William Leahy
EN5520
25 pages total
The Shakespeare Authorship Question
Visual Metre
as an Authorship Attribute
Robin Williams
Brunel University
This paper explores the possible use of a visual representation of Shakespeare’s metrical patterns to
help determine authorship and/or collaboration of plays. The foundation for this visual strategy is
summed up by a comment from George T. Wright, a humanist working on verse metrics:
Shakespeare’s syllabic freedom combines with his metrical variety and his
remarkable inventiveness in adjusting English phrases and sentences to the metrical
line to produce an iambic pentameter verse which, for all its powerful influence on
later poets, is unique in the English tradition.1 [italics added]
The metrist Marina Tarlinskaja confirms:
The idiosyncratic features of a poet’s verse system (e.g., Shakespeare’s iambic
pentameter) can be abstracted from all, or a large part, of his works and presented
in the form of a model.2
What metrists do not know how to do is represent this model visually. Perhaps if we could see
the idiosyncratic features, we might see differences between Shakespeare’s verse system and that
of other playwrights of the time. The system exampled in this essay does not intend to compete
with the staggeringly complex metrical analyses of metrists such as Tarlinskaja, Wright, or Kristin
Hanson. This paper merely presents a new way, a simple way, of looking at the metre in the possibility that patterns hitherto unnoticed may appear once the complexity is removed.
1 George T. Wright, Shakespeare’s Metrical Art (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988; repr. 1997), p. 159.
2 Marina Tarlinskaja, Shakespeare’s Verse: Iambic Pentameter and the Poet’s Idiosyncrasies (New York: Peter Lang, 1987), p. 2.
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
But first it is important to realise that authorship attribution studies of the past 320 years3 can
be, on close examination, compared to the medieval alchemists’ quests to transmutate base metals
into gold. Or perhaps a closer analogy is to voodoo where a particular method occasionally creates
a desired result, complete with rhetoric and smoke screens (in the form of impenetrable charts
and forensic data), but the results are inconsistent and equivocal and often include manipulation
or suppression of unsupportive data. Studies have been made of word length, sentence length, full
text length, extrametricality, syllables with certain vowel sounds, distribution of parts of speech,
type-token ratios, ‘Characteristic K’ based on vocabulary richness, vocabulary distributions, word
frequencies including hapax legomena and hapax dislegomena, semantic buckets, and cluster
analyses.4 Brian Vickers itemises studies of feminine line endings, latinate vocabulary, contraction
preferences, pause patterns, polysyllabic words, function words, alliterative words, vocatives,
rhyme vs. blank verse, syntactical quotients, grammatical preferences, utterance junctures, and
stress profiles.5 Jonathan Hope uses socio-historical linguistic evidence, such as the use of the
auxiliary do; relative markers such as who, which, and that; and use of thou vs. you; he claims ‘the
differences it detects between the linguistic usages of authors are explicable, and that it does not
rely on complex statistical tests for validation’, although his book displays 56 tables and 60 graphs
in 175 pages.6 Parallelisms were used by Gary Taylor and Stanley Wells to prove Shakespeare’s
authorship of the poem Shall I Die? 7 Subsequently Thisted and Efron developed an authorship
attribution model based on butterfly collecting to cement the authorship of Shall I Die? They
begin the article with this statement, ‘Our paper develops simple tests for this question based on
the frequency of occurrence of unusual words’, and twelve pages later end with:
3 Samuel Schoenbaum, Internal Evidence and Elizabethan Dramatic Authorship (London: Edward Arnold, 1966), details
authorship attributions or disintegrations of Shakespeare’s work from Edward Ravenscroft and Titus Andronicus in 1687,
Laingbaine in 1691, Rowe in 1709, Pope in 1725, Theobald in 1726, Hanmer in 1744, Warburton in 1747, Johnson in 1765,
Capell in 1768, Malone in 1787, through Fleay, Hoy, Morton, and others up to 1966.
4 David I. Holmes, ‘Authorship Attribution’, Computers and the Humanities, 28 (1994), 87–106 (passim).
5 Brian Vickers, Shakespeare, Co-Author: A Historical Study of Five Collaborative Plays (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2002), passim.
6 Jonathan Hope, The Authorship of Shakespeare’s Plays: A Socio-Linguistic Study (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1994, repr. 2006), p. 9 and passim.
7 Gary Taylor, ‘Shakespeare’s New Poem: A Scholar’s Clues And Conclusions’, The New York Times, 15 December 1985
<http://www.nytimes.com/1985/12/15/books/shakespeare-s-new-poem-a-scholar-s-clues-and-conclusions.html>
[accessed 01/04/2010]
2
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
They ultimately declare that, ‘On balance, the poem is found to fit previous Shakespearean
usage reasonably well.’ 8 However, following those complex calculations, this attribution to
Shakespeare was demolished by Don Foster 9 and others. In 1989 Foster himself used stylistic
computer analyses to prove Shakespeare’s authorship of A Funeral Elegy for Master William
Peter 10 (in which his ‘aggressive editing’ managed to increase A Funeral Elegy’s ‘average sentence
length by 44 percent and more than double its percentage of run-on (enjambed) lines’ to ‘prove’
that Shakespeare had written it11), but in 2002 Gilles Monsarrat (and subsequently several others)
proved the elegy was actually written by John Ford12. Foster conceded,13 although many still
wonder why the poem is signed w. s.
Marina Tarlinskaja generates complex metrical stress profiles based on ictics, non-ictics,
proclitics, and enclitics (varying levels of syllable stress).14 Hugh Craig and Arthur F. Kinney
use computation stylistics of lexical and function words to great effect; although they place an
inordinate reliance on Brian Vicker’s work, they found Marlowe to be a more likely collaborator
than Kyd in the Henry VI plays.15 Stefan Daniel Keller’s brilliant study of rhetorical devices used in
nine Shakespearean plays is the best of those that use the specific and structured use of figures as a
method of attribution.16
Most methods appear, ostensibly, to make good sense—quantifying a particular technique
or pattern of Shakespeare’s writing and charting how similarly or differently other playwrights
use the same technique or pattern. Vickers quotes six attributes that F. G. Fleay outlined in 1874
to distinguish Fletcher’s work: Fletcher uses more feminine endings; more end-stopped lines,
particularly with feminine endings; moderate use of rhyme; moderate use of short lines; no prose
whatsoever; and regularly either elides words to squeeze the line into iambic pentameter or creates
alexandrines (lines of six feet/twelve syllables). By quantifying, for instance, the average number
of feminine line endings per play, Fleay claimed he ‘conclusively’ separated the works of Fletcher,
Massinger, and Shakespeare. Eighty years later Cyrus Hoy’s method using variant forms of ye,
hath, and ’em overlapped some of Fleay’s findings but contradicted others.17
8 Ronald Thisted and Bradley Efron, ‘Did Shakespeare write a newly-discovered poem?’ Biometrika, 74 (1987), 445–455
<http://www.jstor.org/stable/2336684> [accessed 05/04/2010]
9 Don Foster, ‘“Shall I Die” Post-Mortem: Defining Shakespeare’, Shakespeare Quarterly, 38 (1987), 58–77
<http://www.jstor.org/stable/2870401> [accessed 05/04/2010]
10 Donald W. Foster, Elegy by W.S.: A Study in Attribution (Newark, Delaware: University of Delaware Press, 1989).
11 Ward E. Y. Elliott and Robert J. Valenza, ‘So Many Hardballs, So Few Over the Plate: Conclusions from Our
“Debate” with Donald Foster’, Computers and the Humanities 36 (2002), 457.
12 G. D. Monsarrat, ‘A Funeral Elegy: Ford, W.S., and Shakespeare’, The Review of English Studies, n.s. 53 (2002), 186–203.
13 Don Foster, Shaksper email post, The Shakespeare Conference: shk 13.1514, 13 June 2002 <http://www.shaksper.net/
archives/2002/1484.html>
14 Marina Tarlinskaja, Shakespeare’s Verse.
15 Hugh Craig and Arthur F. Kinney, Shakespeare, Computers, and the Mystery of Authorship (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2009), p. 77 and passim.
16 Stefan Daniel Keller, The Development of Shakespeare’s Rhetoric: A Study of Nine Plays (Zurich: Narr Francke Attempto
Verlag, 2009).
17Vickers, Shakespeare, Co-Author, pp. 47–49.
3
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Metrical, lexical, linguistical, rhetorical, morphological-orthographical, imagistical, syntactical—the sweeping variety of methods would be useful if the results were consistent. But over
the past 100 years, to relate just one example, authorship attribution studies have ‘proven’ that
Edward III was written by George Peele alone; Christopher Marlowe with George Peele, Robert
Greene, and Thomas Kyd; Thomas Kyd alone; Michael Drayton; Robert Wilson; William
Shakespeare alone; William Shakespeare and one unknown other; William Shakespeare and
Christopher Marlowe; William Shakespeare and several others, excluding Marlowe; and most
recently and very specifically Thomas Kyd (60 percent) and William Shakespeare (40 percent). 18
One outstanding voice of reason in the morass of authorship attribution studies is Joseph
Rudman from Carnegie Mellon (whom Vickers never cites). His working bibliography in 1998
contained well over 600 books and articles, and this does not include references to specific kinds
of expertise such as those relating to time period, genre, language, etc. Speaking of the ‘non-traditional’ studies (those that utilise computers) or ‘experiments’, as he sometimes calls them, Rudman
remarks:
Non-traditional authorship attribution studies . . . have had enough time to pass
through any “shake-down” phase and enter one marked by solid, scientific, and
steadily progressing studies. But, after over 30 years and 300 publications, they have
not. . . . There is more wrong with authorship attribution studies [both traditional
and non] than there is right. 19
Rudman calls for standards, a unified methodology, educated gatekeepers, and peer conferences to
regulate the burgeoning discipline. He recognises, however, that what will more likely happen is a
continuation of a flawed process where ‘the practitioners agree that there are problems—but not
with their own studies’. 20
Into this imbroglio of authorship attribution, this paper proposes yet another way of quantifying Shakespeare’s metrical technique. Why would one want to do that? Perhaps this quote
from Anthony Kenny may suffice as a partial explanation: ‘My excuse for being undeterred by
this [problem of being underqualified in a quagmire of authorship attribution] is the fact that
most of those working in the field of literary statistics are also, in one or other respect, novices,
or, as they would no doubt prefer to put it, pioneers’.21 Also, it is not expected in this short essay
that a definitive solution or method can be developed and presented, or even that this particular
method would ever lead to one. But since the field is still ungoverned and chaotic, it is not amiss
to attempt something new, that of examining the possibility that when verse is presented visually,
18 Jack Malvern interviewing Brian Vickers, ‘Computer program proves Shakespeare did not work alone, researchers claim’,
Times Online <http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/stage/article6870086.ece> [accessed
12/04/2009]
19 Joseph Rudman, ‘The State of Authorship Attribution Studies: Some Problems and Solutions’, Computers and the
Humanities, 31 (1998), 351–365.
20 Rudman, ‘The State of Authorship Attribution Studies’, p. 362.
21 Anthony Kenny, The Aristotelian Ethics (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), p. v, quoted in Rudman, ‘The State of
Authorship Attribution Studies’, p. 357.
4
Robin Williams
visual metre as an authorship attribute
different writers present different patterns. It may be one thing to claim with complex and
potentially spurious statistics that Nashe wrote the first act of 1 Henry VI,22 but another to display
the visual patterns of the two writers for all to see and thus (possibly) to clearly and immediately
appraise the similarities or differences.
The reason the metrical pattern can be visualised is that the predominant literary style of
Elizabethan/Jacobean plays was blank (unrhymed) verse in iambic pentameter. The basic line is a
measure of five feet (penta meter), each foot consisting of one iamb. An iamb is two syllables with
an emphasis on the second beat, ba bum. The ictus is where the stress is supposed to fall, metrically, which means in an iambic line of ten syllables, the ictus is every ‘even’ syllable (in the second,
fourth, etc. positions). Thus a line of iambic pentameter, when the stress lands on the ictus, sounds
like five heartbeats: ba bum ba bum ba bum ba bum ba bum. Because not all syllables in a line of
poetry receive the same amount of stress, the resulting pattern is a function of the spoken language
and creates the rhythm we hear when a line is spoken according to the stress/ictus interaction.
When the stress does not fall on an ictus, there might be three reasons: 1) the writer was not
duly trained to write within the metrical pattern; 2) the writer did not take the time to find words
that fit the metre precisely; or 3) the writer intentionally chose to syncopate some of the words
to manifest an emotional state. Elizabethan writers use the metre and rhythm interaction with
varying levels of success. Shakespeare regularly disrupts the metre for specific purposes, generally
to indicate emotional states of the characters; other (lesser) writers tend to mangle the metre
arbitrarily or use it monotonously, as shall be shown in the charts below.
In the formal study of metrical analysis, linguists and metrists use a variety of symbols to
designate how the stress is applied to the various syllables (including intermediate emphases), such
– —
as —
ʹ /—
ʹ , W/S, w/s, S /–/W, –/U/x/✓/✓/∈, ˘/´, ˇ/`/´, and others. Each of these systems adds
another layer of technical mental calculation to the poetry that is one of the stumbling blocks
preventing more literary scholars from bridging the gap from poetics to metrical analyses, as
lamented by Dresher and Friedberg.23
At its simplest level, the basic metre can be displayed graphically with two colours:
had I but DIED an HOUR beFORE this CHANCE
24
22 Brian Vickers, ‘Incomplete Shakespeare: Or, Denying Coauthorship in I Henry VI ’, Shakespeare Quarterly, 58 (2007).
23 Formal Approaches to Poetry: Recent Developments in Metrics, ed. by B. Elan Dresher and Nila Friedberg (Berlin, New York:
Mouton de Gruyter, 2006), pp. 1–3.
24 All quotations are from the First Folio unless mentioned otherwise, and maintain the spelling, punctuation, and
capitalization found there.
5
Robin Williams
visual metre as an authorship attribute
In this way, these lines from Orsino’s opening speech appear very consistent, a perfect pattern
of the iambic pentameter metre and rhythm (spirit is spoken as one syllable):
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
o spirit of LoUe, how quicke and fresh art thou,
That notwithstanding thy capacitie,
receiueth as the Sea. Nought enters there,
of what validity, and pitch so ere,
but falles into abatement, and low price
In creating lines of iambic pentameter, the more skilled Elizabethan/Jacobean writers
developed a variety of methods to prevent the lines from becoming litanies of monotonous
orations. For instance, one might start a line with a trochee, a foot with a beat just the reverse of
an iamb: bum ba. Or one might use a spondee, a foot with two equal beats. Or a dactyl, a threesyllable foot with one strong beat followed by two short ones: bum ba ba. Examples of these feet:
iambs:
upon the place
up ON the place
trochees: William Leahy will iam lea hy
spondee:well-loved
well loved
dactyl:Barbara
bar ba ra
A writer might also add an eleventh syllable, always on the downbeat, called a feminine or
double ending. Graphically it can be shown with a lighter shade of the regular downbeat:
,
,
:
,
to be, or not to be, that is the Question:
whether ’tis Nobler in the minde to suffer
the Slings and Arrowes of outragious Fortune,
One can see in the example above that Shakespeare starts the second line with a trochee; this interruption combined with the feminine endings creates a more sophisticated and less predictable
sound, becoming less patterned and more speechlike. In these three short lines, we can see the soft
ending on a line combined with the soft beginning of the next line, a trochee in the middle, the
short pauses from the two commas in the first line, but no pause at all after the second line. This is
a master in charge of the iambic pentameter line.
6
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
A recent theory regarding Shakespeare’s metrics has been developing through the work of
directors teaching actors how to speak Shakespeare’s verse by using the First Folio or appropriate
Quarto editions of the texts to get as close as possible to the author’s intent in phrasing, punctuation, and rhythm of the lines, understanding the possible inconsistencies added by scribes and
compositors.25 Their work indicating that Shakespeare regularly controls the variation in the metre
and the resulting rhythm to create a desired emotional charge unwittingly confirms Dorothy Sipe’s
earlier meticulous study of variant forms of words that Shakespeare chose in various contexts (such
as bide and abide) that clearly indicate Shakespeare makes a priority of metrical consideration.26 A
close look at several examples, below, exemplify this use of metre. (The blue text indicates where
an actor or reader must elide two syllables into one.)
,
The qualitie of mercie is not straind,
it droppeth as the gentle raine from heauen
:
,
vpon the place beneath: it is twise blest,
,
,
it blesseth him that giues, and him that takes,
,
tis mightiest in the mightiest, it becomes
.
the thronèd Monarch better then his crowne.
,
His scepter showes the force of temporall power,
,
the attribut to awe and maiestie,
:
vvherein doth sit the dread and feare of Kings:
,
but mercie is aboue this sceptred sway,
,
it is enthronèd in the harts of Kings,
;
it is an attribut to God himselfe;
,
vvhen mercie seasons iustice: therefore Iew,
,
though iustice be thy plea, consider this,
and earthly power doth then show likest gods
:
,
,
:
that in the course of iustice, none of vs
,
,
should see saluation: we doe pray for mercy,
and that same prayer, doth teach vs all to render
.
the deedes of mercie. I haue spoke thus much
,
,
to mittigate the iustice of thy plea,
vvhich if thou follow, this strict Court of Venice
.
must needes giue sentence gainst the Merchant there.
27
In Portia’s mercy speech, it is easy to see what a smooth, calming, rhythmical delivery is
expected. The few feminine endings and mid-line caesuras (pauses in the middles of lines,
indicated by the punctuation and the black bars) prevent the text from becoming predictable and
static. Compare this to an introduction by Nathaniel Richards to Thomas Middleton’s play,
Women Beware Women, shown below.
25 John Barton, Playing Shakespeare, 2001, rev. 2009; Peter Hall, Shakespeare’s Advice to the Players, 2003; Patsy Rodenburg,
Speaking Shakespeare, 2004; Abigail Rokison, Shakespearean Verse Speaking: Text and Theatre Practice, 2009; Adrian
Noble, How to Do Shakespeare, 2010.
26 Dorothy L. Sipe, Shakespeare’s Metrics (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968), passim.
27 These examples use Q1, the edition most editors prefer and the one used in the Arden edition of The Merchant of Venice,
ed. by John Russell Brown (London: Arden Shakespeare, 2006), p. xx.
7
Middleton,
Women
Women, Foreword
visual
metre
as Beware
an authorship
attribute
UPON The Tragedy of My Familiar Acquaintance, THO. MIDDLETON . [By Richards, N.]
Women beware Women; ’tis a true Text
;
:
,
Robin Williams
,
,
Never to be forgot: Drabs of State vext,
,
Have Plots, Poysons, Mischeifs that seldom miss,
.
To murther Vertue with a venom kiss.
Witness this worthy Tragedy, exprest
,
By him that well deserv’d among the best
•
:
,
Madness of Women crost; and for the Stage
;
,
Fitted their humors, Hell-bred Malice, Strife
,
,
•
,
Of Poets in his time: He knew the rage,
,
.
Acted in State, presented to the life.
,
I that have seen’t, can say, having just cause,
.
Never came Tragedy off with more applause.
Richards seems to understand that a line must have ten syllables, but is unaware of (or is not
Nath. Richards. [pub. 1657, about 30 years after
concerned with or perhaps incapable of handling)
importance
of the metre and its resulting
Middletonthe
wrote
it.]
rhythm. The visual sloppiness of his text is apparent, and the disturbed rhythm has no emotional
affinity with the text.
Shakespeare creates disturbed metre as well, but it always has a purpose. Consider Lear’s line
with dead Cordelia in his arms:
Never, never, never, never, never.
The line is completely counterpoint (metrists would call it a ‘headless’ line with a feminine
ending). It would have been simple enough for Shakespeare to add the letter O at the beginning
of the line to create a perfect iambic pentameter line with a feminine ending; instead, the obvious
syncopation provides an emotional clue to the actor/reader. This is particularly interesting when
seen in combination with the other lines, as shown below—it is as if this is the moment, this line,
that Cordelia’s death finally dawns on Lear, overwhelmingly and irretrievably. The bullets to the
left of some lines indicate monosyllabic lines. Shakespeare often uses monosyllables to slow down
the spoken rhythm because it is more difficult to speak ten individual words than several multisyllabic words, such as the multitud’nous seas incarnadine. The technique is easy to mark in a visual
system and may be something worth tracking.
•
•
•
:
,
,
?
,
•
•
,
,
,
?
,
.
,
,
?
And my poore Foole is hang’d: no, no, no life?
,
Why should a Dog, a Horse, a Rat haue life,
,
And thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more,
.
Neuer, neuer, neuer, neuer, neuer.
.
,
Pray you vndo this Button. Thanke you Sir,
?
,
Do you see this? Looke on her? Looke her lips,
.
Looke there, looke there.
8
He dies.
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Below is Shylock’s speech to Antonio after Bassanio has (unbeknownst to Antonio) asked
Shylock for a loan. Using Shakespeare’s metre and the rhythms resulting from punctuation,
caesuras (several of which occur unusually close to the beginnings or ends of lines, rather than near
the middle), an unexpected alexandrine, and a short line, an actor can clearly see at what points in
the text the playwright expects the most disturbed emotion from Shylock. (The pale red cells at
the ends of several lines indicate dactylic line endings, a rare technique, according to Tarlinskaja,28
that may be worth tracking.)
Signior Anthonio, manie a time and oft
,
In the Ryalto you haue rated me
,
Still haue I borne it with a patient shrug,
(For suffrance is the badge of all our Trybe)
,
You call me misbeleeuer, cut-throate dog,
,
And spet vpon my Iewish gaberdine,
.
And all for vse of that which is mine owne.
:
Well then, it now appeares you neede my helpe:
,
,
Goe to then, you come to me, and you say,
,
:
Shylocke, we would haue moneyes, you say so:
,
You that did voyde your rume vpon my beard,
,
,
About my moneyes and my vsances:
)
,
,
:
And foote me as you spurne a stranger curre
,
Ouer your threshold, moneyes is your sute.
.
What should I say to you? Should I not say
?
Hath a dog money? is it possible
?
A curre can lend three thousand ducats? or
?
:
,
Shall I bend low, and in a bond-mans key
,
With bated breath, and whispring humblenes
,
,
,
Say this: Faire sir, you spet on me on Wednesday last,
You spurnd me such a day another time,
You calld me dogge: and for these curtesies
:
.
Ile lend you thus much moneyes.
One might expect Shylock’s final and short line to be picked up immediately by the next speaker,
but it is not. A significant pause seems to be expected. In this case, the next speaker is Antonio.
With the pause, Shakespeare apparently gives Antonio a moment to collect himself, and his next
words are coldly even-tempered:
,
,
I am as like to call thee so againe,
.
To spet on thee againe, to spurne thee to.
Yf thou wilt lend this money, lend it not
,
As to thy friends, for when did friendship take
,
?
A breede for barraine mettaile of his friend?
,
But lend it rather to thine enemie,
Who if he breake, thou maist with better face
,
.
Exact the penaltie.
28 Marina Tarlinskaja, Shakespeare’s Verse, p. 226.
9
Robin Williams
visual metre as an authorship attribute
With a visual system, it becomes clear to see how Shakespeare has a particular mastery over
the iambic pentameter line: the metre that creates the line, the stresses that create the speaking
rhythm, the end-stopped lines (punctuation at the end), enjambed lines (those that run on),
mid-line caesuras, feminine endings, monosyllabic lines, elisions, dactylic line endings, short
lines, and extrametrical lines. It is simple to add to any chart other features that have been shown
to be used by varying degrees by various writers of the time, and thus to compare them. This
visual system can include rhyme, the sonnet form, prose, pauses, shared lines, sentence length,
soliloquies, and the interactions between prose and verse and rhyme. The ‘data’ can immediately be
compared with the text to determine the interdependence, if any.
To create these charts, strict parameters had to be developed and adhered to as there can be
great disagreement over where the emphasis in a Shakespearean line should be placed. In this
famous line of Hamlet’s, the natural rhythm of the iambic pentameter places an emphasis on the
word “is”:
,
,
to be or not to be, that is the question
However, some believe the actor should place an emphasis on “that”:
,
,
to be or not to be, that is the question
Adrian Noble, Artistic Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company from 1990 to 2003, scans this
line from the Chorus of Henry V with the emphasis on the first syllable, creating a trochee:29
,
,
,
(Leasht in, like Hounds) should Famine, Sword, and Fire
This is typical of many commentators, to automatically assume that a larger and perhaps weightier
word such as “leasht” should be emphasised. But if one first follows Shakespeare’s metre to see
where the emphasis naturally lands, one can often discover a surprising force where one does not
expect it. In the line above, the iambic metre naturally places the emphasis on “in,” and if a reader
or actor pushes that emphasis, the result is a stronger feeling of the containment, rather than the
image of a leash.
,
,
,
(Leasht in, like Hounds) should Famine, Sword, and Fire
29 Adrian Noble, How to Do Shakespeare (Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2010), p. 54.
10
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Similarly, note the difference between the often assumed reading of the first line of Richard III:
now is the Winter of our Discontent,
And a reading that follows the iambic metre:
now is the Winter of our Discontent
One can make a case that the emphasis, based on Shakespeare’s creation of the line, should be
on the word is, not now. In line 12 of this speech, the line begins, ‘And now . . .’, indubitably
creating an emphasis on now. As George T. Wright points out regarding a similar small word such
as not, ‘When the word appears in [an] unstressed position its negative idea is easily conveyed
without undue emphasis. . . . some modern actors frequently stress not or other negatives unnecessarily and in the process wrench the metre badly’. 30 This is Shakespeare’s apparent preference:
you would not then have parted with the ring
Also consider the iambic rhythm in Richard III’s line, ‘i am not in the giving vein
today’. Wright supports the decision to chart the given metre by describing how ‘sometimes one
or more of a line’s strong beats will fall on a so-called minor syllable—say, a pronoun, preposition,
conjunction, unemphatic verb, or a syllable of a longer word that normally receives only secondary
stress,’ as in:31
‘My MIStress WITH a MONster IS in LOVE’
He recommends that a reader or actor speak those words naturally, and that ‘the lighter beat
doesn’t radically affect our sense of an alternating rhythm through the syllables of the line’. 32 In
fact, ‘Speakers of English often stress minor words, especially when their speech has some urgency
to it, and dramatic speech often does’. 33 Harold Love confirms the ambiguity in that ‘there
will frequently be more than one valid way of scanning any particular line: the actor or reader
decides’. 34
To this end, the decision was made to chart the metre where it naturally falls, rather than
make subjective judgements as to which words ‘should’ be emphasised for one reason or another.
30 George T. Wright, ‘Shakespeare’s Metre Scanned’, in Reading Shakespeare’s Dramatic Language: A Guide, ed. by Sylvia
Adamson et al (London: Arden Shakespeare, 2001), p. 57.
31 Actually, he’s describing when a ‘so-called minor syllable’ falls on an ictus, rather than vice versa.
32 Wright, “Shakespeare’s Metre Scanned’, pp. 55–56.
33Wright, Shakespeare’s Metrical Art, pp. 193–194.
34 Harold Love, Attributing Authorship: An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), p. 112.
11
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
This is a radical departure from any other metrical test, but for the purpose of building a record,
the charts in this essay adhere tightly to Shakespeare’s written text: the emphasis displayed is on
any word or syllable that fits the natural metrics of the line without distorting pronunciation.
At any point, obviously, a reader/actor/director can choose to change the emphases, but those
subjective possibilities are not recorded here. The result of this stricture creates charts that display
Shakespeare’s metre as more consistent and methodical than most might interpret it, but by being
extremely consistent with this restriction, the works of other writers will be more evenly comparable. These are the guidelines developed for the visual charts:
• Selected portions of plays are 60–90 lines. C. A. Langworthy used 500 lines
of verse when studying the verse line as a metrical unit, which Brian Vickers
describes as the most efficient, but that length is not possible in this short essay.35
(The ideal would be to view entire plays at a glance.)
• Red is a stressed syllable, yellow unstressed.
• The dactylic line endings use a paler shade of red in the tenth syllable cell.
• The feminine eleventh syllable is pale yellow.
• Vertical black bars mark caesuras only when the previous line is enjambed or
when there is a full stop, a question mark, or a colon followed by a capital letter
in the line. Thus whether a caesura is initial (near the beginning of a line),
medial, or terminal can be seen at a glance. Whether a caesura is masculine
(follows a stressed syllable) or feminine (follows an unstressed syllable) is also
seen at a glance.
• Punctuation is marked in the individual cells (in case one wants to view these
also as caesurae), except at the ends of lines where it is outside the cell. Thus
end-stopped or enjambed lines are immediately apparent.
• Shared lines are indicated as shared only when they create a perfect line of iambic
pentameter; that is, if the shared lines create extrametricality or a clearly dysfunctional line, they are not shown as shared. If lines are not shared, the empty spaces
indicate either pauses or a writer who was not in command of his craft.
• Short lines are indicated by empty spaces at the end of the words, although the
implied pause may be meant for the beginning of the line.
• Where an apparently insignificant word lands on an ictus, the word is
highlighted in bold italic in the text; perhaps this is a feature to track.
• Black bullets at the beginnings of lines indicate monosyllabic lines; grey bullets
indicate monosyllabic lines that include at the most one two-syllable word.
• Cells that indicate full rhymes are dark blue; assonant rhymes (moon/doom,
dumb/tongue) are a paler blue.
35Vickers, Co-Author, p. 307
12
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
• Text in cyan must be compressed to fit the metre. This includes words that today
are normally two syllables but in Shakespeare’s time were one (hour, fire) and
those that are often compressed in verse (heaven, power, depending on the metre).
Actors and rhetoricians call this elision; metrists call it trisyllabic substitution, or
‘the allocation of two syllables to one position in one of the feet’.36
• Conversely, words that have been expanded (epenthesis) are in orange. For
instance, passion sometimes has three syllables (stretching out the ion) as can
marriage and ocean. Kyd gives three syllables to sapling and four to assembly.
• Prose is variants of green, the darker green indicating naturally stressed words
(although this essay is too short to explore visual prose).
A recommendation in looking at the following charts is to choose one or two features to
notice individually, then move on to compare another set of features. For instance, a quick glance
at the homogeneity—or not—of the general metrical pattern gives one instant impression.
Then perhaps compare the punctuation at the ends of the lines, then the punctuation within the
lines. How do the caesurae compare, where does rhyme typically fall, how many short lines are
used? How often does a writer use a feminine ending or extra syllables in the line? How often
does a writer need to elide or expand a word to make it fit the metre? On a combined textual/
metrical/emotional level, is a disrupted rhythm (not only metre, but enjambed lines with caesurae,
especially initial or terminal caesurae, or an unusual amount of commas with few periods)
consistent with a disrupted emotional state of the character? Conversely, what does the metre look
like for a character who is in a calm state of mind?
The first ninety lines of 1 Henry VI , a disputed scene from an early play, is shown in Figures 1a
and 1b; Figures 2a/b and 3a/b compare sections of the works of Thomas Nashe and Thomas Kyd.
Both Nashe and Kyd have been proposed as collaborators with Shakespeare on I Henry VI, with
claims that Nashe wrote Act 1. The initial but unmistakable differences in the visual representation
of the works of all three writers make this hypothesis difficult to sustain. This does not mean
Shakespeare did not have a coauthor; it merely means more work must be done to confirm the
theories. As a comparison with Shakespeare’s later work, the first seventy lines from Antony and
Cleopatra are shown in Figure 4.
36 Kristin Hanson, ‘Shakespeare’s lyric and dramatic metrical styles’, Formal Approaches to Poetry: Recent Developments in
Metrics, ed. by B. Elan Dresher and Nila Friedberg (Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2006), p. 112.
13
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Figure 1a. The opening lines from the first scene in I Henry VI are shown below and on the following page.
Characters’ speeches are colour coded, and the shades within each speech indicate sentence length. Notice the
play opens immediately with six trochees within nine lines. Where the metre is visually disrupted, check the
text to see if it correlates in some way. As is typical with Shakespeare’s early plays, many lines are end-stopped.
bedfrd
•
,
•
•
,
gloster
,
•
,
Comets importing change of Times and States,
,
Brandish your crystall Tresses in the Skie,
,
And with them scourge the bad reuolting Stars,
:
That haue consented vnto Henries death:
,
King Henry the Fift, too famous to liue long,
.
England ne’re lost a King of so much worth.
:
England ne’re had a King vntill his time:
,
Vertue he had, deseruing to command,
,
His brandisht Sword did blinde men with his beames,
:
His Armes spred wider then a Dragons Wings:
,
His sparkling Eyes, repleat with wrathfull fire,
,
More dazlèd and droue back his Enemies,
.
Then mid-day Sunne, fierce bent against their faces.
•
?
:
What should I say? his Deeds exceed all speech:
.
He ne’re lift vp his Hand, but conquerèd.
•
,
?
We mourne in black, why mourn we not in blood?
,
:
Henry is dead, and neuer shall reuiue:
;
Vpon a Woodden Coffin we attend;
,
And Deaths dishonourable Victorie,
,
We with our stately presence glorifie,
.
Like Captiues bound to a Triumphant Carre.
,
What? shall we curse the Planets of Mishap,
?
That plotted thus our Glories ouerthrow?
?
,
winch
Hung be y heauens with black, yield day to night;
,
,
,
exeter
;
•
,
,
Or shall we thinke the subtile-witted French,
,
Coniurers and Sorcerers, that afraid of him,
.
By Magick Verses haue contriu’d his end.
.
He was a King, blest of the King of Kings.
Vnto the French, the dreadfull Iudgement-Day
,
•
•
gloster
,
•
•
?
?
,
•
,
winch
•
,
,
,
gloster
•
bedfrd
•
,
,
:
•
,
,
.
So dreadfull will not be, as was his sight.
:
The Battailes of the Lord of Hosts he fought:
.
The Churches Prayers made him so prosperous.
,
The Church? where is it? Had not Church-men pray’d,
.
His thred of Life had not so soone decay’d.
,
None doe you like, but an effeminate Prince,
.
Whom like a Schoole-boy you may ouer-awe.
,
Gloster, what ere we like, thou art Protector,
.
And lookest to command the Prince and Realme.
,
Thy Wife is prowd, she holdeth thee in awe,
.
More then God or Religious Church-men may.
,
Name not Religion, for thou lou’st the Flesh,
,
And ne’re throughout the yeere to Church thou go’st,
.
Except it be to pray against thy foes.
:
Cease, cease these Iarres, & rest your minds in peace:
;
Let’s to the Altar: Heralds wayt on vs;
,
In stead of Gold, wee’le offer vp our Armes,
,
Since Armes auayle not, now that Henry’s dead,
14
Robin Williams
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Figure 1b. The very disrupted rhythm of the second line, below, corresponds with the emotion in this
magnificent metaphor of England becoming an isle nourished only by salt tears, and that will be the only
thing sustaining babies, the future of England, who suck their mother’s tears as their mothers wail the dead.
With the advent of the second messenger, the stakes are raised and its impact is reflected in the metre.
,
•
•
,
,
•
,
Posteritie await for wretchèd yeeres,
,
When at their Mothers moistned eyes, Babes shall suck,
,
Our Ile be made a Nourish of salt Teares,
.
And none but Women left to wayle the dead.
:
Henry the Fift, thy Ghost I inuocate:
,
Prosper this Realme, keepe it from Ciuill Broyles,
;
Combat with aduerse Planets in the Heauens;
,
A farre more glorious Starre thy Soule will make,
:
My honourable Lords, health to you all:
,
Sad tidings bring I to you out of France,
:
Of losse, of slaughter, and discomfiture:
,
Guyen, Champaigne, Rheimes, Orleance,
.
Paris Guysors, Poictiers, are all quite lost.
Then Iulius Caesar, or bright —
,
,
messgr
•
,
,
,
,
,
bedfrd
•
•
•
,
,
,
?
What say’st thou man, before dead Henry’s Coarse?
Speake softly, or the losse of those great Townes
,
,
?
gloster
Enter a Messenger.
•
.
Will make him burst his Lead, and rise from death.
?
Is Paris lost? is Roan yeelded vp?
,
If Henry were recall’d to life againe,
.
These news would cause him once more yeeld the Ghost.
exeter
?
?
How were they lost? what trecherie was vs’d?
messgr
,
.
No trecherie, but want of Men and Money.
,
Amongst the Souldiers this is mutterèd,
:
That here you maintaine seuerall Factions:
,
And whil’st a Field should be dispatcht and fought,
.
You are disputing of your Generals.
,
;
One would haue lingring Warres, with little cost;
,
:
Another would flye swift, but wanteth Wings:
,
A third thinkes[th], without expence at all,
.
By guilefull faire words, Peace may be obtayn’d.
,
Awake, awake, English Nobilitie,
;
Let not slouth dimme your Honors, new begot;
.
Of Englands Coat, one halfe is cut away.
,
Were our Teares wanting to this Funerall,
•
,
,
,
,
,
Cropt are the Flower-de-Luces in your Armes
•
,
exeter
,
bedfrd
•
•
,
,
.
These Tidings would call forth her flowing Tides.
:
Me they concerne, Regent I am of France:
.
Giue me my steelèd Coat, Ile fight for France.
;
Away with these disgracefull wayling Robes;
,
Wounds will I lend the French, in stead of Eyes,
.
To weepe their intermissiue Miseries.
Enter to them another Messenger.
15
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Figure 2a. Below and on the following page are sections from the only play written by Thomas Nashe,
A Pleasant Comedy, Called Summer’s Last Will and Testament, printed in 1600. The contrast shown
between Shakespeare’s sophisticated use of metre, even in such an early play as 1 Henry VI, and of Nashe’s
more consistent and unemotional metre is striking. Note also the random rhymes (purple).
?
summer
•
,
•
•
,
•
•
,
,
•
•
•
•
•
,
•
•
What pleasure alway lasts? no ioy endures:
Summer I was, I am not as I was:
:
Haruest and age haue whit’ned my greene head:
.
On Autumne now and Winter must I leane.
.
Needs must he fall, whom none but foes vphold.
.
Thus must the happiest man haue his blacke day.
,
This month haue I layne languishing a bed,
;
Looking eche houre to yeeld my life, and throne;
,
And dyde I had in deed vnto the earth,
,
But that Eliza Englands beauteous Queene,
,
On whom all seasons prosperously attend,
,
Forbad the execution of my fate,
.
Vntill her ioyfull progresse was expir’d.
,
For her doth Summer liue, and linger here,
:
And wisheth long to liue to her content:
.
But wishes are not had when they wish well.
:
I must depart, my death-day is set downe:
.
To these two must I leaue my wheaten crowne.
,
So vnto vnthrifts rich men leaue their lands,
.
Who in an houre consume long labours gaynes.
,
True is it that diuinest Sidney sung,
,
.
O, he is mard, that is for others made.
,
.
Come neere, my friends, for I am neere my end.
,
In presence of this Honourable trayne,
)
Who loue me (for I patronize their sports)
:
Meane I to make my finall Testament:
,
,
:
:
,
But first Ile call my officers to count,
,
And of the wealth I gaue them to dispose,
.
Know what is left. I may know what to giue
,
,
.
Vertumnus then, that turnst the yere about.
,
Summon them one by one to answere me,
,
First Ver, the spring, vnto whose custody
:
I haue committed more then to the rest:
,
The choyse of all my fragrant meades and flowres,
.
And what delights soe’re nature affords.
,
It were a whole Olimpiades worke to tell,
act iii
winter
,
,
How many diuillish, ergo armèd arts,
,
:
Sprung all as vices, of this Idlenesse:
,
For euen as souldiers not imployde in warres,
,
But liuing loosely in a quiet state,
,
Not hauing where withall to maintaine pride,
,
Nay scarce to finde their bellies any foode,
•
,
,
•
,
,
Nought but walke melancholie, and deuise
,
How they may cousen Marchats, fleece young heires,
,
Creepe into fauour by betraying men,
,
Robbe churches, beg waste toyes, court city dames,
:
Who shall vndoe their husbands for their sakes:
,
The baser rabble how to cheate and steale,
.
And yet be free from penaltie of death.
16
1275
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Figure 2b. This second piece is from the middle of Nashe’s play. There is a little more flexibility in the
rhythm, but it is generally arbitrary and does not have an emotional connection with the text.
,
,
So those word-warriers, lazy star-gazers,
,
,
Vsde to no labour, but to lowze themselues,
,
Had their heads fild with coosning fantasies,
,
They plotted how to make their pouertie,
:
Better esteemde of, then high Soueraignty:
,
They thought how they might plant a heauen on earth,
,
Whereof they would be principall lowe gods,
,
That heauen they called Contemplation,
,
As much to say, as a most pleasant slouth,
,
Which better I cannot compare then this,
,
•
•
,
•
,
,
That if a fellow licensèd to beg,
,
Should all his life time go from faire to faire,
.
And buy gape-seede, hauing no businesse else.
,
That contemplation like an agèd weede,
,
Engendred thousand sects, and all those sects
,
,
:
Grammarians some: and wherein differ they
,
?
From beggers, that professe the Pedlers French?
,
The Poets next, slouinly tatterd slaues,
.
That wander, and sell Ballets in the streetes.
,
Historiographers others there be,
,
And the like lazers by the high way side,
,
That for a penny, or a halfe-penny,
,
Will call each knaue a good fac’d Gentleman,
,
Giue honor vnto Tinkers, for good Ale,
,
Preferre a Cobler fore the Black prince farre,
:
If he bestowe but blacking of their shooes:
,
And as it is the Spittle-houses guise,
,
Ouer the gate to write their founders names,
,
Or on the outside of their walles at least,
,
In hope by their examples others moou’d,
,
Will be more bountifull and liberall,
,
So in the forefront of their Chronicles,
,
Or Peroratione operis,
,
The learnings benefactors reckon vp,
,
Who built this colledge, who gaue that Free-schoole,
,
What King or Queene aduauncèd Schollers most,
;
And in their times what writers flourishèd;
,
Rich men and magistrates whilest yet they liue,
,
.
They flatter palpably, in hope of gayne.
,
,
Smooth-toungèd Orators, the fourth in place,
,
,
•
,
,
•
•
,
,
,
•
Were but as these times, cunning shrowded rogues,
,
Lawyers, our common-wealth intitles them,
,
Meere swash-bucklers, and ruffianly mates,
,
That will for twelue pence make a doughtie fray,
.
Set men for strawes together by the eares.
;
Skie measuring Mathematicians;
,
Golde-breathing Alcumists also we haue,
,
Both which are subtill witted humorists,
,
That get their meales by telling miracles,
,
Which they haue seene in trauailing the skies,
,
Men that remouèd from their inkehorne termes,
.
Bring forth no action worthie of their bread.
17
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Figure 3a. This selection from The Spanish Tragedy, attributed in 1773 to Thomas Kyd but not confirmed,1
shows a methodical slavery to the metre, as well as few caesuras and every line but the first end-stopped.
Kyd’s only known work is Cornelia (a closet drama) and little more than a hundred lines of poetry.
Where Spaine and Portingale do ioyntly knit
general
,
•
,
,
,
,
•
•
•
•
,
•
•
•
,
:
Their frontiers, leaning on each others bound:
,
There met our armies in their proud aray,
:
Both furnisht well, both full of hope and feare:
,
Both menacing alike with daring showes,
,
Both vaunting sundry colours of deuice,
.
Both cheerly sounding trumpets, drums and fifes.
,
Both raising dreadfull clamors to the skie,
,
That valleis, hils, and riuers made rebound,
.
And heauen it selfe was frighted with the sound.
,
Our battels both were pitcht in squadron forme,
,
Each corner strongly fenst with wings of shot,
,
But ere we ioynd and came to push of Pike,
,
I brought a squadron of our readiest shot,
,
From out our rearward to begin the fight,
:
They brought another wing to incounter vs:
,
Meane while our ordinance plaid on either side,
.
And Captaines stroue to haue their valours tride.
:
Don Pedro their chiefe horsemens Corlonell:
,
Did with his Cornet brauely make attempt,
.
To break the order of our battell rankes.
,
But Don Rogero worthy man of warre,
,
Marcht forth against him with our Musketiers,
.
And stopt the mallice of his fell approch.
,
While they maintaine hot skirmish too and fro,
.
Both battailes ioyne and fall to handie blowes.
,
Their violent shot resembling th’oceans rage,
,
When roaring lowd and with a swelling tide,
,
It beats vpon the rampiers of huge rocks,
.
And gapes to swallow neighbour bounding lands.
,
Now while Bellona rageth heere and there,
,
Thick stormes of bullets ran like winters haile,
.
And shiuered Launces darke the troubled aire.
,
On euery side drop Captaines to the ground,
:
And Souldiers some ill maimde, some slaine outright:
,
Heere falles a body scindred from his head,
,
There legs and armes lye bleeding on the grasse,
:
Minglèd with weapons and vnboweld steeds:
.
That scattering ouer spread the purple plaine.
,
In all this turmoyle three long hovres and more,
,
The victory to neither part inclinde,
,
Till Don Andrea with his braue Launciers,
,
In their maine battell made so great a breach,
:
That halfe dismaid, the multitude retirde:
But Balthazar the Portingales young Prince,
,
1 In 1773, eighteen years after Kyd’s death, Thomas Hawkins
‘cited
a passing
reference
in Thomasthem
Heywood’s
Brought
rescue
and encouragde
to stay: Apology for
:
Actors (1612) to “M. Kid, in the Spanish Tragedy”’. Dictionary of National Biography, Thomas Kyd. The attribution is
considered suspect because the performance and printing history of the play is relatively astronomical, more popular than
anything by Shakespeare, and there are more than 100 contemporary allusions to the play, but aside from Heywood’s brief
mention almost two decades later, Kyd and The Spanish Tragedy are never otherwise connected.
18
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
Figure 3b. Below is another selection from The Spanish Tragedy chosen from later in the play in the vain
hope that the author might have grown a little more adventurous with the metre.
cas
,
•
I tell thee Sonne my selfe haue heard it said,
When to my sorrow I haue beene ashamed
•
,
,
•
,
,
•
•
,
lorenzo
cas
•
lorenzo
•
•
cas
,
lorenzo
•
,
,
cas
,
,
To answere for thee, though thou art my sonne,
,
Lorenzo, knowest thou not the common loue,
.
And kindenes that Hieronimo hath wone
?
By his deserts within the Court of Spaine?
,
Or seest thou not the K. my brothers care,
?
In his behalfe, and to procure his health?
,
Lorenzo, shouldst thou thwart his passions,
,
And hee exclaime against thee to the King,
,
What honour wert in this assembly,
,
Or what a scandale wert among the Kings,
.
To heare Hieronimo exclaime on thee.
,
Tell me, and looke thou tell me truely too,
.
Whence growes the ground of this report in Court.
,
My L. it lyes not in Lorenzos power,
:
To stop the vulgar liberall of their tongues:
,
A small aduantage makes a water breach,
.
And no man liues that long contenteth all.
,
My selfe haue seene thee busie to keep back,
.
Him and his supplications from the King.
,
Your selfe my L. hath seene his passions,
,
That ill beseemde the presence of a King,
,
And for I pittied him in his distresse,
,
I helde him thence with kinde and curteous words,
,
As free from malice to Hieronimo,
.
As to my soule my Lord.
,
Hieronimo my sonne, mistakes thee then.
.
My gratious Father, beleeue me so he doth,
,
But whats a silly man distract in minde,
:
To think vpon the murder of his sonne:
?
Alas, how easie is it for him to erre?
,
But for his satisfaction and the worlds,
,
Twere good my L. that Hieronimo and I,
.
Were reconcilde, if he misconster me.
,
Lorenzo thou hast said, it shalbe so,
.
Goe one of you and call Hieronimo.
19
Robin Williams
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Figure 4a. Below and on the following page are the first seventy lines of Antony and Cleopatra, a later
play. One can see the development of the flexibility in creating the rhythm. As always, the interconnection
between the text, rhythm, and emotion is apparent.
,
philo
Nay, but this dotage of our Generals
Ore-flowes the measure: those his goodly eyes
:
•
•
,
:
That o’re the Files and Musters of the Warre,
,
Haue glow’d like plated Mars: Now bend, now turne
The Office and Deuotion of their view
.
,
Vpon a Tawny Front. His Captaines heart,
,
,
The Buckles on his brest, reneages all temper,
•
Which in the scuffles of great Fights hath burst
And is become the Bellowes and the Fan
•
.
To coole a Gypsies Lust.
Flourish. Enter Anthony, Cleopatra, her Ladies,
the Traine, with Eunuchs fanning her.
•
•
:
Take but good note, and you shall see in him
(
cleo
)
•
(The triple Pillar of the world) transform’d
.
.
Into a Strumpets Foole. Behold and see.
,
.
If it be Loue indeed, tell me how much.
.
There’s beggery in the loue that can be reckon’d.
.
Ile set a bourne how farre to be belou’d.
.
Then must thou needes finde out new Heauen, new Earth.
.
Newes (my good Lord) from Rome.
antony
cleo
antony
Looke where they come:
,
•
•
,
Enter a Messenger.
messeng
antony
cleo
•
•
•
(
)
,
:
.
Grates me, the summe.
.
Nay heare them Anthony.
,
Fuluia perchance is angry: Or who knowes,
If the scarse-bearded Cæsar haue not sent
.
,
;
,
antony
cleo
•
•
•
,
,
?
,
His powrefull Mandate to you. Do this, or this;
:
Take in that Kingdome, and Infranchise that:
.
Perform’t, or else we damne thee.
?
How, my Loue?
:
Perchance? Nay, and most like:
,
You must not stay heere longer, your dismission
,
?
Is come from Cæsar, therefore heare it Anthony
(
)
?
:
Where’s Fuluias Processe? (Cæsars I would say) both?
,
,
Thou blushest Anthony, and that blood of thine
:
.
antony
•
•
,
When shrill-tongu’d Fuluia scolds. The Messengers.
,
Of the raing’d Empire fall: Heere is my space,
,
:
Let Rome in Tyber melt, and the wide Arch
Kingdomes are clay: Our dungie earth alike
;
•
Is Cæsars homager: else so thy cheeke payes shame,
.
:
•
•
Call in the Messengers: As I am Egypts Queene,
Feeds Beast as Man; the Noblenesse of life
:
,
Is to do thus: when such a mutuall paire,
,
And such a twaine can doo’t, in which I binde
,
One paine of punishment, the world to weete
We stand vp Peerelesse.
.
20
Robin Williams
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Figure 4b. This is a continuation of the text in Figure 4a.
cleo
,
:
Excellent falshood:
?
Why did he marry Fuluia, and not loue her?
Ile seeme the Foole I am not. Anthony
.
will be himselfe.
.
antony
•
,
.
But stirr’d by Cleopatra.
,
Now for the loue of Loue, and her soft houres,
;
Let’s not confound the time with Conference harsh;
?
Without some pleasure now. What sport to night?
.
Heare the Ambassadors.
:
Fye wrangling Queene:
,
Whom euery thing becomes, to chide, to laugh,
•
There’s not a minute of our liues should stretch
.
cleo
antony
,
,
To weepe: who euery passion fully striues
:
•
(
)
,
,
•
.
To make it selfe (in Thee) faire, and admir’d.
,
No Messenger but thine, and all alone,
[to night]* Wee’l wander through the streets, and note
,
,
The qualities of people. Come my Queene,
.
Last night you did desire it. Speake not to vs.
demet
?
Is Cæsar with Anthonius priz’d so slight?
philo
,
Sir sometimes when he is not Anthony,
.
•
.
Exeunt with the Traine.
He comes too short of that great Property
Which still should go with Anthony.
.
21
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
There are several deterrents to the use of this method in attributing authorship. Metrics is
only one piece of the dramatic writing puzzle, and comparing the metrics is only potentially useful
when comparing works in similar metres. Although all Elizabethan and Jacobean playwrights
use iambic pentameter in their plays, this visual method eliminates the possibility of recognising
possible coauthors whose only known work is prose. Also, to be useful, the visual results must be
statistically quantified. To say, ‘This looks like Shakespeare’ or ‘This does not look like Shakespeare’
is no more defining than the time-honoured but ultimately unprofitable, ‘That sounds like
Shakespeare’ or ‘That does not sound like Shakespeare’. This visual method, if useful for attribution
at all, can probably go no further than indicating a work is Shakespeare’s style or it is not. Even
that must take into account how radically Shakespeare’s style changed over time, on all levels and
in different genres. As Keller displays in one of his many charts, shown below, of Shakespeare’s use
of one particular rhetorical device, ‘There are considerable differences in frequency between plays
composed within short periods of each other, showing how flexibly Shakespeare was responding
to the demands of different plots or constellations of characters’. 37
Figure 3.2 Anadiplosis in nine Shakespeare plays (instances per thousand lines).
In the same way that Shakespeare explored the use of different rhetorical devices in individual
plays, he experimented with various ways of using the metre, as can be superficially seen by
comparing Figures 1a/b and 4a/b.
On the other hand, this visual method does provide a variety of features at a glance, as Love
insists, ‘It is only by recognising a number of characteristic features of style present in combination
that we can have any kind of security in a judgement’ [italics are Love’s]. 38 This paper provides only
very small test portions of a few works; it remains to be seen whether expanding the process might
tell us more. For instance, although the amount of rhyme varies tremendously throughout the
canon, Shakespeare uses it in very specific ways, and this visual presentation can easily track rhyme
schemes. Although there are four Shakespearean plays with no prose at all (meaning we can’t use
a lack of prose as an attribute pointing toward another author), Shakespeare’s prose is often highly
patterned, and it may be seen that it looks significantly different from that of other writers. If an
37 Stefan Daniel Keller, The Development of Shakespeare’s Rhetoric, p. 44.
38 Harold Love, Attributing Authorship, p. 101.
22
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
entire act (or an entire play) could be seen at a glance, the interactions between prose and verse
might signify something heretofore unnoticed; or we might see that Shakespeare maintains the
metre between shared lines differently from other playwrights; or parallels, juxtapositions, and
segues between scenes might display noticeable patterns. At the very least, a wall chart of an entire
Shakespearean play would be a remarkable piece of art, a sort of ecphrasis, or graphic/artistic
depiction of another work of art.
. . . . . . . .
23
visual metre as an authorship attribute
Robin Williams
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25