Michaelmas Term (play)
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Michaelmas Term is a Jacobean comedy by Thomas Middleton. It was first performed in 1604 by the Children of Paul's, and was entered into the Stationers' Register on May 15, 1607,[1] and published in quarto later that year. A second quarto was printed in 1630 by the bookseller Richard Meighen.
[edit] Synopsis
The play begins with a dialogue between the four terms of the year, Michaelmas Term, Hilary Term, Easter Term, Trinity Term, and about events happening during Michaelmas Term with references to the legal activities of the Inns of Court. The play takes place at the beginning of Michaelmas Term.
The main plot in the play is that of Master Quomodo, an arch-cozener. Being a rich merchant (he is a woolen draper) but lacking a gentry title, he wants to possess a patch of land in the countryside to establish his son Sim as a real gentleman. To acquire the land, Quomodo gulls a real peer, the gentleman Richard Easy, of his lands with the help of two accomplices, Shortyard and Falselight, who are both assuming false identities. Blastfield approaches Easy in the name of common acquaintance and lends him money for dicing. He acts the part of the benevolent and helpful friend to beguile Easy. Then Easy, trusting both Quomodo and Shortyard, enters a bond for two hundred pounds. A month later, Shortyard having disappeared, Easy has to pay for the bond and bequeath his land on Quomodo. Shortyard and Falselight both appear together as Sergeant and Yeoman to arrest Easy, and then as wealthy citizens to serve bail.
Quomodo's son, Sim, though develops a wasteful attitude and has no respect for his father's works. Thus, Quomodo tries to make him aware of his duties as an adult and feigns death. However, the plot backfires as Sim immediately starts spending his heritage after his father's false death and as Quomodo's wife, Thomasine, acknowledges her love for Easy. After that, Shortyard grasps the chance to seize the ill-gotten wealth of his master Quomodo. He cozens the profligate Sim and acquires Easy's lands for himself, but in the end he also fails and the land ownership is returned to Easy. Quomodo is finally stripped of all his possessions by his own mistakes.
Another plot is played around Master Andrew Lethe. He is the son of a toothdrawer but pretends to be a gentleman by wearing expensive clothes. Lethe engages with Quomodo's daughter Susan and they plan to be married. Lethe encounters a country wench who has been seduced by his pander, Hellgill, on his behalf. The temptation and fall of Easy is parallelled with the temptation and fall of the country wench in the sub-plot. She is lured into believing she can be turned into a lady when she is offered a satin gown. Her own father, not recognizing her, is drafted into her service, like Lethe's mother. The country wench is turned into Lethe's courtesan, and learns his scheme of marriage with Quomodo's daughter Suzan and her consequent desertion. In the end, Lethe's is caught with the country wench on his wedding morning. The marriage with Susan is spoiled and Lethe has to marry the country wench.
[edit] References
- ^ Paster ed., Introduction p. 1
[edit] Bibliography
- Middleton, Thomas: Michaelmas Term, ed. by Gail Kern Paster; 2000, Manchester University Press and Room 400.
