Staging as a Key to Meaning in The Alchemist

Abstract

Although The Alchemist, one of the great comedies of the English Renaissance, has received considerable attention from critics, very few have been interested in examining the play as something that is realized in three-dimensional space. Jonson's language creates character and dramatic tension, as well as thematic and metaphoric resonances, with such fullness that the literary critic is tempted to read the play as literature only. Jonson, however, was not writing closet drama any more than Shakespeare, and it is important for understanding the play to try to envision the original staging—something which, I feel, has not been sufficiently done. William A. Armstrong's belief that Jonson was convinced “that the profoundest intimations come by the ear, not the eye” (p. 61) seems to me an oversimplification. The Alchemist reveals that the ear and eye are not necessarily opposed, nor even merely complementary. They are interconnected and interdependent. The stage sets up the metaphoric dimensions and dynamics of the play. This approach to The Alchemist concentrates its extraordinary busyness— a busyness which makes the play so difficult for first readers— into a relatively simple, but charged, set of defining tensions and movements.