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By Root 861 0

ways, this is the least Shakespearean moment in the entire play, and, though Mr. Phillips did not note it, I will: the revelation to the audience here—that Philip is in fact a fraud—would normally occur before his acceptance by Arthur (if Arthur is sincere in believing the boy’s story and is not simply accepting it as a useful lie to break his pact with Mordred). This particular dramatic effect occurs elsewhere in the canon—I am thinking of Iachimo and the trunk in Cymbeline and the statue of the “dead” Hermione in The Winter’s Tale—but not in quite the same way. That having been said, the unique occurrence of an effect or word in one particular play by no means proves he didn’t write it. There are canonical plays that include unique examples of vocabulary, for example, the technical term being hapax legomenon. That he did something only once does not prove he didn’t do it. And, in this case, I am obviously not dissuaded of his authorship. Rather, I would consider this as an experiment he felt was not worth repeating, or an effect that audiences did not like. [RV]

30. unlooked unexpected.

31. bating beating impatiently, as if to take off.

32. mews me up Continuing the bird imagery, mewing a bird is to confine it or tie it down. [RV]

Act V, Scene I

1. There is, perhaps, a sexual implication in this line. [RV]

2. Mordred mistakes the actors for foreign royalty. The actors, in turn, mistake Mordred for another actor, dressed, not very convincingly, as a king.

3. avaunt begone!

4. base interluder a lowly actor.

5. puffy blustering, bombastic.

6. malapert presumptuous one.

7. current actual, real.

8. compassed built upon, contrived.

9. Charlemagne … Jove emperor of the Franks, Roman emperor, king of the Israelites, king of the Jews, king of Troy, Roman thunder god. [RV]

10. Icarus in Greek myth, the boy who with his wings of feathers and wax flew too near the sun and fell into the sea. [RV]

11. gulls … paints a virtuoso triple meaning (1) Only birds cannot distinguish makeup from real blood; (2) Only fools cannot distinguish kings from actors; and (3) Only a fool would mistake you, Mordred, for a king. One is reminded of the words of the Italian writer Cesare Pavese: “Shakespeare was conscious of a double or treble reality fused together into one line or a single word.” [RV]

12. needless word remove “mother” from “mother-queen” and marry Guenhera as queen.

13. misconster misunderstand.

14. crooning bellowing, like a bull, especially Scottish dialect. [RV]

15. pert impertinent.

16. my continuance “the continuation of my line.”

17. I.e., the throne to Philip. [RV]

18. kersey king the player king, dressed in kersey, a coarse cloth.

19. like likely.

Act V, Scene II

1. welkin sky.

2. saggish soggy.

3. Sisyphus a mistake on Bell’s part, or my father’s. In myth, Sisyphus was condemned by the gods to push a rock up a hill, never reaching the summit.

4. There is in this line an implication of Guenhera cuckolding Arthur. [RV]

5. bawcock from “beau coq”—fine fellow. [RV]

6. squiff skiff.

7. Strike her a command to lower sails.

Act V, Scene III

1. quaggy boggy.

2. sermoner a preacher.

3. right for right fair.

4. front confront, oppose.

5. kens knows.

6. tercel-gentle male peregrine falcon.

7. carriages … caps The wheeled cannons are sunk to the axles. [Anachronism. —RV]

8. fletcher an arrow maker.

9. heaven’s car the sun.

10. give the fico make an obscene gesture.

11. o’ertopping surpassingly arrogant.

12. caterans Scottish troops.

13. o’ermanned outnumbered.

14. singly in single combat.

15. engirt encircled.

16. abroach in motion. My father, I am reminded, told me that he once announced a University of Minnesota football game for the college radio station, KUOM. Among the reasons he was not asked back was his repeated color commentary that “the backfield is abroach.”

17. nook to hide in a corner. [Interestingly, the next recorded usage of this rare verb (1611) is by a younger playwright, Thomas Middleton, who collaborated with Shakespeare on Timon of Athens around 1605. A case, perhaps,