Detailed summary of Volpone or The Fox

Summary and Analysis Act I: Scene 1

Summary

Volpone, a gentleman of Venice, is discovered at home rhapsodizing about his wealth, that "sacred treasure in this blessed room." His servant Mosca impishly sings the harmony to his master's praise of gold. Volpone treasures the manner in which the gold comes to him.

Heirless Volpone attracts the greedy and wealthy to his house; they bring with them plate, coin, and jewels in the hope that his imminent death will return their gifts tenfold. The gift-giving competition is whetted by Volpone's clever feigning of serious illness. While savoring the success of his ruse, Volpone summons his eunuch, dwarf, and fool to celebrate his present triumph with an interlude, a brief, comic, play-like sequence.

Analysis

The play is set in Renaissance Italy; the characters take their names from animals and birds. The plot grew out of a beast fable popular in the Elizabethan oral tradition. Volpone(volpe) means fox in Italian; Mosca is the word for parasitic gadfly. Mosca is dependent upon the goodwill of the sly Volpone. Volpone's genius lies in his ability to fleece the greedy rich, the covetous wealthy, without resort to trade, venture, or product, the usual methods of commercial advancement. Furthermore, no poor, ignorant person is harmed, and several parasites are maintained in husbanding the gold.

Two types of parasites or fools are found in the courts of Renaissance gentlemen: the natural idiots or deformed fools (for example, the dwarf, eunuch, and fool who entertain Volpone) and the obsequious but clever fools (for example, Mosca). The others are fools by nature; Mosca plays the fool by choice.

It is important to note that although Volpone is a gentleman and not a parasite, he is nonetheless making his living by employing the methods of such fools. Despite his noble heritage, Volpone chooses the occupation of a parasitic fool. This indicates that he is to be a comic and not a serious figure.

The locale of Scene 2 is the same as that of Scene 1. Each scene begins on the entrance of a new character. These are often called "French scenes," and their unity rests in the revelation of the quality of a new character, the demonstration of his chief characteristics by example, and the contribution he will subsequently make to the play's conflict.

Summary and Analysis Act I: Scene 2

Summary

The scene begins with the interlude performed by the deformed fools of Volpone's household. At its conclusion, the first dupe arrives outside Volpone's residence. Voltore (the vulture) is an advocate by profession and a gull by avocation. Volpone hurries to change into his costume of a decaying carcass. He dons a long gown, covers his head with a nightcap, and climbs under the fur coverlets of his supposed deathbed. All is in readiness for Mosca to bring in the victim. Mosca appears with Voltore's rich gift of an exquisitely carved gold plate engraved with the arms and name of Volpone. Mosca, hardly able to contain his glee, tells Volpone of the greedy anticipation of Voltore.

Analysis

The interlude performed by the eunuch, dwarf, and fool is a satire on the kind of comic relief injected between the acts of a morality play. Jonson's dialogue imitates the false pace of such verse while demonstrating his command of the literature of the ancients. The playwright takes the opportunity to show his contempt for the policies of Puritanism by arguing for the Pythagorean rule over that of reformed religion. In the end, the fools of the interlude suggest that it is best to suffer neither rule; as Mosca's song indicates, the fool's condition is best:

Fools they are the only nation
Worth men's envy or admiration,
. . . . .E'en his face begetteth laughter,
And he speaks truth free from slaughter.

The fool lives outside the social order and can speak the truth because he is not responsible for what he says. Mosca has chosen this course for himself.

Ben Jonson was a man of some classical learning as well as an accomplished man of the theater. His satire of the poorer professional players of the traveling morality drama gives him a chance to demonstrate his theatrical superiority. His larding of the dialogue of this interlude with Greek names serves to show his familiarity with the classics.

In the tradition of the beast fable, the nameVoltore characterizes the gull as a bird of prey. The vulture hovers outside the rooms of the fox waiting for his victim to die.

The playwright has established the atmosphere of the proceedings. He has introduced the audience to his two leading characters and set up the circumstances of their mischievous ruse. At the same time, he has mocked players, Puritans, and the foolishness of the world which comes to Volpone's very house to be gulled.

The reader should note Jonson's understanding of theatrical technique. The playwright has afforded his leading actors a chance to employ what performances call "sight gags" (visual humor); for example, Volpone dresses in an elaborate invalid's costume in preparation for Voltore's entrance. Throughout the play, Jonson has prepared places in the action for just such play. The beastiary character names are also visually suggestive. An authority on Ben Jonson's plays, Robert E. Knoll, believes that "if we fail to visualize the scenes and the movements on stage, we miss half the fun and two-thirds of Jonson's dramatic genius."

Summary and Analysis Act I: Scene 3

Summary

Mosca tells Voltore that Volpone holds the vulture first in his love. The present is offered Volpone; the value of the gift evokes Volpone's suggestion that Voltore come more often. Voltore feigns sadness at the pitiful sight of Volpone. Mosca shares the private asides of both Volpone and Voltore as he moves across the stage between them. He encourages both actors to exaggerate their false conditions. Mosca assures the advocate that all of Volpone's wealth will soon pass into the lawyer's coffers. The drooling gull is interrupted by the knocking of another aspirant to Volpone's hoard, one Signor Corbaccio (carrion crow). Mosca hurries the fleeced Voltore out, promising him a copy of Volpone's will. The two conspirators, Volpone and Mosca, rejoice at the first victim's folly and prepare for the entrance of the next fool.

Analysis

Voltore's entrance presents the audience with its first opportunity to watch the central action of the play. It is evident that all of the actors are playing their own game. Volpone must feign deathly illness and rely upon Mosca as his interpreter and cohort. Voltore, too, relies on Mosca to secure the will in his favor. The parasite Mosca depends upon Volpone's munificence, which is directly related to the success of their ruse.

While the gadfly Mosca goes from the fox to Voltore and back to the fox, the vulture hovers near his dying prey and Volpone plays dead to trick the hunter. The names of the characters indicate not only their emotional dispositions but even the affected way in which they move during the action of the play.

Jonson has intended some comment upon the fact that the vulture is a lawyer. Mosca wisely appeals to Voltore's greed by referring to his weakness for things in writing, specifically, Volpone's will. It is a fine comic insight into human character.

Voltore's scene is ended by the announcement of the entrance of another gull. The playwright allows Voltore to learn of his competition for Volpone's gold. He is building the audience's comic expectation. (The audience is aware of the entire ruse.) The reader should keep these mounting complications in mind because they represent the gradual progression of the comic mood.

Summary and Analysis Act I: Scene 4

Summary

Though Corbaccio is older and more impotent than Volpone could ever pretend to be, he hopes to hop over Volpone's grave. The carrion crow has purchased a drug for Volpone, which Mosca wisely refuses on his master's behalf. Mosca mocks the medical profession, saying that when a doctor kills a man, the law not only absolves him but gives him great rewards. Mosca relates Volpone's worsening condition by illustrating the approach of death on the face of Corbaccio. Corbaccio is pleased that Volpone is near death. Mosca cleverly obtains Corbaccio's gift of a bag of gold sequins by reminding him that Voltore left the gold plate.

Not to be satisfied with a mere bag of gold, Mosca, with cozening audacity, persuades the old, decaying Corbaccio to disinherit his brave, noble son in favor of Volpone. Corbaccio will surely outlive Volpone and the fox will gratefully, after so great a display of affection by Corbaccio, make the old crow his heir. Eventually, the son will get all of Corbaccio's inheritance and more.

Corbaccio's distracted delight, coupled with his bad hearing, enables the bold Mosca to tell him to his face that his knowledge is no better than his hearing. Volpone, playing the bedridden sick man, can hardly cover his laughter as Corbaccio exits. The two rogues re-create their triumph with gales of laughter until they are interrupted by the knock of Corvino (the raven).

Analysis

Corbaccio, as the name suggests, is an old crow ready to die, living only on carrion. He is not as fearsome a bird of prey as the vulture, and Mosca is bolder in his presence. This boldness is evident in two excellent pieces of visual "business." In mimic fashion, Mosca illustrates Volpone's death throes on Corbaccio's face. Again, Mosca employs Corbaccio's hearing defect to mock his infirmity. The actor's facial expression and vocal tone belie the meaning of his rhetoric.

Hyperbole is the rhetorical device of exaggeration for effect and not to be taken as literal speech. Usually, hyperbole is used as an ornament to speech. In Jonson's case, it is an essential part of the dramatic fun. Mosca's use of hyperbole has special ironic power. He is exaggerating Volpone's condition but not Corbaccio's present state of health. Jonson's use of hyperbole as a rhetorical device inVolpone enriches the meaning of the dramatic situation. The hyperbolic intensity of the play's rhetoric increases as the plot complications become more involved.

Mosca's attempt to get Corbaccio's will made out to Volpone increases the plot complications. It is not to be supposed that the old crow's son will take his disinheritance lying down. Mosca has created another complication by cheating an innocent person.

Summary and Analysis Act I: Scene 5

Summary

Mosca tells Corvino that Volpone does not even recognize old friends in his present condition. On cue, the delirious Volpone weakly drawls "Signor Corvino." Mosca announces that his master's hearing is gone, but he can feel the gem Corvino has brought. Corvino feigns sorrow over Volpone's condition, but Mosca discourages this act. After all, what difference does it make now that Volpone cannot hear them. Mosca uses this ruse to attack his employer, declaring that Volpone has only bastard children begot on beggars, Gypsies, Jews, and Blackmoors. Volpone is powerless to reprimand his parasite because he must continue to feign deafness. Mosca heaps on the insults, saying that the dwarf, fool, and eunuch are Volpone's natural children! Encouraged to join the game, Corvino pledges Mosca a share of his inheritance in exchange for the gadfly's assistance. Mosca suggests that part of Corvino's fortune is his gallant wife! This causes Corvino to make a quick exit. Another knock indicates the presence of Lady Would-be, the wife of the English knight Sir Politic Would-be.

Volpone tells Mosca to get rid of her, wondering that the "bold English . . . dare let loose their wives to all encounters!" Mosca says that with her face she cannot help but be honest (virtuous). Mosca makes a hymn to the beauty of Corvino's wife, and Volpone resolves to see the lady. A disguise must be designed to deceive the insanely jealous Corvino; he guards his wife with ten spies!

Analysis

Corvino is a preening raven; his greatest treasure is his beautiful wife. Mosca sees this character flaw and plays upon it by suggesting that she might be shared with the rest of his fortune. It is a telling remark. It also serves to warn of a future plot development. Corvino's wife will surely be a pawn in the villainous game. Jonson is preparing us for her entrance.

The playwright employs the actors' skills in the suppressed anger and frustration of Volpone, the impish delight of Mosca, and the foolish recklessness of Corvino as each deceives the other. The use of hyperbole is especially ironic and effective in revealing Mosca's character. He is the servant of all, but he has no affection or loyalty for anyone. It is a business deal, and, if he can cover his fun, the gadfly is glad to sting anyone. Furthermore, Corvino's use of abuse is particularly ironic because he is unaware of its real effect. He is being the subtle fool! Notice that only the audience is aware of these complications. Volpone is angry at the insults and frustrated that he cannot reply, but he does not suspect that this is the first indication of the treatment to which he subjected himself when he decided to play the fool. He has the fool's license; he also has the fool's lowly social position. Corvino is preoccupied with his own folly, and Mosca is impressed by the power of his own audacious behavior.

Though the play is set in Italy, Jonson has already satirized London Puritanism. In the last sequence, he prepares us for the English tourist Sir Politic Would-be. Sir Pol suggests the poll parrot, and the English fools are bumbling and ineffectual mimics of the fools of the main plot. Lady Pol is a burlesque of the three birds of prey.

The three gulls have been robbed of their gold, and Mosca promises to relieve them of larger treasure. The gold belongs to whoever can take it. So Volpone and Mosca become involved in stealing innocent beauty.

Until this moment, the action has taken place in Volpone's palace. The world has come to him to be fleeced. Now the fox must leave the safety of his lair and risk capture.

Summary and Analysis Act II: Scene 1

Summary

Jonson begins the second act by introducing his audience to a couple of English tourists sightseeing in St. Mark's Square. Sir Politic Would-be is in Venice at his wife's insistence; it is the height of the social season. Peregrine is confused by Sir Pol's strange conversation: "This fellow, does he gull me, trow, or is gulled?" Sir Pol mysteriously asks of signs and portents current in London. Affecting the same disposition, Peregrine relates the death of the fool Stone. "Stone dead!" puns Sir Pol in unconscious shock, and Peregrine hopes that the fool "was no kinsman" to the knight. Sir Pol tells Peregrine that Stone was actually a dangerous secret agent who "received weekly intelligence" in a "trencher of meat" and "before the meal was done, convey[ed] an answer in a toothpick." Peregrine repeats that he has heard "your baboons were spies" and Sir Pol gravely concurs. Anxious to mark the ebbs and flows of states, Sir Politic keeps a notebook filled with pertinent observations. At that moment, Mosca and the dwarf enter the square and begin erecting a stage. They are disguised.

Analysis

The first act of Volpone develops the central conflict and introduces the main characters of the play. Jonson begins the second act with the people and action of the parallel subplot. The most obvious parallel is the gullible nature of Sir Politic, whom Peregrine uses as his fool.

Jonson uses Sir Pol's political machinations as a prologue to the more serious schemes connected with Volpone's mountebank disguise. Furthermore, Sir Pol represents the credulous audience before whom Volpone is about to play.

Peregrine is a pilgrim falcon. The falcon, a bird of sport, is commonly trained to hunt other birds. The subplot characters imitate the actors of the main plot, but that is their major folly. The game they play is not a serious one, and the outcome is not as harsh as the conclusion of the main plot.

Summary and Analysis Act II: Scene 2

Summary

Mosca has the stage placed beneath the windows of Corvino's house in St. Mark's Square. Peregrine describes mountebanks as "quacksalvers, fellows that live by vending oils and drugs." Sir Pol protests that such mountebanks are "great general scholars" and "excellent physicians." Sir Politic asks the disguised Mosca for the name of the mountebank about to take the stage. Mosca names an Italian juggler who was in England about that time, Scoto of Mantua. At that moment, Volpone enters, as Scoto, followed by a crowd.

Volpone attacks the methods of other mountebanks, those "turdy-facy-nasty-paty-lousy-fartical rogues." Scoto, alias Volpone, declares that, unlike other mountebanks, he has nothing to sell. Sir Pol smiles smugly at Peregrine. At once, Volpone draws forth a "precious liquor," crying "O health! Health! The blessing of the rich! The riches of the poor!" Peregrine smiles knowingly, but Sir Pol is completely fooled. Volpone wants eight crowns for this elixir, which can cure vertigine, mal caduco, tremor cordia — in short, everything from dandruff to athlete's foot. A song is extemporized, a seventeenth-century singing commercial, and Volpone launches into the final pitch.

He promises to give away his expensive elixir to anyone who will give him a memento, a handkerchief. He looks to the balcony of Corvino's house, where Celia has been listening intently. Suddenly, she throws down her handkerchief. Volpone speaks directly to her and, with great desire in his voice and words, promises to give her a powder more potent even than the oil of Scoto.

Analysis

Act II is composed of two actions. The first is the preparation for, and the appearance of, the mountebank, Volpone. This includes the action of the subplot between Sir Politic and Peregrine and the performance of Volpone as Scoto of Mantua, whose real name was Dionisio. The derivation from Dionysus, Greek god of wine, brings to mind the pagan festival of fertility, a time of wild debauchery and hilarity. The figure of the god Dionysus had a reputation for changing its shape. The special irony of Volpone's disguise is that it describes the proceedings as a pagan festival, with Volpone as the god of wild license and many faces. Elizabethans were familiar with holidays of this kind, and they called the central actors of such festivals "mummers." At the end of each festival, it was customary that the god or prince of the debauchery be burned in effigy, to the great delight of the participants. Jonson's audience expected Volpone to be sacrificed at the end of the fun.

The first four scenes of Act II take place on St. Mark's Square before Corvino's house. Like those of the first act, they begin with the entrance of a new character. The locale prevails until the first action is completed.

The dialogue is in blank verse except during the mountebank's pitch. Volpone's sales talk is purposeful and pragmatic. It is important to remember the presence of Mosca during Volpone's oratory. Though he hasn't a line, he engineered the performance and knows which is Celia's window. He is the device that focuses Volpone's and our attention on her presence in the window.

Jonson's rhetoric for Scoto has all of the enchantment associated with carnival barkers. The irony of the exaggerated language is in the dramatic situation. The language demands that the actor playing Scoto be able to perform well in the role of a mountebank. Volpone is more than competent; he is cast to type. Mosca is clever enough to draw our attention to this irony.

Finally, it is evident that the fox is out of his lair. Volpone's action was previously confined to his feigning illness from his "deathbed." Now he seizes control of the play's action. Out of his usual domicile, the fox puts on a disguise.

Summary and Analysis Act II: Scene 3

Summary

Corvino suddenly rushes from his house, screaming at and beating on the disguised Volpone, demanding that he leave instantly. Does Scoto of Mantua intend to make Corvino a Pantalone and his wife a Franciscina? Sir Politic interprets this unexpected excitement as a trick of state and beats a hasty retreat. "This knight," says Peregrine, "I may not lose him, for my mirth, till night."

Analysis

The central figure of much festival comedy was the cuckold. The word is said to be an allusion to the cuckoo bird's habit of laying its eggs in the nests of other birds. Corvino, a proud and preening raven, is about to be turned into a cuckoo bird! Aware of this threat to his reputation, he refers to the commedia dell'artecharacters of the cuckold and his wife, Pantalone and Franciscina. A travelingcommedia dell'arte troupe had recently played in London, and Jonson alludes to these comedians as a parallel to the action of his play. It was traditional with mountebanks to beat them for their labors. Harlequin of thecommedia was the fool who tried to trick Pantalone and was beaten for his trouble. Harlequin was a base fellow and generally deserved the blows. Volpone, disguised as Scoto, is beaten by Corvino as a base mountebank about to cuckold him. It is ironic that, once again, the fox cannot reveal his true identity without risking disaster. The human Volpone is beginning to lose his identity. The animal Volpone is a perversion of humanity. The special dramatic significance of the animal names is becoming more apparent.

Summary and Analysis Act II: Scene 4

Summary

After the crowd disperses in confusion, Volpone and Mosca stagger down to the front of the stage in great distress. Volpone has been wounded by "angry Cupid, bolting from her [Celia's] eyes." Volpone must see her or die a wretched man. Though the meeting seems impossible, Mosca undertakes to turn the trick. Volpone offers Mosca everything for a meeting with Celia. Mosca consoles Volpone's longing by promising him success in cuckolding Corvino. Volpone is pleased that he played the mountebank so successfully. Mosca tells his master that "Scoto himself could hardly have distinguished!"

Analysis

Now that Volpone has discovered for himself the beauty of Celia, she becomes another desired possession. The important thing is that she already belongs to Corvino. Volpone's greed is reserved for objects that others possess. Mosca is fully aware of this character trait, and he teases Volpone's longing with the promise of making Corvino a cuckold. Celia is not desired because of her beauty; rather, her beauty makes tricking Corvino worth the effort. Volpone's greed has completely mastered him.

The servant Mosca is aware that Volpone is now a slave to his own greed. Volpone even desires the parasite to praise his performance as a fool! When Mosca responds with lavish praise, Volpone is too preoccupied with his desires to hear the irony in his servant's voice.

Jonson ends the scene without disclosing how he means to have Mosca bring about the meeting between Volpone and Celia. This mystery adds comic anticipation to the suspense of the plot.