Benjamin Jonson (1572-1637) as an English playwright and poet, whose artistry exerted a lasting impact upon English poetry and stage comedy. He is best known for the satirical plays
Every Man in His Humour (1598),
Volpone, or
The Fox (1606),
The Alchemist (1610) and
Bartholomew Fair (1614) and for his lyric and epigrammatic poetry. He is generally regarded as the second most important English dramatist, after William Shakespeare, during the reign of James I.
Jonson was a classically educated, well-read and cultured man of the English Renaissance with an appetite for controversy (personal and political, artistic and intellectual) whose cultural influence was of unparalleled breadth upon the playwrights and the poets of the Jacobean era (1603–1625) and of the Caroline era (1625–1642).
The son of a disgraced nobleman who had lost his property and died a few months before his birth, Jonson was able to pursue decent education in Westminster School thanks to a family friend willing to pay for his studies. He was supposed to continue his studies in the University of Cambridge, but he was unable to do so due to a forced apprenticeship under his bricklayer stepfather. He spent a few years as a bricklayer, but he never stopped looking for opportunities to escape this job. Eventually, he left for the Netherlands to serve the English regiments under Francis Vere in Flanders. It was here that Jonson reportedly engaged, fought and killed an enemy soldier in single combat, and took for trophies the weapons of the vanquished soldier.
Jonson began his theatre career soon after the end of his military service. He started out as an apprentice under more established playwrights such as Thomas Kyd and Philip Henslowe. During his apprenticeship, he wrote a number of tragedies on the side, but they were hardly successful. As a playwright, Jonson had his first big break on
Every Man on His Humour (1598), a satirical comedy which established the Comedy of Humours genre, as well as his reputation as a dramatist. Jonson capitalized on this success by releasing a sequel to this play on the very next year, titled
Every Man Out of His Humour (1599). This sequel was a big hit among the audience, further bringing Jonson's name into the spotlight.
Over the years, Jonson would continue to release numerous plays, drama, and poetry. He tried his hand once again in writing tragedy, but they never seemed to be successful. Instead, Jonson's talent shone the brightest in writing satirical comedies mocking various social and political events of the time. Unsurprisingly, the controversial nature of his plays had caused him a few brushes with the law. In 1597 a play which he co-wrote with Thomas Nashe,
The Isle of Dogs, was suppressed after causing great offence. Arrest warrants for Jonson and Nashe were issued by Queen Elizabeth I's so-called interrogator, Richard Topcliffe. Jonson was jailed in Marshalsea Prison and charged with "Leude and mutynous behaviour", while Nashe managed to escape to Great Yarmouth. Two of the actors, Gabriel Spenser and Robert Shaw, were also imprisoned. A year later, Jonson was again briefly imprisoned, this time in Newgate Prison, for killing Gabriel Spenser in a drunken sword duel on 22 September 1598 in Hogsden Fields (today part of Hoxton). Tried on a charge of manslaughter, Jonson pleaded guilty but was released by benefit of clergy, a legal ploy through which he gained leniency by reciting a brief bible verse (the neck-verse), forfeiting his 'goods and chattels' and being branded on his left thumb. While the cause of this duel was unknown, many seemed to believe that Spenser's death was well-deserved, citing the man's ill-tempered, violent, and uncooperative nature when questioned regarding Jonson's potential motives.
Between 1599 and 1602, Jonson got himself involved in the Poetomachia (War of the Theatres). As dramatic as that sounds, it's less of an actual "war" and more like a number of playwrights passive-aggressively throwing shades at each other in their plays. Because of an actual ban on satire in prose and verse publications in 1599 (the Bishops' Ban of 1599), the satirical urge had no other remaining outlet than the stage. The resulting controversy, which unfolded between 1599 and 1602, involved the playwright Ben Jonson on one side and his rivals John Marston and Thomas Dekker (with Thomas Middleton as an ancillary combatant) on the other. The role Shakespeare played in the conflict, if any, has long been a topic of dispute among scholars.
The "war" started on 1599, where John Marston satirized Jonson's self-righteous pride through a character in his play,
Histriomastix. In response, Jonson satirized Marston's wordy writing style in
Every Man Out of His Humour. Marston and Dekker worked together in the next play,
Jack Drum's Entertainment (1600), depicting Jonson as a cuckold. This back-and-forth continued on until 1602, where the conflict gradually subsided. In 1605, Jonson and Marston worked together with George Chapman to write
Eastward Hoe, a satirical comedy which offended King James due to the anti-Scottish satire it presented. While Marston evaded capture, Jonson and Chapman ended up briefly in jail as a result. Shakespeare vaguely referenced the War of the Theatres in a scene between Hamlet, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern, referring it as an argument between three individuals which grew into a conflict between three
theatre companies
kingdoms
.
There are many legends about Jonson's rivalry with Shakespeare, some of which may be true. Historian Thomas Fuller related stories of Jonson and Shakespeare passionately arguing in the Mermaid Tavern, a well-known gathering place of the time. Regardless of the nature of their relationship, it was clear that the two men shared mutual respect towards each other. It was said that Jonson helped to edit Shakespeare's First Folio, and Shakespeare's company adapted a number of Jonson's plays including
Every Man in His Humour, which Shakespeare himself possibly acted in.
Jonson continued writing satire over the years, but his productivity began to decline in the 1620s when younger dramatists such as Robert Herrick, Richard Lovelace, and Sir John Suckling began to take the stage. That said, he remained a well-known figure, and many of these younger dramatists took lessons from him. Despite his declining fame and health, Jonson continued writing until his death on 1637. His death was mourned by London, and countless people attended his funeral.
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