SOURCE: “Is John Heywood's Play of the Weather really about the Weather?,” in Renaissance Drama, Vol. VII, 1964, pp. 11-19.

[In the following essay, Bevington concentrates on the role played by Merry Report in Play of the Weather, concluding that the character is an “allowed fool,” “wisely exposing the insanity of supposedly sane men.”]

To what extent is John Heywood's Play of the Weather about the weather? A modern reader approaches it first as a jeu d'esprit on a trivial subject, revealing the playwright's skill in mere ingenious debate and farfetched comic situations. Kenneth Cameron theorizes, on the other hand, that Heywood's intent is essentially political, and that the figure of Jupiter as peacemaker and judge among factions is an extended analogy to Henry VIII as governor of the realm.¹

Cameron's hypothesis raises several questions basic to a consideration of early Tudor drama. Is a topical interpretation valid? In this particular instance, did Heywood intend a political allusion throughout the play, and would it have been apparent to his audience? What is the nature of proof that the allusions are intentional? Even if an extended comparison can be shown to exist, it may be fortuitous, the anachronistic discovery of the over-zealous critic forever in search of correspondences. How is it possible to identify the playwright's stand on contemporary matters? The problem of topical proof is complicated by the genre of drama, in which the characters may or may not represent the dramatist's point of view. Even if topical interpretation is demonstrable, does it have any literary significance?

This paper will attempt to show that it is possible to discover the playwright's political intention, and that the study is a valid literary concern. It is central to an understanding of Heywood's auspices, his dramatic intention, his handling of point of view, and his conception of the genre in which he wrote.

The text of The Weather gives ample indication of specific auspices.² The performance is at night (p. 127).³ Torchbearers are in attendance; and Merry Report emerges from the audience of gentlefolk, proclaiming himself to be a gentleman even though his dress betrays him as an interloper (p. 96). Like Fulgens and Lucrece, this humanist play is an interlude to enliven a patrician banquet. Unlike Heywood's more popular farces, such as The Four PP, this drama would not serve for village green or city innyard. The actors are too numerous for a troupe. All ten members of the cast gather on stage for the final scene, so that doubling of parts is impossible. The part of the Boy is assigned to “the least that can play” (p. 126), implying that the other actors are also boys. The Weather is seemingly a product of Heywood's professional service at court in which he was expected to provide scripts for the Chapel boys. If the play was for the Chapel children it could hardly have been witnessed outside the court circle, since the boy companies were not yet exploited for commercial presentation. It follows that if Heywood had a topical sentiment to convey, he must have intended it for the rulers of England.

Viewing the play as one performed under noble auspices, we are in a position to follow a pattern of dramatic irony that would otherwise escape attention. In the opening scene, for example, we find an actor, probably a boy, posing as the monarch of the universe—in the presence of the royalty and nobility of England. The prevailing tone of Jupiter's speech is one of allowed license, of mock elevation and usurpation, something akin to the saturnalian rule of the Boy-Bishop.⁴ Jupiter is ruler for this night, and he does not hesitate to demand obeisance from everyone in the audience including the king:

Which highly shall bind you, on knees lowly bent,
Solely to honour our highness, day by day.

(p. 93)

At his first exit, Jupiter retires with regal superciliousness worthy of an impudent boy king:

And now, according to your obedience,
Rejoice ye in us with joy most joyfully,
And we ourself shall joy in our own glory!

(p. 99)

The situation lends itself to comic bombast, and Jupiter exploits it. The audience would see a gentle parody of kingship in a familiar tradition of court entertainment.

Pomposity continues to be the keynote of the exposition. Jupiter's account of the war in heaven among Saturn, Phebus, Eolus, and Phebe is exaggerated into heroic bombast. He speaks of high parliaments of gods and goddesses “For the redress of certain enormities,” and of constellations engaged in cosmic strife “To the great damage of all earthly nations” (p. 94). Dispute among the gods leads to rebellion among men. Jupiter, having made peace among the gods, now descends to earth to content all who have been offended by strife among the elements—that is, all who complain about the weather. The whole concept of the deus ex machina, of men's fate as ruled by the Olympian gods, of the microcosm and macrocosm, is designed to the scale of a classical epic. In the context of this ostensibly “trivial” entertainment, however, the heroic becomes mock heroic. Jupiter's warnings of dire happenings on earth suddenly collapse into the banality of what appears to be a debate on the weather.

Heywood's elite audience would perceive at once, then, that he was treating a serious subject lightly. The satire, achieved by juxtaposing high seriousness and triviality, is directed against discord. The device is not unlike another “parliament” in earlier English literature, Chaucer's Perlement of Fowles. Just as Chaucer exposes the folly of bickering by reducing it to barnyard gabble, Heywood portrays his great debate as a cataclysm about nothing at all.

The role of Merry Report is central in continuing the mood of irreverent and yet instructive gaiety. His name reflects his dual nature:

And, for my name, reporting alway truly,
What hurt to report a sad matter merrily?

(p. 97)

Although he treats everything comically, his subject is serious and his word may be trusted. “Report” as he uses it means not rumor but information. He appears to be, even more than Jupiter, the mouthpiece for Heywood. Merry Report mocks everything he sees—each petitioner, the audience, Jupiter himself. Yet his mocking is not malice, but comic indifference. Heywood calls Merry Report “the vice” of the play, but the term “vice”—not yet in common use when The Weather appeared—does not convey the meaning that it acquired in the popular morality. The popular “vice,” derived from figures like Tityvillus in Mankind, was the epitome of evil and the chief tempter of Man.⁵ In Heywood's courtly drama the “vice” is clearly an allowed fool.⁶ He is the jester of the king's retinue who may scoff at everything because his impudence is unpremeditated. Beneath his raillery and abusive obscenity shine perceptions of natural wisdom. He is the forerunner of the Fool in Lear, just as the popular “vice” is the forerunner of Richard III and Iago.

Merry Report is indeed a wise fool. He parodies everything at hand. After Jupiter's first exit, Merry Report apes his master by scurrilously demanding obedience from his noble audience:

Why, ye drunken whoresons, will it not be?
By your faith, have ye nother cap nor knee?
Not one of you that will make curtesy
To me, that am squire for god's precious body?
Regard ye nothing mine authority?

(p. 99)

He is openly critical of the Gentlemen's life of sensual ease and implicates the women of the audience in his endless jests upon cuckold's horns and apothecary's glisters (pp. 101, 103). Yet his raillery is not to be dismissed as idle rant. He has license to speak out because he is the fool, but he still reports truly. The audience must accept the satire of courtly life without offense because it is offered zanily and without venom. Laughter sweetens the mock but it does not invalidate the picture of court life as giddy and vapid. The device enables Heywood to speak plainly without sounding pontifical. The criticism is lighthearted and friendly, spoken by an insider rather than reformer—yet it is seriously moral. The satire of the lower classes is no less cheerful and to the point, an indication of Merry Report's even-handed justice.

If Merry Report is a social critic, he is even more a prophet and impartial witness of the debate. He is far wiser than the individual petitioners, for he can tell from the start how their differences will be reconciled—as, indeed, any fool could tell. Totally unmoved by their quarrels, he can only chortle to see them competing uselessly with one another. He is the perfect foil for Jupiter. Jupiter resolves the debate and contents each petitioner; it is Merry Report who points out with incredulous laughter that no one is any better off than he was before.

As the moving spirit of the play he represents not discord but amity; his function is not to destroy or to shame, but to reconcile through laughter. The point of view is that of the simpleminded observer, used so effectively by Heywood's beloved Chaucer. The audience, recognizing in Merry Report the type of allowed fool, would appreciate the dramatic irony of a simpleton's wisely exposing the insanity of supposedly sane men. He is mad, but they are “more than mad.” And since the spectators are indicted as well, they are asked to examine their own ambitions and to laugh at the folly shown them by a fool.

What, more specifically, is the nature of the discord that Merry Report satirizes? Heywood's fable, if read as moral allegory, suggests mere selfishness. Every man desires a particular kind of weather for his narrowly-defined purposes. The good of mankind requires compromise between conflicting claims, and accordingly the gods have decreed a mixed climate that suffices for each man without preferring one before another. True wisdom consists in accepting this divinely-ordained condition, acknowledging that a part of humanity must not dictate for the whole.

From this point, the transfer to an historical allegory of Tudor political theory is easy, and plainly indicated in the text. As the suitors parade before the audience, it becomes clear that they represent a cross-section of English society: the knight, the merchant, the overseer of a forest, the small mill-owner, the lady, the washerwoman. It is indeed a “parlement,” as Jupiter calls it; and if the representation is more democratic than one would expect of Tudor parliaments, the decorum of rank is still punctiliously preserved. Jupiter enjoins Merry Report

Here to receive all suitors of each degree;
And such as to thee may seem most meetly,
We will thou bring them before our majesty,
And for the rest, that be not so worthy,
Make thou report to us effectually,
So that we may hear each manner suit at large.

(p. 98)

Merry Report carries out the order with precise and meaningful distinctions. The Gentleman is unhesitatingly granted audience with Jupiter. So is the Merchant. The Ranger's request for audience is refused, but his exchanges with Merry Report are at least respectful. The millers do not even get as far as to request audience. And so it goes. These distinctions have dramaturgic value, for they vary the staging of a potentially repetitive series of appearances. Their chief function, however, is to observe precedence in a debate before royal authority. All estates may have equal claim to royal attention, but few are privileged to approach the throne directly.

The Gentleman appears at first to have best claim to royal favor. After all, Heywood's aristocratic patrons share the Gentleman's viewpoint. He alone is on equal terms with the audience, and greets them with nonchalance: “Stand ye merry, my friends, everyone” (p. 100). To Jupiter he addresses himself on behalf of the entire noble estate. His claim is that the nobility exerts a greater effort for the welfare of society than does the “common flock,” and therefore deserves greater protection from the crown. He also claims the luxuries that are rightfully his by inheritance. The scene is not, however, a traditional defense of a hierarchical society. Arguments for privilege are placed only in the mouth of the Gentleman. The simpleminded and disinterested observer, Merry Report, shows the Gentleman to be a biased pleader. The notion of rank is pitted in debate with the medieval Christian truism that one man is as worthy as another before God and the law.⁷ At the same time Heywood's position is certainly not that of a leveller. His dramatic device is satirical, probing. The nobility shall get what they deserve, but their claim to being disproportionately vital in the affairs of government is left open to question.

Ostensibly the Merchant has just as much reason to hope for favored treatment from Heywood and his dramatic persona Merry Report. The Merchant's plea for special favor is made on the basis of mutual self-interest; the English economy can be enriched only by a more powerful mercantile class. He speaks not of right or duty, but of financial common sense. Without adequate financial return he will avoid taking risks, and without speculative investment there will be no “common increase.” This practical argument might well appeal to a friend and relative by marriage of Thomas More. As holder of public office in London and as investor in a mercantile colonial project,⁸ More had respect for the aspirations of this social class. Nevertheless he was a tolerant and impartial man, and a like spirit of detachment appears throughout Heywood's drama. The Merchant fares no better than the Gentleman, for all his belief in profitable industry rather than indolent luxury. Jupiter promises only to judge so “that each man's part may shine in the self right” (p. 106); and Merry Report greets the Merchant with characteristically deflating mockery. The Merchant engages in no badinage with the audience, and deplores digression of any sort. He cuts short Merry Report's impudent small talk peremptorily: “But let pass, Sir, I would to you be suitor / To bring me, if ye can, before Jupiter” (p. 104). It is a plain, blunt proposition. The Merchant is alone among the suitors in supposing that Merry Report will wish to be requited for his part in the deal (p. 106). Merry Report is comically outraged to be taken for a bribable courtier. The dramatic device of the fool places the Merchant in a satirical perspective.

By now, the central topic of debate is clear: which segment of society is most useful in the whole and therefore most deserving of royal endorsement? Through the handling of point of view, the answer is equally clear long before the denouement. No major group should either be pampered or slighted, not even petty bureaucrats like the Ranger, the type of shiftless hack who is fit only for carrying out routine administration and so grumbles at a system he cannot escape. No government can afford to ignore the restive demands of its minor officialdom. Nor can it overlook the problem of small entrepreneurs like the mill-owners, who most graphically illustrate the inherent conflict between closely rivalled factions. In their fratricidal and unreasoning desire to deprive each other and to overwhelm themselves with needless excess, Heywood documents his belief that the motivating force of ungoverned society is self-destruction.

The debat between the Gentlewoman and Launder has no direct bearing on the men's world of economic rivalry. Yet their moral conflict is of parallel significance. The Gentlewoman speaks in the name of “all other that do beauty have,” whereas the Launder represents all those who “daily toil and labour” for the well-to-do. The debate quickly centers on the topic of idleness, a favorite concern of humanist writers in such works as Utopia and the play Calisto and Melibea.⁹ Which way of life is more defensible, the parasitic frivolity of the court or the productive labor of the servant class? The debate also takes on an ethical significance parallel to that of the popular Owl and the Nightingale. The Gentlewoman is a creature of sensual beauty, purely ornamental and yet undeniably attractive. The Launder is an older woman, and like the Owl she represents the experienced and cautious virtue of age in contrast to the frivolity of youth. The two women represent not estates of the political realm but ethical polarities of youth versus age, idleness versus industry, physical versus spiritual beauty, sensuality versus moral wisdom, body versus soul.

As thus defined, the debate would seem to favor the Launder's position that true gentleness resides in the soul and not in the superficial accident of noble birth or beauty—a truism expounded in other humanist plays, including Heywood's. Yet the viewpoint in The Weather, as seen in the attitudes of Jupiter and Merry Report, does not express a preference. The ideal seems to be a golden mean. Fleshly and spiritual beauty seem at odds, but in the truly temperate life they act in harmony. Just as the body politic reconciles warring factions in a mutually profitable union, the individual life blends many diverse impulses into one ordered whole. Joy and seriousness, amusement and instruction are most effective in combination, as in a farcical and yet thoughtful play. In both political and ethical life, Heywood sees conflict of opposites as the definition of wisdom.

Heywood's ultimate view of political life, then, is that the parts of society can never understand the whole. Only the king can act as umpire between elements seeking continually to destroy one another. To do so he must have knowledge of the claims of each estate, and so listens to partial arguments without accepting the advice of any one counselor. The best course for every subject is to accept this overruling wisdom with gratitude and to wait his turn patiently for such favors as he deserves. The petitioners of the play do so with sincerity, pledging their fealty to the throne in a ceremony that includes the audience as well (pp. 133-134). Despite all its satire, Heywood's play is reverent toward the institution of the crown.

If this topical interpretation defines Heywood's political stance, it also reveals the artistry of his dramatic method. It shows, first, his approach to metaphor. The Weather lacks the pictorial metaphors and conceits that enrich later Renaissance drama. Instead, Heywood borrows the device of extended metaphor from contemporary religious drama. The structure of his entire play is a single metaphor: just as each individual selfishly hopes for one kind of weather to suit his peculiar needs, so in society each estate seeks its private welfare to the exclusion of others. The interplay of meanings is the chief source of dramatic irony; for, as the audience perceives, the debate is at once trivial and consequential.

Most of all, the topical nature of The Weather shows its basic literary genre to be the mock heroic. This grand debate, commencing as a war in heaven and encompassing the fate of humanity, ends as much ado about nothing. Merry Report gleefully announces the ultimate anticlimax:

Lord, how this is brought to pass!
Sir, now shall ye have the weather even as it was.

(pp. 134-135)

This is the well-deserved reductio ad absurdum of all political, social, and even ethical conflict. The solution of tolerant acceptance and harmony is so simple that it requires a fool to point it out.

Notes

1. Kenneth W. Cameron, John Heywood's “Play of the Weather”: A Study in Early Tudor Drama (Raleigh, N.C., 1941).

2. See my From “Mankind” to Marlowe (Cambridge, Mass., 1962), pp. 40-41.

3. All page references are to The Dramatic Writings of John Heywood, ed. John S. Farmer (London, 1905), in the Early English Dramatists Series.

4. E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage (Oxford, 1903), I, 336-371.

5. Bernard Spivack, Shakespeare and the Allegory of Evil (New York, 1958), passim.

6. Robert L. Ramsay, ed., Magnificence by John Skelton, Early English Text Society, extra series, XCVIII (London, 1908), pp. xcvii-cvi.

7. See The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, ed. F. N. Robinson, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, Mass., 1957), “Wife of Bath's Tale,” I. 1162.

8. A. W. Reed, Early Tudor Drama (London, 1926), pp. 11ff. and 187-201.

9. Sir Thomas More, Utopia, trans. Ralph Robinson, Everyman's Library (London, 1951), pp. 23-24. Compare with the ending of Calisto and Melibea.