abstract illustration of Sir John Falstaff's face flanked by those of Miss Ford and Miss Page set against a wall of trees

The Merry Wives of Windsor

by William Shakespeare

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Places Discussed

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*Windsor

*Windsor. Town on the River Thames that is the play’s principal setting. Windsor is also the site of Windsor Castle, about twenty miles west of the center of London. Landmarks in the town include the great park and the castle, Datchet Mead, the road to Frogmore, the Garter Inn, the great oak in the forest, the nearby sawpit, and the castle ditch, in which Thomas Page conceals himself with Justice Shallow and Shallow’s simple-minded nephew, Slender. The play’s Windsor is a solid, comfortable community that takes pride in itself. Apart from the decadent knight Sir John Falstaff, Master Fenton, Justice Shallow, and Slender, all the characters in the play are citizens of Windsor.

*Garter Inn

*Garter Inn. Windsor meeting place of Falstaff and his cohorts. The setting provides another perspective of Windsor society and affords Falstaff a place in which to hatch his scheme to replenish his finances by wooing Mistress Ford and Mistress Page, the wives of two substantial citizens.

Caius’s house

Caius’s house. Home of the stupid French doctor Caius that is the scene of sheer farce, in which the eccentric Frenchman is satirized. Production designers avail themselves of the opportunity to embellish the set with extra doors and paraphernalia that add to the scene’s zaniness.

Herne’s oak

Herne’s oak. Site of Falstaff’s third adventure, where he appears at midnight, disguised as Herne the Hunter with antlers on his head. The forest is appropriate for the references to Diana and Actaeon, with Falstaff’s becoming a parodic Actaeon figure.

Modern Connections

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The Merry Wives of Windsor focuses on how a community establishes and preserves its own standards. Outsiders like Falstaff, Fenton, Caius, and Evans cause a wide range of threats to Windsor's inhabitants. Evans and Caius threaten the conventions of language use that other characters rely on: the Welsh Evans has an accent, and Caius frequently misunderstands English expressions and imports French words into his speech. Even native speakers within the community often lack language skills— Mistress Quickly mistakes Latin for vulgar English, and Slender frequently mistakes the prefixes and suffixes of words. But language is nevertheless used by the characters to define an inside group and an outside group; and foreigners are on the outside. They are the object of the host's tricks, and remain the subject of humor throughout the play. There are many ways in which modern communities use language to distinguish among groups, and sometimes to exclude certain people or groups of people. For example, slang associated with younger people often receives ridicule and rejection from the adult community.

Falstaff poses a different kind of threat to the community of Windsor: he uses language exceedingly well, and in fact he is fully in control of his own jokes, fully capable of mocking other people (and himself) through language. But his cleverness also works against him. The very ruse he sets up to earn himself money reveals his capacity for using other people for his own ends. Trickster figures often appear as social outsiders, in many other literatures and in social life. Falstaff is not unlike a modern "class clown" who plays clever tricks, shows off, or tells jokes to get attention. As a result, he is punished in an elaborate and ceremonial way that may appear strange to modern audiences. The entire community dresses up as fairies from local folklore in order to torment a stranger. A distant analogy in modern life might be the jokes and disguises designed to frighten people on camping trips or at Halloween. But the punishment Falstaff receives is also quite...

(This entire section contains 702 words.)

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strange, and it takes on a magical and even solemn quality all its own.

Class anxiety is the source of much of the play's conflict. The Order of the Garter, which provides an underlying context for the whole play, was an order of knights with special privileges and a special relationship to Queen Elizabeth. Much of the play is staged at the Garter Inn, so named because the Order had its annual feast at Windsor. The host and inhabitants of the In aspire to be members of the court culture of Windsor—or at least to serve that culture—but none of them actually has any contact with the court. Indeed, the community of the play is actually quite marginal to the court and to the trappings of nobility. Although they may have titles—Falstaff has the title of knight—these do not necessarily give them the cultivated conduct of gentry. Indeed, the play raises the question of what might constitute gentility, especially in relation to Anne Page. Though Caius has money and court connections, he is a blustering foreigner and therefore unfit to marry Anne Page; though Shallow and Slender remind us of their status as landowners, they are (as Anne says) ''idiots" and therefore unfit to marry her. Fenton, with his connections to ''the wild Prince and Poins,'' has no money, but Anne finds him suitable enough to marry.

In The Merry Wives of Windsor, nearly everyone claims to be a gentleman on the basis of title, land, court connection, or money. Falstaff is excluded from the community based on his distinctly ungentlemanlike behavior toward the Mistresses Page and Ford; Caius and Evans are mocked because of their indiscretions. Only Fenton and Anne Page show propriety and discretion—to the point of marrying in secret. In contemporary American life, class relationships are similarly ill-defined. Most people would claim to be "middle class," just as most people in The Merry Wives of Windsor claim to be gentry. Although wealth—or lack of it—is often accepted as the defining characteristic between classes, behavior and language are also used to distinguish class, just as they are in The Merry Wives of Windsor.

Bibliography and Further Reading

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Anderson, Linda M. A Kind of Wild Justice; Revenge in Shakespeare's Comedies. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1987. Anderson argues that The Merry Wives of Windsor is a play "obsessed" with revenge, and offers a detailed and readable analysis of its three separate revenge plots. She also gives an accessible account of other critical opinion, including the general tendency to ignore the play.

Barton, Anne. Introduction to The Merry Wives of Windsor, by William Shakespeare. In The Riverside Shakespeare, edited by G. Blakemore Evans, 286-89. Chicago: Houghton Mifflin, 1974. Barton discusses the play's possible commission by Queen Elizabeth and its performance at the Feast of the Garter in 1597. She also analyzes the play's content, especially Falstaff's relation to the Windsor community and the meaning of the play's many misuses and abuses of English language.

Bradbrook, Muriel C. Shakespeare the Craftsman. The Clark Lectures, 1968. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979. In a chapter entitled "Royal Command: The Merry Wives of Windsor," Bradbrook offers a discussion of the play in terms of its (possible) intended audience. She elucidates the play's humor by connecting ito the political events of the time, including English relations with German and French politicians, and argues that the play is a marketable and professionally astute accomplishment because of its topical nature.

Bryant, J. A. "Falstaff and the Renewal of Windsor." Publications of the Modern Language Society 89 (1974): 296-301. Bryant sees Falstaff's role as painful and comic; he argues for the productive effect of the Herne the Hunter scene, where Falstaff is scapegoated to renew Windsor society. The Merry Wives of Windsor fulfills the expectations of comedy, making us "see the mysterious terms on which we live, accept those terms, and once more concede that the game shall go on".

Craik, T. W. Introduction to The Merry Wives of Windsor by William Shakespeare. InThe Oxford Shakespeare, 1-72, 223-30. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1989. Craik reviews the play's occasion, date, and critical and textual histories; he analyzes the substance and dramatic structure of the play in detail. The edition contains illustrations of Windsor, photos of stage performances and manuscripts, and appendices on a textual "crux," Marlowe's song "Come live with me and be my love" (see III.i), and an explanation of Falstaff's disguise.

Erickson, Peter. "The Order of the Garter, the Cult of Elizabeth, and Class-Gender Tension in The Merry Wives of Windsor." In Shakespeare Reproduced: The Text in History and Ideology, edited by Jean Howard and Marion F. 6'Connor, 116-42. New York and London: Methuen, 1987. Erickson's exploration of the relations between social forces and the play focuses on class and gender tensions. He argues that although the women characters create comic subversions, they return in the end to a bourgeois, patriarchal framework.

Evans, Betrand. Shakespeare's Comedies. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1960. Evans coined the term "discrepant awareness" to describe the various levels at which characters under- stand events. His work explains the understanding of events that various characters in the play possess and analyzes the subtle ironies that stem from the exploration of the discrepancies between these understandings.

French, Marilyn. Shakespeare's Division of Experience. New York: Summit Books, 1981. In the context of an early feminist analysis of Shakespeare, French sees the women in The Merry Wives of Windsor as a radical threat to male supremacy. The society of Windsor, which she analyzes in one chapter with The Merchant of Venice, is "masculine" in its preoccupation with possession of property, money, and women.

Green, William. Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962. Green views the play as an outgrowth of the election of Shakespeare patrons to the Order of the Garter in 1597. Green's book provides useful background and explanatory material—along with some fascinating documents.

Kegl, Rosemary. "The Adoption of Abominable Terms: The Insults that Shape Windsor's Middle Class." Journal of English Literary History 61:2 (1994): 253-78. Looking at how characters insult each other in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Kegl redefines the social and economic context of the play. She views the play's middle class as defined by a set of unstable social ties among people with often contradictory interests.

Leggatt, Alexander. Citizen Comedy in the Age of Shakespeare. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1973. Leggatt illuminates a genre otherwise lesser known to students; Shakespeare produced only one citizen comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor, while the genre became increasingly popular with other playwrights. The section on The Merry Wives of Windsor specifically (146-9) asserts that the play has the distinct moral purpose of preserving chastity, and views the jokes on Falstaff as "appropriate comic punishments.''

Oliver, H. J. Introduction to The Merry Wives of Windsor, by William Shakespeare. New Arden Edition, i-lxv. London: Methuen, 1971. Oliver offers extensive discussion of the text; the relation of The Merry Wives of Windsor to the histories of 1 and 2 Henry IV and Henry V; the possible occasion and date of its composition; critical sources; and a critical description of the play.

Roberts, Jeanne Addison. Shakespeare's English Comedy:The Merry Wives of Windsor in Context. Lincoln: The University of Nebraska Press, 1979. Roberts explores thematic and genre issues such as Falstaff's character and the comedic content of the play. She argues that the play offers a disturbing look at Falstaff's downfall within the Windsor community.

Slights, Camille Wells. Shakespeare's Comic Commonwealth. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1993. In a chapter entitled "Pastoral and Parody in The Merry Wives of Windsor," Slights explores the threat posed by Falstaff and his men from outside of the Windsor community. She argues that the play's resolution depends on the "cohesion of the local community and its resistance to external pressures," even as the local community shares the characteristics of greed and pride with the threatening outsiders.

White, R. S. Twayne's New Critical Introductions to Shakespeare:The Merry Wives of Windsor. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1991. This is the most complete critical introduction to the play. It contains material on the history of stage performance and operatic adaptations, as well as chapters on the town of Windsor, women in the play, plot structure, and language.

Bibliography

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Barton, Ann. “Falstaff and the Comic Community.” In Shakespeare’s “Rough Magic”: Renaissance Essays in Honor of C. L. Barber, edited by Peter Erickson and Coppélia Kahn. Newark, N.J.: University of Delaware Press, 1985. An excellent study of Falstaff, the most controversial character in the play. Barton shows that Shakespeare was consciously trying to exclude such self-seeking epicureans from his plays; Falstaff in The Merry Wives of Windsor was the last time such a character received such prominence.

Green, William. Shakespeare’s “Merry Wives of Windsor.” Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1962. This book follows the history of the play, from its composition to its first performance and audience.

Hemingway, Samuel B. “On Behalf of That Falstaff.” Shakespeare Quarterly 3 (1952): 307-311. Hemingway attributes Falstaff’s controversy to his presence in the Henry IV plays as well as in The Merry Wives of Windsor. Shakespeare’s portrayal of him is different in each.

Roberts, Jeanne Addison. Shakespeare’s English Comedy: “The Merry Wives of Windsor” in Context. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1979. Places the play into the context of the development of Shakespeare’s career, arguing that the play provided Shakespeare’s transition from writing histories to writing tragedies. Roberts also includes chapters on the text, date, sources, and genre.

Wells, Stanley, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare Studies. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1986. This is where all studies of Shakespeare should begin. It includes excellent chapters introducing the poet’s biography, conventions and beliefs of Elizabethan England, and reviews of scholarship in the field.

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