ABSTRACT
A potent blend of Aristophanic and revels comedy, Volpone tells the story of a middle-aged recluse who, despite being a magnifico, has not played a powerful role at court since his magnetic performance of 'graceful gesture, note, and footing' as Antinous, twenty-one years earlier in the Doge's entertainment for the new king of France (see 3.7.155ff.). In the Jacobean court as well, literally dancing attendance upon a ruler was a formidable method of gaining influence, to judge from the career of James I's current favourite, Robert Carr, later Earl of Somerset. But instead of continuing to dance for favour in Venetian politics and commerce, Volpone rejects the competition. He prefers to dominate his own golden sphere at home, mocking and defeating challengers who try to share it, glorying in his absolute authority. His treasure-hoard, his freaks, his parasite, his pretence of dying, and his sick-bed visitors, all express Vol pone's contempt for a world he sees as diseased and twisted, a 'wrong' reality which he miniaturises and torments, thus freeing himself from an otherwise intransigently oppressive system.
