without Jack getting Jill, without the young hero winning the hand of his lady fair. Shakespeare was never one to slavishly adhere to convention. So, why not explore and exploit the tradition of the clown in the presentation of one character? As many of the critics noted above have stipulated, the character of Falstaff does distinctly and quite noticeably change from 1 Henry IV to 2 Henry IV and from both of the Henry plays to The Merry Wives of Windsor.
Surely, Shakespeare was not only aware of these changes but was deliberately making them to surprise and fascinate his audiences.
Northrop Frye, in his Anatomy of Criticism, distinguishes among four quite separate and distinct types of comic characters; and Frye's distinctions may prove useful in examining the varied roles that Falstaff assumes in the three Shakespeare plays. However, Frye is careful to point out that to distinguish "between the lifelike character and the stock type is a vulgar error. All lifelike characters, whether in drama or in fiction, owe their consistency to the appropriateness of the stock type which belongs to their dramatic function. The stock type is not the character but it is as necessary to the character as a skeleton is to the actor who plays it" (172). Frye's comment reaches at the heart of one of the critical issues in regards to the character of Falstaff: namely, whether Falstaff should be regarded as a comic type or a lifelike character. For Frye, the answer is both. But, of course, such an answer will