The
epilogues to "King Henry V." and "Pericles" are of course spoken by
the Chorus and Gower, respectively, who, throughout those plays, have
favoured the spectators with much discourse and explanation. "Twelfth
Night" terminates with the clown's nonsense song, which may be an
addition due less to the dramatist than to the comic actor who first
played the part.
The epilogues of the Elizabethan stage, so far as they have come down
to us, are, as a rule, brief and discreet enough; but, after the
Restoration, epilogues acquired greater length and much more
impudence, to say the least of it, while they clearly had gained
importance in the consideration of the audience. And now it became the
custom to follow up a harrowing tragedy with a most broadly comic
epilogue. The heroine of the night--for the delivering of epilogues
now devolved frequently upon the actresses--who, but a few moments
before, had fallen a most miserable victim to the dagger or the bowl,
as the case might be, suddenly reappeared upon the stage, laughing,
alive, and, it may be said, kicking, and favoured the audience with an
address designed expressly, it would seem, so to make their cheeks
burn with blushes that their recent tears might the sooner be dried
up.
Pages:
703
704
705
706
707
708
709
710
711
712
713
714
715
716
717
718
719
720
721
722
723
724
725
726
727