Krantz

Mystery and Morality Plays: A Lecture

All references are to the Norton Anthology of English Literature, Vol. 1, 6th ed.

The "mystery" in mystery plays refers to "the spiritual mystery of Christ's redemption of humankind" (308). Mystery plays were typically written in "cycles" (a series) that would begin with the Creation, chronicle the major events of the Old Testament through the New Testament and the Last Judgment. The mystery plays "endeavored to make the Christian religion more real to the unlearned by dramatizing significant events in biblical history and by showing what these events meant in terms of human experience" (363). They are thought to have evolved from the liturgies and plays that were conducted in Latin.
Mystery plays produced in the vernacular (common language rather than Latin) in the streets of towns were a way of reaching a wide audience that included educated lay people and clerics as well as the unlearned folk. The authors of these plays usually broadened their appeal by giving the characters of the plays the appearance and characters of contemporary men and women. The Wakefield Master, "probably a highly educated cleric stationed in the vicinity of Wakefield" (319), did this in his play The Second Shepherds' Play. "As the play opens, the shepherds complain about the cold, the taxes, and the high-handed treatment they get from the gentry--evils closer to shepherds on the Yorkshire moors than to those keeping their flocks near Bethlehem" (319). This convention would help lay people identify with the characters and make the religious message, that Christian charity doesn't go unrewarded, seem more personal.

While the mystery play was "sometimes boisterous comedy" (309), the morality play opted for a more austere, overtly didactic approach. Everyman is a strong example of this. While the name might imply an attempt at personalizing the lesson, the lesson itself keeps the audience at a distance with its direct sermonizing. Where The Second Shepherds' Play opened with Coll complaining about the weather and social injustices, Everyman opens with a messenger preaching the moral of the story. The names of the characters reinforce the moral lesson through allegory, with every character behaving "entirely within the limits" as "defined by his name" (364). Where The Second Shepherds' Play might seem like entertainment that happens to have a subtle message, Everyman appears to be a message or lesson that happens to subtly seem like entertainment. Most morality plays, including Mankind, do seem to "share with the mysteries a good deal of rough humor" (363). The fact that Everyman's friends and relations abandon him so quickly in his hour of need might be construed as rough humor, but that humor is over-shadowed with the directness of the message of the play which is stated at the beginning and reinforced in the summary at the end of the play.

Second Shepherd's Play
1. What is the general tone of the Second Shepherd's Play at its beginning? What examples support your reading?
2. When and how does the tone change?
3. Some of the actors in the play may have taken two roles. What roles would have been able to be duplicated and how might that affect the audience's response to the second half of the play?
4. How just does Mak's punishment seem? Explain your answer.
5. How appropriate are the gifts that the shepherds bring the Christ Child? Explain your answer.