Motisfont Abbey

Wednesday 14^th to Saturday 24^th July 2004 (except Monday 19th July)

The Merry Wives of Windsor is one of Shakespeare’s so-called Garter plays. It was written in 1597 and was probably performed at the Garter Feast on April 23rd. The general opinion is that George Carey, the second Baron Hunsdon who was one of the five newly elected Knights of the Order of the Garter, commissioned it. On April 17, 1597 George Carey was appointed Lord Chamberlain so it would have been appropriate that he should ask Shakespeare to write a new play. He had also inherited the position of patron of the company of players to which Shakespeare belonged. The company was known as The Lord Chamberlain’s Men.

There is also rather flimsier evidence that the Queen “was so well pleased with that admirable character of Falstaff, in the two parts of Henry the Fourth, that she commanded him to continue it for one play more, and to shew him in love.” So we find a number of characters from these other plays appearing once again, including Bardolph, Pistol, Nim, Mistress Quickly and Robert Shallow.

The play is set in and around Windsor with many topical references. One aspect of the play that was also topical is the reference to the German Duke of Wurttemburg who was appointed a Knight of the Garter in absentia in 1597. The audience would have been well aware of the significance of the three mysterious Germans who are staying at the Garter Inn. There is also Caius saying to the Host “it is tell-a me date you make great preparation for a duke de Jarmany, by my trot.”

There are two aspects that differentiate The Merry Wives from other Shakespeare plays. The first is that around eighty percent of the text is in prose, rather than the verse that we usually associate with Shakespeare. The exceptions are Fenton, who always speaks in verse, Pistol, who appears to aspire a bit of a poet, and Act 4, Scene IV where the Fords and Pages are plotting Falstaff’s final downfall. The second aspect of note is that the play is so contemporary. The Fords and Pages in particular may well be drawn from acquaintances of Shakespeare. We could even imagine that Anne (with the same name as his wife) may also have some of the characteristics of Shakespeare’s older daughter Susanna, who would have been fourteen at the time. In Shakespearian England William and his wife may well have been contemplating the marriage of their daughter.

1597 must have been a turbulent time for Shakespeare. He was at his most successful as a writer and during the year he bought New Place, which was said to be the grandest house in Stratford. During the previous year his father had been granted arms, and so recognised as a gentleman. Between these two successes his twin son Hamnet had died, aged eleven.

Some critics suggest the play was written in fourteen days. We can imagine that Shakespeare collected plots and ideas for future plays so that once he started writing he had all the outline of the play clearly established. There is an earlier story by Fiorentino called Il pecorone in which a young student asks his professor to teach him the art of seduction and then sets about the task and reports his progress to the professor. The professor suspects the woman is his wife, which it is. He follows the student to his house but does not find him because his wife has hidden the student under a heap of washing. With that plot in mind and the other major plot of the three suitors for Anne, Shakespeare was in a position to intertwine these two plots with his usual skill until all is satisfactorily resolved in the final scene.