Category Archives: French Farces

Two Medieval French Farces: A Reading – the Details

Posted on by under Drama, Farces, French Farces, Historic, News, Production

We’ve talked a lot about what’s in our farces, their history, and similar things, but it’s time to reveal the actual details of what we have planned to present Master Pierre Pathelin and The Washtub.

This will be a laid-back, fun, and free, event for anyone with an interest in comedy, medieval drama, theatre, or even none of the above!

Anyone who is interested in taking part should sign up and, nearer the date, we’ll send scripts along for you to read, so you can get familiar with the plays. We won’t be auditioning. We won’t be pre-casting. We’ll gather for a couple of hours before the performance to read together, to assign parts, and hopefully have a good laugh. We’ll also be taking drop-ins on the day, for both participants and audience- if you can’t get in touch with us ahead of time, we’ll still be happy to hand you a script so you can take part! (Please note that, while we believe this event is suitable for most ages, anyone under 16 wishing to participate will need to be accompanied by an adult, and material may not be appropriate for young children.)

Then, when an audience has gathered at the set time, we’ll perform the reading, with our scripts, for their entertainment as well as our own! Hopefully it’ll be a good laugh for everyone, and a chance to get to know some very funny plays that aren’t especially familiar to an English speaking audience. (In case you are worried, we will be reading English translations so you won’t be expected to tackle Medieval French!)

Tickets- did we mention it’s FREE, by the way!- are available via Eventbrite. Please sign up there to be either a participant or an audience member, and get in touch with us if you have any questions.

Participants should join us at the Black Swan Inn, 23 Peasholme Green, York, YO1 7DE at 17.00 on Saturday 9th May; we’ll be meeting upstairs.

Audience are invited to arrive for a 20.00 start at the same location.

Drinks will be available at the bar.

A Taxonomy of Farces (Maybe)

Posted on by under Academic Curiosity, Farces, French Farces

Think you know what a farce is? Maybe nobody really knows! This week’s #FarcesFriday looks at scholarly debate about what medieval farces are, aren’t, and how to tell them from other styles- or not!

As humans, we like to label, define, and classify. It’s part of how we make sense of our world. This can be problematic, like when we assume people fall into stereotypes rather than seeing them as nuanced individuals, but it can also be extremely useful in making sure that, when we’re communicating, we have the same understanding of what we’re talking about. It’s all towards making sense and being understood.

For several weeks we’ve been talking about “medieval French farces”, and the fact that we didn’t lead with this particular essay tells you that we- like you, mostly likely!- didn’t feel like the word “farce” required a definition or explanation. After all, it’s not a rare word; in fact, when I was doing some initial reading with an eye towards proposing this project, I felt like I was seeing the word farce in the news almost daily. (Interestingly, when I checked Newspapers.com for use of the term “farce”, I expected the political section to be where it was found. But, while not infrequent there, it wasn’t where farce shows up most often. It’s most frequently used in the sports section!) If we can use it so readily, if the news can bandy that word about, then… surely we all know what a farce is, whether theatrical or otherwise. Right?

Well… not exactly. We’re probably okay on the “otherwise”, news-usage category, but scholarship debating the question “what is a farce”, particularly a medieval farce, has a lengthy history, and it does not seem to have ever become a settled answer. Moreover, there is not a linear direction of travel (“we used to think this but now we believe that”). You can’t pinpoint a specific understanding to a particular time; the ideas come and go and multiple arguments exist simultaneously to debate amongst one another. Any of these people can or could probably claim far more knowledge of this specific genre than I, so my goal here isn’t to take sides. Rather, it’s to illustrate for you just how messy this question is, so that when you next see a medieval farce (hopefully ours! this summer!) you can make up your own mind about how you’d define it.

On the surface it seems easy to posit that if drama is split between tragedy and comedy*, then farce is clearly a subgenre of the latter. However, some scholars have posited that farce is actually a third type that sits between them, particularly because so much of farce humour comes at the expense and discomfort of someone else. If one person’s laughter is directly at the result of another’s degradement, how can it be assigned either category? It’s tragedy for one character, comedy for another. At least one scholar suggests that comedy is probable while farce is so exaggerated as to be impossible in real life. This is just one example of how different opinions align farces within the dramatic tradition.

If we assume that farce is indeed a subfield of comedy, then defining farce often means separating it from other forms of comedy, particularly types unique to medieval France, such as the sottie and the morality. Some models suggest that they exist on a spectrum: farce is pure comedy, a sottie is meant to be funny but probably has a more moralistic subtext, and a morality uses humour solely to teach a moral lesson, often using what is funny to say “this is what you shouldn’tdo”. Other scholarship spins morality off completely, seeing it as something totally removed from farce and humour. As morality is the genre most distant to farce in any model (though still within sighting distance!), I won’t dwell on its definition overmuch; I just want to point out that if you’ve seen any of our Mankind iterations, or are otherwise familiar with the play, it will be readily apparent that much of what is often taken to define a farce is present in a play that, in the English classification, is usually called a morality play. (It’s worth noting that defining any medieval drama can be slippery- are they mystery plays? cycle drama? biblical drama?; you can find all of these terms used for the same plays!)

So, sotties and farces. They’re the two types most closely linked and fought over, in terms of taxonomy. It seems to be a minority position, and perhaps an earlier one rather than current, but some scholars have felt that the title determined this, since there are plays clearly titled with one term or the other. Particularly in early scholarship, it was posited that where a play sat on the afternoon’s playbill could be considered in trying to name the type. (“Farce” originally meant “stuffing”, as in “stuffed into a programme of other entertainment”.) More commonly, the argument is that some internal component is what separates them. Some believe it’s the characters: named characters are more indicative of farce, while allegorical or “type” names might suggest a sottie. One school of thinking is that the determining factor is who is performing them; a “company of sots (or fools)” would perform the eponymous sotties, while other similar fare performed by an acting troop out of fool costumes would perform farces. 

Content is one of the most complex aspects that many farce scholars believe make the difference. I won’t go as further in depth as this issue really deserves, but suffice to say that the contradictions in theory are plentiful! “Farce is more like a slice of real life, sotties are more stylised, exaggerated, or absurd” might be the summation of one argument, while another writer will tell you that what defines a farce is how “stylised, exaggerated, and absurd” it is. Indeed, the “ordinariness” of characters and story is frequently mentioned in defining farce, but the “clowning” and slapstick or improbability is mentioned equally often- can it encompass these together? Do sotties contain more or less slapstick than farces? If sotties are indeed played by “fool” characters, does that make a difference on the slapstick question? And does verbal humour versus visual humour place them in one category or the other? 

The intention of a play is no less debated, and may or may not factor into defining farce from sottie from morality. Is a farce’s sole purpose to invoke laughter? Some argue that the answer is yes, and that is one of the defining features of a farce. Others, however, that none of these forms- or perhaps any drama!- is intended solely for amusement, without any potential subtextual lessons or food for thought. Is a sottie inherently more satirical than a farce- or is satire something entirely different altogether? Where is the place of allegory, particularly between moralities and sotties? It is probably also fair to question whether intent can actually be divorced from content, or whether the two aspects are inherently in service to one another.

And there’s the vexing caveat inherent in all of this. Almost everyone agrees that, however one chooses to define farce, sottie, morality, or comedy, there are always going to be outliers, plays in the medieval French repertoire that just don’t fit any model particularly well, or fit very well… except that one little detail… That detail may be so unique that it doesn’t argue for throwing out one’s entire framework, but it will always be a weak point, a place for someone else to begin developing a different argument that will fit most plays very well… except that one little detail….

So much of the previous paragraphs have been laid out as questions rather than answers, because these are the heart of academic disagreement and complexity of thinking, which means they’re also some of the most interesting places to ponder if one is seeking to create a Taxonomy of Farce. I would love to tell you that I had the answers, but if scholars far more versed in this niche specialism haven’t managed it over the past four centuries, I cannot pretend to be their better. With regard to our own pair of plays, The Washtub seems to fit fairly neatly into various taxonomical models, maybe not always under the same headings, but it doesn’t itself seem to be a freak. Pathelin, on the other hand- and this may be why it’s held in such high esteem- almost never seems to fit easily into any model; it seems so much an outlier, though it’s historically been labelled as the pinnacle of medieval French farce, that I almost wonder if it isn’t the dramatic equivalent of a missing link, fitting neatly into no easy category because it represents the bridge between them.

In the end, I am left with the famous words of the late US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, who, charged with coming up with a legal definition for smut, replied, “I can’t define it, but I know it when I see it.” I daresay most of us would feel exactly the same way about farce. Whether or not we’d be correct remains for debate in the halls of academia.

*In the modern usage, which I intend throughout this article, “comedy” and “tragedy” are usually understood to be defined by a generally happy or unhappy outcome at drama’s end. Ancient Greek drama used these terms to mean the characters were high status or low status; the emotional output didn’t matter.

Wondering where all this comes from? Closer to the performance we’ll be sharing the bibliography of the sources that inform our work on farces, so stay tuned!

Director’s Notes: Lost and Found in Translation

Posted on by under French Farces, Musings, Uncategorized

For this week’s #FarcesFriday, our director discusses the process she used to turn medieval French scripts into modern English, and how language takes a role in one of our plays.

            Let me begin with an admission: I don’t speak French. (At least, not yet!) My lack of multilingualism is one of the things in my life that I deeply regret, and I have Opinions about the lack of languages in early education in America that contributed to this. The reason I’m leading with this information is that tackling medieval French farces comes with some extra challenges, and that a knowledge of language- or lack thereof- actually plays an important part in Master Pierre Pathelin. 

            My first order of business was to round up as many iterations of Pathelin and The Washtub as I could- in modern English, in modern and medieval French, in clear cases where the words “inspired by” could be appended to what were very loose adaptations, even in one case a manuscript facsimile that I couldn’t possibly read. The point was to get a sense of what seemed essential to the text, and what approaches other people had taken (if, for example, it was clear just from comparing structures and lineation that entire chunks had been excised for a particular edition, that was information worth having, especially because, as you’ll see, I would also cut certain parts from the “original” for our script). It also gave a sense of the evolution of how the plays were received: the early twentieth century, for example, invariably “cleans up” anything deemed offensive, while more recent iterations take a more warts-and-all approach that prioritises the historicity of the piece.

            Then I fed every non-English version I could into a couple of language-translation websites. Yes, I know Google Translate isn’t always that fantastic! That’s why I used more than one, to check them across one another. And then I compared those results to all the modern English translations in books, to see if they were in the neighbourhood of translations created by actual humans who are competent in French. 

            And then, with more than a dozen versions laid out on a table in front of me, I wrestled out our script. What, of the options that made the most sense, sounded best? Were there parts that were just too idiomatic to translate at all? Were there lines that every single translation, book and online-translator, agreed upon? I won’t lie- this wasn’t fun. I’m genuinely terrified that I’ve got something important wrong. As a final fail-safe, before it goes out for reading and performance, it will be read and critiqued by someone who does read medieval French, and can tell me if I need to do some serious editing, or if it’s come out as a reasonable version of the plays. 

            As much as this process has been, let’s be honest, neither easy nor fun, I have no regrets about the time that’s been put into it. On a personal level, it’s inspired me to really attempt to learn French! (Just doing this much work on it, I can definitely read more of it than I could before this project came along.)

            But the major reason this work is pertinent applies to the Pathelin play in particular. (The Washtub doesn’t use language as a dramatic plot-point.) In one of the scenes, Pathelin tries to convince the clothseller that he, Pathelin, is sick to the point of being delusional. He does this by babbling random things in various languages and French dialects. He may be spouting imbecilities in terms of content… but he is actually speaking in those languages, or at least a reasonable enough degree that translation is possible. Yet it’s worth noting that, probably like my own efforts, there are those who have called into question just how much of those languages Pathelin had correct, and how much was true gibberish. If his skills are up to this feat, it’s an incredibly impressive one, given his background as a man who claims more education than he actually has. But to those who have said it would be impossible for the writer to create this scene with knowledge of such breadth… well, let’s just say that I have multiple friends who, though not professional linguists, can comfortably read and write in more than a half-dozen languages, so I am unconvinced by the impossibility of this! It’s worth remembering that, for the upper and professional classes of medieval France- the people who would have written these plays, and at least a reasonable portion of their audience- being at least moderately bilingual was not unusual, as they would have needed French and Latin to conduct legal business, and while education was a privilege, classical languages were seen as a normal part of education, not as luxurious extras.

            Having attempted to put together a plausible iteration of Pathelin, there remained the challenge of putting that scene back into some sort of language that wasn’t English, but would be at least potentially identifiable- knowing whathe’s speaking is part of the joke. I have seen several suggestions on how to achieve this: use the original language, use your own language’s dialects, or use whatever “nonsense” your language might offer up. I felt that using the original language was an enormous lift for actors, especially as this project is for a reading, where they won’t be spending months wrestling with how to pronounce and memorise lines of medieval Limousin or similar. Sadly, dialect in English is mostly moribund- though I hold very dear memories of trying to understand my late adopted grandfather’s delightful Yorkshireisms, neither his children nor theirs use those words and phrases. Instead I went with the third option: modern nonsense, in the form of Pig Latin (familiar enough to most children) and what the internet informs me may be a version of “bubble talk” or “ob”, but I grew up knowing as “Jabay Tabalk”, ‘Jay Talk’, named after the family friend who taught it to me. (I considered trying to use Cockney Rhyming Slang, the one seemingly-nonsense language I do encounter among adults occasionally, but I couldn’t make sense of how an entire paragraph would actually work, and I don’t want to mock a genuine cultural phenomenon.) Hopefully, these choices will result in something not necessarily automatically coherent, yet familiar enough to be recognised as ‘nonsense’! 

            This is also where I must confess to some excisions. The scene with different languages in Pathelin is quite extensive- extravagant, really, in its delight in his macaronic prowess! But it can grind the play to a juddering halt; the point is quickly made, and, dramatically, doesn’t require quite the belabouring it gets. I’ve cut it down to giving Pathelin just two “babbling languages”, just to keep things moving. It loses some of the delight of excess, but it’s dramatically more sound.

            I hope that the result of all this playing with words is a pair of plays that keeps the comic spirit of the original, even if the words aren’t quite the same, and that it even briefly allows the audience to consider just what can be done by playing with language, although I don’t recommend taking any lessons from Pierre Pathelin himself, however clever he is with speaking them.

Director’s Notes: Comedy Tonight!

Posted on by under French Farces, Historic, Musings

It’s #FarcesFriday, and our director, Laura-Elizabeth Rice, is back with reflections on choosing to work with medieval French farces, and how we chose our plays.

Two memories:

I’m six years old, listening to a group of boys sitting around one’s school desk. One of them is using a hand under his armpit to make noises that mimic gas, and they’re laughing like it’s the funniest thing they’ve ever heard. And I find myself thinking, I can’t wait to be an adult, so people won’t find fart jokes funny anymore, because they aren’t! (Oh, the innocence of youth!)

I’m eighteen and in university, in a class that’s supposed to be on Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, but our professor has decided that, instead, we’re going to be focusing on the question of “what is comedy?” He’s a young, early-career lecturer; it’s painfully obvious that he’s anxious to spit out the silver spoon he was born with, and his way of doing this is to argue strenuously that slapstick is the only valid form of comedy, because if you like anything else, you’re being a snob. I don’t think slapstick is funny at all. I’ll spend the semester arguing that watching someone be injured or made to feel embarrassed isn’t amusing, and that I don’t think that inherently makes me stuck-up.

I’m sharing these memories because it’s deeply ironic that I, of all people, should be spending time working on farces, a genre that relies heavily on physical and/or bodily humour… and irony is often a foundational part of comedy. Moreover, it’s worth knowing a little bit of that background, to help explain why, of all the farces in all the theatre in all the world (or at least, in France!), we should have settled on Master Pierre Pathelin and The Washtub for our upcoming reading.

Medieval comedy isn’t absent from the English canon of dramatic literature, but it’s quite limited, and exists entirely within wider dramatic genre that aren’t focused on laughs. Joseph’s Trouble About Mary is pretty funny, because it’s a pragmatic look at a Biblical moment that is usually held in pure reverence. The Second Shepherds’ Play is a strange combination of comedic folk play married to the more standard Christmas story. Our old friend, Mankind, has much bawdy humour, but its purpose is to be held up as an example of what not to be. There just isn’t a vast body of secular comedy from medieval England that exists solely because people wanted a laugh. 

It’s different in France. There are hundreds of farces from medieval France. Unfortunately, the majority aren’t available in translation; if you don’t read French- and medieval French at that!- these plays remain largely a literal and metaphorical closed book. This is changing (most notably, several collections translated and adapted by Jody Enders, which I highly recommend as entertaining reading even if you have zero interest in putting a farce onstage), but a lot– the majority- of the enormous body of farce remains just out of reach. So while I knew that, in deciding to present a comedy, we would be looking past English borders, the language question meant limitation among riches.

That said… once you start reading what is available in English, you confront the challenge of translation that isn’t about language or even France vs. England, but about cultures across time. My undergraduate lecturer was correct that slapstick has indeed stood the test of chronology- medieval people would have understood those six year old boys!- but the line of what is acceptable has definitely shifted. It’s quite shocking to realise that a significant percentage of medieval comedy is about violence, particularly domestic. Imagine watching a “Punch & Judy” show but with actors instead of puppets; men and women may give as good as they get, but the violence is unrelenting. There are those who argue that it is so exaggerated that it becomes comic, because it’s completely unrealistic, but we still felt it was over the line where we felt comfortable. 

The Washtub is marital comedy, but it still works as comedy if one ignores or excises stage directions that indicate the couple being violent towards one another- that is a disposable “extra” that isn’t necessary dramatically. Even without that, there is physical comedy, and it follows the slapstick trope of exaggeration of physical events: it’s unlikely that a grown, fully conscious woman would drown by falling into even a large medieval washtub in her own home; all she has to do is stand up! Thus much of the comedy centres around the absence of injury that the audience appreciates, but the character doesn’t; the rest is clever one-upmanship between spouses, of the sort that is still a staple of television sitcoms.

Pierre Pathelin is probably the best-known medieval French farce- possibly the best-known medieval French play, full stop, and I suspect that one of the reasons this is true is because it almost totally lacks violence-as-humour, so it hasn’t turned the corner into being more offensive than funny. It pokes fun at lawyers (another tradition that has carried on!), at unearned pomposity, and the idea of the clever scoundrel getting away with one-upping those considered his “betters” still resonates. It also includes a twist at the end that reminds me that my university lecturer did make some good points: reversal of expectation can be one of the criteria for defining comedy. In Pathelin, everybody is trying to cheat everyone else, and virtually everyone has some comeuppance along the way. 

I suspect that the same thing that made me read these plays and say, I want to do this!, is the same thing that has made them the best known among a fairly obscure genre: their surprisingly delicate balance between the hyperbolic actions of slapstick, and the jokes that ask the audience to contribute some thought or knowledge. You can appreciate them for exactly what they lay out in front of you- isn’t a man bleating “Baaa” in a courtroom ridiculous?- or you can be entertained because you know something about law and what Pathelin is faking. Or both. Meet them where you are. The medieval French writers gave us plays which understood what neither a younger version of me, nor my university teacher, did: that “funny” needn’t have a hierarchy; there are only different, and complimentary, ways of making an audience laugh.