VOLPONE, or THE FOX. Jonson was a colossus. An autocrat, a scholastic, a rider of hobbies, a combatant, he overstrides the or dinary men who swartn about his ankles and snap at his shins.
In spite of his assumption to checic up his fancy by reference to rules of the ancients, the play is quite loose in construction. It violates the unities of place and action. It has a vaguely moving under-plot of topical hits re volving around Sir Politick Would-be and his talkative wife. After the first act the plot resolves itself into a succession of stage tricks, the changing of disguises and identities, the farce of confusion and doors. When the plot seems on the point of running out, Volpone disguises himself as Barabas had done in (The Jew of Malta) and goes forth to seek new complications.
The author's purpose of moral censure is revealed in the characters. Volpone is the Fox who starts out to best °the Vulture, Kite, Raven and Gorcrow." More than a miser he is a wily villain who serves his turn by pitting knave against knave. But Volpone himself is dwarfed by his familiar servant Mosca. Mosca, the parasite of Latin comedy, becomes in this play the purest example of malevolence in Eng lish drama. Iago had the charm of heroism; Bosola of (The Duthess of MAW is given moments of doubt. Not so with Mosca. aI fear I shall begin to grow in love with my dear self,' she says. In the end he proves that there is no honor even among thieves of his ilk. These two are the chief figures. All the others are dupes or fools, with the exception of Celia, the passages of whose tragic story seem tom from another and more elevated type of play.
(Volpone) was played at the Globe Theatre in 1605, and later at the universities. It was printed in quarto in 1607. After the Restora tion it was revived, and according to Downes °proved very satisfactory to the town? It was last done, unsuccessfully, by the elder Colman, a century later at the Haymarket Coleridge praised the play for 'fertility and vigor of invention, character and language.'