A kind of Chameleon ... hyper-link

This fascinating animal gets dragged up twice in Two Gentlemen:

SIL. What, angry, Sir Thurio? do you change colour?

VAL. Give him leave, madam, he is a kind of chameleon.

THU. That hath more mind to feed on your blood than live in your air.

II, 4

Usually associated with love ...

SPEED. Ay, but hearken, sir; though the chameleon Love can feed on the air, I am one that am nourish'd by my victuals, and would fain have meat.

II, 1

But, published around the time of the play's writing, I came across this fascinating little snippit:

But herein they rather disgrace than adorn their persons, as by their niceness in apparel, for which I say most nations do not unjustly deride us, as also for that we do seem to imitate all nations round about us, wherein we be like to the polypus or chameleon; and thereunto bestow most cost upon our arses, and much more than upon all the rest of our bodies,

It's in a description of England by one Mr William Harrison - part of Holinshed's Chronicles. What I like is the connection with clothes - which is the context it pops up in with Thurio ... killing two birds with one stone.

Do you also notice the 'polypus'? Now, searching high and low I eventually got a 'none-medical' connection ... the cuttlefish. What on earth is Proteus? Well a sea creature ...who changes shape in order not to be captured. I admit, I am stretching it a bit, but I can just hear this sort of conversation going on after the play - all very 'witty' all very 'intellectual' and schoolbookish.

We've also got the poor thing popping up in Lyly:

Love is a chameleon, which draweth nothing
into the mouth but air and nourisheth nothing in the body
but lungs.

(Endimion)

So linking in the theatrical hyperspace too.

Am I getting into tangled webs here? Most likely, but I get the impression that this is the way this play works ... sparks of ideas fly around and 'conceits' abound.

Technorati Tags: Chameleon, Shakespeare, Two Gentlemen of Verona

I, the Man in the Moon ...

"...it is a tale of the man in the moon "

Another of those - sounds familiar.

No way Shakespeare was in this - it was performed by 'the boys' - but, you know what - I'd bet rather a lot he knew it.

That prologue - for what is a 'court performance' - is there in 'The Dream'.

More evidence of Shakespeare's involvement in court affairs? Maybe. And maybe the later play throws light on this play of Lyly, MA: Did the courtiers interrupt the silly prologue - the whole performance in fact? Intriguing.

Also intriguing is this little snippet:

his person -- ah, sweet ... [I.2.60]
person! -- shall he deck with such rich robes as he shall
forget it is his own person; his sharp wit -- ah, wit too sharp,
that hath cut off all my joys! -- shall he use in flattering
of my face and devising sonnets in my favor. The prime
of his youth and pride of his time shall be spent in melan-
choly passions, careless behavior, untamed thoughts, and
unbridled affections.

Is there a better description of so many of Shakespeare's early lovers? I am tempted to say of teenage Shakespeare himself if Sonnet 145 is anything to go by, but will refrain.

Performed around 1588. - Two Gentlemen of Verona has a similar first performance date if the earliest given for it is right. What are the connections?

There is an exploration of 'what is love' - there is man spurning woman - and women's revenge ... there is a wittiness in the dialogue.

But it is more a feel - a lightness and an expectation set up as to what such a play is about.

The business of boys and serving men also strikes a chord.

Apart from the direct links to 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', there also seem links to several other plays and characters - Falstaff is here in prototype (Sir Tophas) - but it is the Falstaff of Merry Wives rather than the Henry plays ... and elements of this Falstaff seem to have transmogrified into Pistol, and Armondo (Love's Labours Lost).

More than anything else though is a sense of elegance here - this is a 'court' play.



Technorati Tags: Shakespeare, Lyly, Endimion