"It is become a cage of unclean birds": The Presence of Plague in The Alchemist. Issue 2 (November 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Thiele, Matthew
• Is Part Of: Ben Jonson journal. Volume 28:Issue 2(2021)
• Page Start: 163
• Page End: 190
• Publication Date: 2021-11
• Subjects: plague -- runaways -- medicine -- Royal College of Physicians -- trochisk -- apocalypse -- Revelation; English literature -- Early modern, 1500-1700 -- History and criticism -- Periodicals; Criticism and interpretation -- Periodicals; 822.3
• DOI: 10.3366/bjj.2021.0312
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1079-3453

Abstract

Abstract : This essay challenges the assertions of Patrick Philips and others that plague is not a meaningful subtext in The Alchemist by demonstrating various ways that the play can be interpreted as a satire of plague-time beliefs and practices. For example, Jonson's audiences would have recognized in the character Abel Drugger a satire of early modern medical care common in prose plague tracts. I also attempt to explain why Jonson would go to such lengths to conceal plague allusions in a play set in plague time. Ian Munro and Ernest Gilman have suggested that the plague was simply too traumatic to directly represent onstage, but it is also possible that Jonson was trying not to attract any official trouble after his experience with Eastward Ho, as David Riggs suggests. Jonson had to be careful not to directly attack the King, the Church of England, or the Royal College of Physicians, all of which had a stake in responding to plague.