The Classical Context of Ben Jonson's "Other Youth"

Epicoene's self-conscious comparison between Ben Jonson and an unnamed "other youth"-possibly Shakespeare-may best be read in the context of classical notions of the aging process, which conceive of "youth" ("iuventus") as a category encompassing the ages from roughly twenty to forty-five and which define that category in terms of sexual potency and military service. While invoking this classical conception of the masculine life cycle, Epicoene also realigns the determinants of "youth" so as to foreground rhetorical and literary performance, thereby effecting a shift in its vision of empowered virility away from arms and toward letters.