Understanding Shakespeare: The Merry Wives of Windsor by Robert A. Albano - HTML preview

Falstaff as Jester: 1 Henry IV

Although Frye’s four basic types of comic characters do not seem appropriate in any attempt to label or describe the various manifestations of Shakespeare’s Falstaff, Frye’s notion of “stock type” can still be applied to distinguish the essential changes that Falstaff undergoes as he shifts from one history play to the next and from the history plays to the comedy. The problem, however, is determining what stock type to apply. Norman Holland suggests that the change is from a “Chaplinesque clown” in 1 Henry IV to a Lord of Misrule in 2 Henry IV; but Caroline Spurgeon, on the other hand, suggests the change is from a poetically rich and active character in 1 Henry IV to a coarse-speaking and passive figure in 2 Henry IV. 5 With all due appreciation for Chaplin set aside, Holland’s anachronistic terminology simply will not suffice. Moreover, the much-used label of Lord of Misrule could apply to Falstaff in any of his three roles in the histories and the comedy. Clearly, another term is needed.

Risking the various and sundry criticism that comes when creating a new label of any type, for the sake of convenience the term of Jester (in place of Frye’s Self-Deprecator or the Aristotelian eiron) will be applied to refer to the stock type that appears to be most in evidence for the character of Falstaff as he appears in 1 Henry IV. Like Frye, the reader should bear in mind the relationship of the stock type to the lifelike character. And with the character of Falstaff,