Critique
Elizabethan dramatist Thomas Dekker was an extremely prolific writer, working often in collaboration with other playwrights. From a passage in Henslowe’s diary, it is known that Middleton had a hand in Part One of this play; but scholars are uncertain as to the precise amount that he contributed. The main plot, as will be seen, has a strangely inverted resemblance to that of ROMEO AND JULIET, while the subplot, although the scene is laid in Milan, gives a realistic glimpse of London shop life of that time. Both plots are, by modern standards, exaggerated and improbable. Lamb found the play “offensively crowded” with diatribes against the harlot’s profession; the reader of today, however, will not be shocked. Rather, unless he is a specialist in Elizabethan drama, he is likely to be bogged down in the plot complications, and he will hardly agree with Hazlitt that the “contrivance” of the main plot is “affecting and romantic.”
Critique
Part One of THE HONEST WHORE must have been successful on the stage, for Dekker very quickly followed it with a sequel, written entirely by himself. He was obviously endeavoring to capitalize on features of the first play, since in the second part he used all the principal characters save one and continued the subplot of the patient Candido. He ended with a scene in Bridewell, a London prison of his time, to balance the Bethlem Scene in Part One. He also continued the high moral tone of the earlier play, this time, however, making gambling as well as prostitution the object of his strictures. The new character of Friscobaldo, the outwardly stern yet inwardly forgiving father, was extravagantly admired by Hazlitt, and both he and Ernest Rhys considered Part Two superior to Part One. The modern reader will perhaps find that some of the freshness of Part One has worn off and feel that Dekker tried to carry a good thing a bit too far.
The Honest Whore, Parts I and II
Characters Discussed
Part I, 1604
Bellafront
Bellafront (BEHL-eh-fruhnt), a beautiful prostitute who yearns from the start to find one man to whom she can be true. She falls in love with Hippolito and woos him, but he is an unattainable nobleman. He does, however, prevent her from committing suicide and persuades her to reform. Having renounced her trade, she marries Matheo. In the course of the play, Bellafront becomes a symbol of marital constancy and chastity, able to maintain her resolve even in the face of poverty and other temptations.
Count Hippolito
Count Hippolito (ee-POH-lee-toh), who is in mourning over the apparent death of his devoted Infelice, whose father simply had given her a sleeping potion to forestall the marriage. Nobly born Hippolito is held in high esteem by his putative father-in-law but is unsuitable because he belongs to a rival family. A malcontented Hippolito announces eternal devotion to his late fiancée and vows to renounce forever the company of women. His tirade against prostitution convinces Bellafront to renounce her trade and initiates the reconciliation with her estranged father.
Gasparo Trebazi
Gasparo Trebazi (GAHS-pah-roh treh-BAH-tsee), the duke of Milan, who is led by a feud to oppose a marriage between his daughter Infelice and Hippolito. The duke tells Infelice that Hippolito has died, sends her into exile, and plots to poison the suitor, despite his high regard for him. After the doctor falsely reports Hippolito’s death, the duke is beset by conflicting emotions, rues his decision, and banishes the doctor. The young couple outwits him, however, and ultimately the duke must accept Hippolito as his son-in-law.
Candido
Candido (
(This entire section contains 807 words.)
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Candido (KAHN-dee-doh), a patient and honest shopkeeper whose refusal to become angry even when provoked makes him the object of cheating and tricks that lead to his incarceration in Bedlam, the London insane asylum. Despite his obsessive good nature, he is a highly regarded businessman and a dedicated member of Milan’s senate. Ultimately, he prevails over his wife and tormentors in a subplot that lightens the atmosphere of the play.
Viola
Viola (vee-OH-lah), Candido’s ill-tempered but loving wife, whose yearning to see him lose his temper causes her to engage with roisterers in a plot against her husband. She later repents these ill-advised actions and seeks his release from Bedlam.
Matheo
Matheo (mah-tay-oh), a disreputable man about town, friend of Hippolito, and first seducer of Bellafront. He agrees to wed her only when the duke offers him the choice of death or marriage.
Anselmo
Anselmo, a friar at Bethlem Monastery who marries Infelice and Hippolito despite his fear of retribution from the duke. When the ruler’s men arrive at the monastery, Anselmo shrewdly disarms them, so that when the newlyweds appear, the duke is powerless to act. Kneeling, Anselmo begs the ruler’s pardon and persuades him to bless the match.
Part II, 1630
Count Hippolito
Count Hippolito, who no longer is a model of virtue but rather is an amoral and selfish hypocrite. He has become a wayward husband to Infelice and the would-be seducer of Bellafront. He again uses rhetoric to achieve his purpose, but this time he fails, even after bribing her with gold. All that can be said in his favor is that he encourages Bellafront’s reconciliation with her estranged father.
Bellafront
Bellafront, now wholly reformed and honest in every way but beset by her unscrupulous husband Matheo, to whom she remains loyal, and a turncoat Hippolito, whose advances she resists. She is, as Candido was in the first part of the play, the personification of patience.
Orlando Friscobaldo
Orlando Friscobaldo (ohr-LAHN-doh FREES-koh-bahl-doh), Bellafront’s estranged father, whose gruff exterior masks an inner warmth. When Hippolito tells him that Bellafront is poor and her husband is in prison, Friscobaldo says that seventeen years have passed since he last saw her and that all feeling is gone. He then immediately dons a disguise, goes to Matheo as a servant to be near his daughter, and gives Matheo money that he mistakenly thinks will benefit Bellafront.
Matheo
Matheo, a wild gambler and thief who sells the clothes off the back of his wife, Bellafront. She intervenes to save him from Bridewell prison, but he remains shameless and unrepentant even when threatened with the gallows. The duke pardons him as a favor to Bellafront and Friscobaldo.
Infelice
Infelice (een-fay-LEE-chay), the duke’s daughter and Hippolito’s wife, who learns from the servant Pacheco (actually Friscobaldo) about her husband’s waywardness and demonstrates a previously unseen strength and shrewdness. Falsely confessing unfaithfulness to Hippolito, she submits to his self-righteous denunciation but then confronts him with evidence of his own transgressions. He is only angered and not at all chastened.
Candido
Candido, now a widower and released from Bedlam, but no longer a heroically patient man. He remarries, again to a “shrew,” whom he succeeds in taming.