FLETCHER, BEAUMONT & Cos.,

by Lawrence B. Wallis '18 King's Crown Press,N. Y., 1947. xiv-315 pp. $3.75.

Here at last is a much needed book in its field. As Prof. Wallis implies by the title, his impressive study revises the status of each member in the partnership. More importantly it argues for a sympathetic appreciation of their artistic aims. He commands a wealth of reference to all that is known about the group and also about the changing theatrical world for which they wrote. Never has this great task been so thoroughly done, or the tangle of the collaboration, and of the critic ism following it to the present day, been so clearly presented. He is willing to concede to Beaumont precedence as poetic stylist, but he realigns a fund of scattered information to show that Fletcher was the active deviser of the company's play pattern, and to prove that it was consciously developed to appeal to the gentry patronizing the private theatres and the King's players. Incidentally he throws new light on the unsolved problem as to who was first in the field: Shakespeare or Fletcher.

He substitutes for the terms "degenerate," "mechanical/' and "melodramatic," that have caused undue disparagement, the more significant phrase "emotional form," which he thinks more justly denotes Fletcher's purpose and artistry, and he shows by careful analysis of the plays that this was a dramatic contribution similar to the "well-made" technique of the past century. By abundant evidence he proves that it had its intended affect on the public and critics of the cavalier periods. He frankly admits the faults involved, but insists that Fletcher was a master-craftsman in relation to his "time-space." Prof. Wallis has made a sane, stimulating, and readable contribution to Jacobean scholarship.