deceived even your own eyes; what your wisdoms could not discover, these shallow fools have brought to light" (V. i. 232-34). The ease, yet ingenuity and agreeable surprise in the development of this plot, with the variety of characters engaged in it, have made the comedy one of the greatest favourites on the stage.
The character of the father, Leonato, has no prominent feature in it deserving particular consideration, unless it be to notice the consistency of the poet in tracing the ebbs and flows of a temper that yields to every wind of passion sweeping over it. Leonato is a re-fusion of old Capulet (in Romeo and Juliet), but without his fussiness and dollying. In the first blush of the charge against his daughter, he rashly casts her off, and is only brought to reason by the friendly and sagacious old friar, and his own brother, Antonio; and then he becomes equally furious against Claudio, denouncing him as the slanderer of his child; and, like a true specimen of a man of strong passions and weak judgment, he sinks into a mere negation before the consistency and equanimity of the Friar and Benedick. He says, in reply to their reasoning with him, "Being that I flow in grief, the smallest twine may lead me" (IV. i. 249-50). How true to nature all this! and how apt, as well as choice, that metaphor (307-09).
The Friar in this play is as amiable and intellectual a character as the one in Romeo and Juliet quiet, observant, patiently biding his time to speak, until his silent comment shall have enabled him to deliver judgment upon the case before him. His close noting of the belied Hero's demeanour having convinced him of her innocence, he advises the plan of reporting her sudden death, and thus sagely explains his motive:
It so falls out,
That what we have, we prize not to the worth
Whiles we enjoy it; but being lack'd and lost,
Why then we rack the value; then we find
The virtue that possession would not show us
Whiles it was ours: so will it fare with Claudio....
(IV. i. 217-22)
The characters of Conrad and Borachio are such as may be met with in all populous communities,"fellows who are purveyors of moral filth to those who have wherewith to pay them for such hire. Men who generally end their career under a rug in the corner of a loft or garret, unless chance have given them a very high commission indeed for scoundrelism, and then they are perchance destined to close their revered existence in a "cottage ornée."
Margaret and Ursula may come under the denomination of "pattern waiting-women", that is, the patterns somewhat surpassing the order of the women. Margaret has perhaps too accomplished a tongue for one of her class; she, however, evidently apes the manner of Beatrice, and, like all imitators of inferior mind, with a coarse and exaggerated character. She forms an excellent foil to her mistress from this very circumstance; and both domestics are samples of that menial equality that exists between mistress and dependant still common in Italy.
But what shall we say to you, O Dogberry and Verges, Hugh Oatcake and George Seacoal? Why, that among his other crystallisations of animated nature, "there you are, you most ancient and quiet watchmen" (III. iii. 39-40), in all your integral conceit and imbecility of character, physical, mental, and moral; full-fledged specimens of your order, preserved for all time in the imperishable amber of his genius, when your race and calling have passed away from the earth (313-14).
Dogberry, in himself, is not so much a caricature as he is a satire upon all who are intrusted with duties for which neither nature nor art ever destined them. The public instructor who cannot conceal his jealousy at the increase of knowledge among the commonalty, is a Dogberry in his vocation. The civil functionary who declaims upon the omnipotence and impartiality of statue law, yet swerves in his decision when the rich and powerful become amenable to its penalties, is not more or less than a Dogberry among magistrates. Every jackanapes with more sail than ballast is a Dogberry full blown. Every public officer who can command no more respect than attaches to his two gowns, whose "soul," as my Lord Lafeu says, "is his clothes" (All's Well That Ends Well, II. v. 43-4), is a Dogberry in grain. Asses"conceited and stolid, pragmatists, sneaks, bullies, and grovellers, are but "the varied Dogberry." Sweet are the uses "of old Dogberry! "He weareth a precious jewel in his head" (As You Like It, II. i. 12, 14): for he readeth a homely lecture to all of us: viz., to elevate ourselves by moral worth in the station to which God has called us; and constantly to bear in mind that the office only adds lustre to the man, when he conscientiously and efficiently discharges the duties of it. It has been prudently recommended that no man should be without a corkscrew in his pocket; he had better always have a Dogberry. Should he be blest with one grain of self-knowledge, it will assist in drawing off his ignorance and conceit.
In one sentence, in conclusion, I would draw attention to another amiable quality in our poet's disposition; and that is his magnanimity in revenge. This item in his philosophy frequently crosses us in our progress through his dramas. Upon the present occasion it is accompanied with his own innate love of cheerfulness. In the last sentence of the 5th Act, a messenger comes to say that the contriver of all their late sorrow, the malignant Don John, is taken in flight, and brought with armed men back in Messina. "Oh! think not of him till to-morrow, [says the happy Benedick;] I'll devise thee brave punishments for him! Strike up, pipers!" (V. iv. 127-29).
In rising from the perusal of this enchanting play, we are impressed with three axioms: That people truly and deeply enamoured, are not only not suspicious, but are the last to be convinced of their lovers' transgressions, and the first to receive atonement for them. Secondly, That the union of two such beings as Beatrice and Benedick, although an amiably fraudulent one, in which there exists no more than a mutual esteem, offers an infinitely happier prospect to the woman, than the cold-blooded, hard conduct of Claudio can ever promise to her whom he so cruelly punished. And, lastly, That almost all the poison of unhappiness in this life is the result of our own want of judgment, or of faith in goodness, and that sooner or later it will engender its own antidote (315-16).
Source: Charles Cowden Clarke, "Much Ado about Nothing", in his Shakespeare Characters: Chiefly Those Subordinate, Smith, Elder, & Co., 1863, pp. 295-316.