Abstract
Ben Jonson was not a republican but he was fiercely involved in a debate over community and communal rights. By now it will be clear the ways in which notions of republicanism in the Jonsonian text and in his ‘theatrical republics’ shade very obviously into notions of community and the communal. Perhaps the plural ‘communities’ would be a more accurate term since Jonson — specifically in his generic variety (poetry, prose, criticism, drama, and masques) — celebrates the vast potential of literature for the production of a multiplicity of meanings.
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Notes
John Dryden s categorization of the late Jonson plays as ‘dotages’ has held critical sway in this respect (see Barton, Ben Jonson, Dramatist p. 263). Ian Donaldson has, however, recently suggested an important kinship between the two authors; see his ‘Fathers and Sons: Jonson, Dryden, and Mac Flecknoé in Jonson’s Magic Houses pp. 162–79. See also Jennifer Brady, ‘Dryden and the Negotiations of Literary Succession and Precession’, in Earl Miner and Jennifer Brady (eds), Literary Transmission and Authority: Dryden and Other Writers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 27–54, and Wiseman, ’The Eccho of Uncertaintié.
See Burt, Licensed by Authority, and Arthur F. Marotti, ‘All About Jonson’s Poetry’, English Literary History, 39 (1972), 208–37.
Marcus, The Politics of Mirth, makes just this case for the play, pp. 24–63. Marcus has, however, recently challenged her own earlier reading in ‘Of Mire and Authorship’, in David L. Smith, Richard Strier and David Bevington (eds), The Theatrical City: Culture, Theatre, and Politics in London, 1576–1649 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), pp. 170–82.
See Rosemary Gaby, ‘Of Vagabonds and Commonwealths: Beggars Bush, A Jovial Crew, and The Sisters’, Studies in English Literature, 34 (1994), 401–24.
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© 1998 Julie Sanders
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Sanders, J. (1998). Conclusion: ‘The End of (T)his Commonwealth Does Not Forget the Beginning’. In: Ben Jonson’s Theatrical Republics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230389441_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230389441_11
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