Early Modern Drama · Character Archetypes

BRISCO

in If It Be Not Good, the Devil Is in It (If This Be Not a Good Play, the Devil Is in It) — Dekker, Thomas

Metadata

PlayIf It Be Not Good, the Devil Is in It (If This Be Not a Good Play, the Devil Is in It)
AuthorDekker, Thomas
Year (catalogued)1612
First performance1611
Decade1610s
GenreComedy
Play typeAdult Professional
CompanyQueen Anne's Men
TheaterRed Bull;Outdoor Professional
Speech prefix(es)Bris. | Bris: | Br. | Bri: | Bri. | Rris: | Rus. | Pris. | Pris:
Words365
Characters2069
Typicality0.37 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP idA20066
BritDrama no.1641
ClusterCluster 16 — Errand servants & brief parts

Important excerpts

No keyword-matching excerpt could be extracted (the cluster label doesn't share vocabulary with this character's speech).

Full speech

Till Saturday came, we lived in terrible fear. Thank Bohor, who your dead spirits up did rear. So we may be safe— I shall bestow them freely: The physic of your proclamation works: Your guilded pills (rolled up in promises Of princely favours to his wit, who highest Can raise your pleasures) slip so smoothly down Your Subjects throats, that all (upon a sudden) Are loosely given. I would your Grace would let me purge this ouse of her infection; bestow the Livings of it on me, isle S eeten it one Month. Name but what sport, your Highness would have Acted I'm prologue too : your court must have more gates To let in ruffling Saturday: without (now) waits Music in some ten languages: each one swears (By Orpheus fiddle-case) they will tickle your ears If they can doo't with scraping. Theres seven score Noise at least of english fiddlers. Very base-vial men most of they: beside whole swarms of welsh harps, Irish bagpipes, Jews tromps, And french kitts. All these made I together play: But their damned catter-wralling, frighted me away. How Like you then of these? The cittie-waterbearers (trimly dight) With yellow oaker-tankerds (pined upright) Like brooches in their hats; In their fresh loves A may-game bring, All, wearing dogskin gloves. Made not to shrink it'h wet ng. The Scholar has his device, the Mariner his. I'll fetch these worthy spirits in my self. No, no, weel aid you sir. What will you have then? Will you see the Turners show, bravely prepared With colours, drumes, and guns (with rust half mar'de Bearing that, of which they long have been depriu'de. Their daring Giant, (newly reui'de) I have bowls of this bias too, for your Lordship's alley. The wodden-leg Soldier, Waits to present you with his show of war. Will you see these? And yet pa'em scurvily! 'tis impossible. Not if you be our slu panimbly sir. You have lost the day sir, for your Soldiers fly. Let Apollo go and lie with his own Daughters. Hell, I think. Thats I: Show me first where your Abbey-gold sleeps, then go die. A main gallop I hope. And Saturday. The tied now turns.

Plot summary

Plot — If It Be Not Good, the Devil Is in It (If This Be Not a Good Play, the Devil Is in It)
Hell has a population problem: so few new souls are arriving that Charon’s earnings are in decline, but Pluto is reluctant to allow him to raise his fare lest the new price should prove a deterrent. Instead, he sends devils to Naples in human disguise to tempt people into sin in the court, the abbey, and the city. They are later to rendezvous in a grove to report their progress. Ruffman goes to court, assuming the identity of the foreign courtier Bohor. The newly crowned King of ===== PAGE 144 ===== Is In It Naples, Alfonso, intends to be a just and godly ruler, and plans out his week to devote each day toa different state task. Bohor persuades him to spend more time on pleasure and less on duty, so Saturday is designated a day of hedonism. Alfonso proclaims a reward for whoever entertains him best, and Bohor wins with a display of airborne fireballs. Alfonso’s devotion to pleasure starts to extend beyond Saturdays, and he neglects his state duties. He also breaks off his engagement with Princess Ermenhild, who retires to a convent and lets it be known that she is dead. Shackle-Soul becomes Friar Rush, a novice in the abbey. On learning that the friars eat frugally, he tempts them to gluttony and is appointed the abbey cook. Only Clement, the Sub-Prior, dissents, and Rush identifies him as an enemy who will have to be dealt with. He also makes an enemy of Scumbroth, his predecessor as cook, when he lays an untrue accusation of unchastity. Obtaining gold from a spirit, he tempts Clement: when Clement goes to fetch water, he finds his pot filled instead with gold, which he gives away to Scumbroth. After squandering the money, Scumbroth returns to the grove to get more, witnesses the diabolic rendezvous there, and realizes that Friar Rush is a devil. Ermenhild hears that her father, the Duke of Calabria, has declared war on Naples over her apparent death. She asks Friar Clement to deliver him a letter establishing that she is in fact alive. Clement continues to withstand Rush’s temptations, proving insensible to the pleasures of music, dancing, and voluptuous women, and is steadfast even when Rush reverts to diabolic form and tells him he is to die that night. Grumball adopts the name Lurchall and enters the service of the corrupt merchant Bartervile, who attempts to cheat his client Innocentio: the terms of Innocentio’s loan require him to repay it at a set time, or else his mortgaged estate will revert to Bartervile; so Bartervile tries unsuccessfully to…