Roister Doister | Page 3

of the present Comedy are ascertained by a
quotation in Sir Thomas Wilson's Rule of Reason of Roister Doister's
letter to Dame Custance.
The first edition of the Rule of Reason, 1550-1, is a very scarce work;
of which I have been unable to see a copy. The second edition, 1552,
8vo, 'newely corrected by Thomas Wilson,' has not the quotation: which
apparently first appears in the third edition of 1553, 4to, the title of
which runs, "The Rule of Reason, conteinyng the Arte of Logique.
Sette furthe in Englishe, and newly corrected by Thomas Wilson. Anno
Domini. M.D.LIII. Mense Ianuarij."
At folio 66 of this edition, Wilson, in treating of The Ambiguitie, adds
to his previous examples, Roister Doister's letter, with the following
heading:
¶ An example of soche doubtful writing, whiche by reason of poincting
maie haue double sense, and contrarie meaning, taken out of an
entrelude made by Nicolas Vdal.
The present comedy was therefore undoubtedly written before the close
of the reign of Edward VI., who died 6 July 1553.
If it was then printed, that entire edition has perished. The prayer for
the Queen at p. 86, can be for no other than Queen Elizabeth: and
therefore, although the title-page is wanting and there is no conclusive
allusion in the play, it may confidently be believed that the extant text
was printed in Elizabeth's reign: and that it had possibly in some
respects been modified.
There now comes the evidence of the Stationers Co.'s Register, as
quoted by Mr. Collier, Extracts, i. 154, Ed. 1848:
Rd of Thomas Hackett, for hys lycense for pryntinge of a play intituled
auf Ruyster Duster, &c. iiijd

The missing title-page and the absence of any colophon in the Eton
copy, here reprinted, preclude demonstrative proof that it is one of
Hackett's edition. It is however morally certain that it does represent
that text.
On the whole, therefore, though that text was posthumous--Udall
having died in Dec. 1556--: and though its authorship rests entirely on
the above heading of Wilson's quotation: it may be safely accepted that
Udall is the author of this comedy, and that he wrote it before 1553.
Conclusions both of them consonant with the known facts of Udall's
life.
The comedy was probably first written for the Eton boys to act. Mr. W.
D. Cooper thus writes:--
Certain, however, it is that it was the custom of Eton, about the feast of
St. Andrew, for the Master to choose some Latin stage-play for the
boys to act in the following Christmas holidays, and that he might
sometimes order smart and witty English plays. "Among the writings of
Udall about the year 1540," says Warton, "are recited Plures Comediæ,
and a tragedy De Papatu, on the Papacy, written probably to be acted
by his scholars;" and it is equally probable that the English comedy was
written with a like object; for it is admirably adapted to be a good
acting play, and the author avows in the prologue that his models were
Plautus and Terence, with whose writings his scholars were familiar.
Of the few dramatic pieces of that early period that have survived,
Roister Doister is regarded as the transition-play from the Mysteries
and Enterludes of the Middle Ages to the Comedies of modern times. A
critical examination of its position in our Literature has been made by
Mr. Collier. Hist. of Dram. Poetry. ii. 445-460 Ed. 1830. A full
consideration of the play would exceed our present limits: we may
however call attention to the peculiar rhyme in which Udall wrote it.
In the present reprint, the text appears according to modern usage: but
in the original it stands in lines of unvarying length. Where the speech
is continuous, these lines rhyme like our ordinary poetry: but when the
dialogue is short; one, two, three or more speeches are thrown into one

line, and the last syllables of that line--whether they occur in words in
the middle or at the end of a sentence, as dictated simply by the length
of line of type--are made to rough rhyme in couplets. Thus an irregular
assonance jingles through the play.
On the opposite page are a few lines set up as in the original, to
illustrate this peculiarity; and also to show the mode used of marking
the actor's names. May this peculiar rhyme be accepted as any evidence
that Udall composed this play as much for the press as the stage?
There being no description of the representation and the stage
directions being scanty: Roister Doister should be read a first time to
learn the plot; a second time to imagine the action: and a third to
combine and enjoy the two.

[Transcriber's Note:
The word "Nay" is the catchword at the bottom of its page. The