Ben Jonson's Antimasques: A History of Growth and Decline (review)

Reviews 233 themes, Crossing Boundaries is still worth reading as an entity that is more than the sum of its extremely diverse parts. Adina Hamilton Department ofHistory University of Melbourne Mickel, Lesley, Ben Jonson's Antimasques: A History of Growth and Decline, Aldershot, Ashgate, 1999; cloth; pp. vii, 207; R.R.P. £39.95. Lesley Mickel's Ben Jonson's Antimasques: A History of Growth and Decl should appeal to anyone with an interest in Early Modern literature and culture. This study offers a comprehensive look at the shifting relationship between the Jonsonian m a s q u e and antimasque in Stuart court entertainment. Particular attention is paid to the prominence of the antimasque from around 1610, through to its rapid decline in the early 1630s. Mickel's historically aware discussion also considers the antimasque/ masque in relation to various other forms of Early Modern writing. One of the most satisfying aspects of this study is the clarity with which Mickel identifies her position amongst the m a n y critical approaches available for the analysis of Early Modern theatrical literature. Her approach to the Jonsonian antimasque borrows from a number of critical perspectives, including N e w Historicist and Cultural Materialist, as well as Pierre Macherey and Roland Barthes. There is also a certain degree of departure from the critical perspectives mentioned here. In particular, Mickel is at pains to reject the subversion/containment framework which underpins the work of Greenblatt, Dollimore and Sinfield. Mickel convincingly argues that the antimasques, when read in historical context, are too indeterminate for such a model to be of any use. While Mickel's study does acknowledge that iconography, dance and music are essential elements of the antimasque/masque, her study is focused on textual and literary elements, claiming that Jonson in particular 'meant these texts to be read' (p. 3). Furthermore, this study is framed by the assertion that the antimasque's evolution and decline, as i t pertains to Jonson, can only be fully appreciated when the antimasques are read in relation to Jonson's other works. 234 Reviews In Chapter O n e Mickel tackles the problem of panegyric and hyperbole in the masques by identifying a particularly Jonsonian ironic strategy at work which pits the antimasque against the masque in a dialogic fashion, with the former questioning the assertions of the latter. Mickel also identifies this kind of satirical structure in Jonson's poems. Jonson's poetry and court entertainments are often dismissed as royalist panegyric. In Mickel's view, Jonson's panegyric is never self-sufficient, but always tempered by the satirical aims of the work. It is the exchange between these two things which produces the particular 'Jonsonian' effect, and it is to the identification of this effect that most of Mickel's close reading in this chapter is committed. Mickel artfully draws the reader into her discussion of the masques by comparing their 'ironic subtexts' (p. 41) to those found in the more familiar poems, 'To Sir Henry Wroth' and 'To Penshurst'. Most importantly, however, Mickel shows h o w a reading of an Early M o d e m form of public literature m a y still properly account for socio-political influences, without deference to the subversion/containment model of analysis. As Mickel moves into closer analysis of Jonson's work one realises that this book is grounded in a solid theoretical premise but always aware of alternative critical approaches and assumptions. At times this book seems as much a study of recent critical attitudes to Renaissance texts and culture as it is a study of the Jonsonian antimasque. In Chapter Two, Mickel explores differences between the Jacobean royal entertainments and their Elizabethan antecedents. Mickel discusses James's adoption of the self-image of 'Rex Pacificus', rejecting the patently militaristic Protestantism of the Elizabethan model preferred by the king's son, Prince Henry. Due largely to his premature death, Prince Henry is a largely ignored presence in studies of early Stuart literature and society. Mickel's study benefits from the decision to read Jonson's masque Prince Henry's Barriers (1610) in relation to the popularity of Henry among courtiers and poets and...