The book starts out with a cover.
I opened the cover and much to my surprise I saw my name. It took me a moment to realize that the seller of the book had not written me a message but a previous owner of the book had the same name.
Introduction 84 Pages The Play 40 Pages Illustrations 12 Notes to Introduction 4 Pages Notes to Everyman 6 Pages Bibliography 7 Pages |
The Introduction is long because it gives a history of Morality plays.
The play is short because it only incudes the spoken lines and not the lyrics to the songs.
Links to the Illustrations are provided below.
The Notes are Notes.
The Bibiography is divided into the following sections: The Church; French Period; German Period; English Period; and Editions of Plays.
The Title Page.
Followed by:
Copyright 1903.
Published, October, 1903
Followed by:
Dedication: To My Mother
List of Illustrations. Scenes from the play.A Rekenynge of Every Mannes Persone
EVERYMAN. Commaunded I Am to Go a Journaye
EVERYMAN. Therfore I Pray The Go with Me
KNOWLEGE. Everyman, I Wyll Go with The and Be Thy Gyde
CONFESSYON. Here Shall You Receyve That Scourge of Me
EVERYMAN. O Eternal God, O Hevenly Fygure
EVERYMAN. It Is the Garment of Sorowe
EVERYMAN. Strengthe, Dyscrecyon, Beaute, Fyve Wyttes, Lacke I Nought
EVERYMAN. I Go before, There I Wolde Be : God Be Our Gyde
GOOD DEDES. Nay, Everyman, I Wyll Byde with The
EVERYMAN. Into Thy Handes, Lorde, My soule I Commende
Character Group.
The Predecessors of Everyman  COMPREHENSIVE appreciation of Everyman involves some knowledge of the dramatic developement of which it is a part. The Morality was no sudden form of play, sprung into existance; it was based upon a historic tradition of rare interest, involving centuries of social progress. Changes in civilization, it thought, in form, are not sharply defined, but grade, one into the other, and follow evolutionary laws. The student of medieval literature, of the literature of any epoch, will find reasons for the existance of a particular genre only so far as he underderstands the social forces that called it forth.In the early history of drama this fact is strikingly illustrated, since drama became an accessory of the Church, to satisfy social want. Scholars are now well agreed that the sources of the modern drama are not to be found in the theaters of Greece and of Rome. Mention is made of a Greek play, dealing with the Passion of Christ, which was probably written in the IVth century by St. Gregory Názianzen, who died A. D. 390; one Latin comedy, constructed along the lines of Plautus; and six Latin Comedies by Hroswitha, a nun of the Gandersheim convernt, Saxony. But save for the fact that Gregory drew his form from Euripides, and Hroswitha from Terence, there is little in spirit or purpose to show any deeper influencde from the classic drama. These plays were more on the order of the later Scholar pieces which rarely reached any other atmoshpere than that of the monastary. It is to the Church that the modern drama owes its life, and in the Church that dramatic beginnings were nurtured. Christianity, from the first, had some vital and conflicting forces with which to contend. On the one hand, there were paganism and Judasim, with their countless forms and customs; and on the other hand, a people, unthinking and ignorant, who were attracted toward the licentious amusements paganism encouraged. Against this opposing tide, the Christian Church set an art which would help allay the restless ignorance of her converts. The congreagations that listened to the Latin sermon did not understand Latin; the Bible was not an open book to them, since they could not read; it was natural that form alone became symbolical of allthat the priest was saying in a stange tounge. To this new form, the character of the service lent itself readily. In the IVth and Vth centuries, "the public worship of God assumed, if we may so speak, a dramatic, theatrical character which made it attractive and imposing to the mass of the people, who were as yet incapable of worshiping God in spirit and in truth." There was one underlying motif throughout the service, a deep religious strain which became more profound as each step in the life of Christ was magnified through the desire to live again the life of the Crucified. Deeper and deeper this desire became, until the Divine Presence rose before His people i the transubstantiation of the bread and wine. An examination of the Mass will show this steady rise in intensity and dramatic contenct. The questions of the priest and the responses of the congreagation gave definite divisions, not unlike character divions. The service was necessarily dramatic since the Life was fraught with passion. [We now skip over 54 pages of Introduction to the mention of Everyman.] The very names themselves [this follows a list of earlier Morality plays] reveal the character of the dramas. Of them all, none would approach, in completeness and unity of development, the Morality play of Everyman......As in Everyman, there is detected a strong note of Catholicism, so in later plays the cause of Protestantism is strongly argued. ..... With the exception of Everman, it is conceded that the Moralities are dull, without enough action to sustain interest. Isolated passages posses considerable literary skill. When Everyman first meets with Dethe, there is a song upon his lips, but no words are extant in the text as we have it. ..... It but remains to say a word concerning Everyman, and the purpose of this Introduction has been accomplished. Ten Brink and Collier assign it to the reign of Edward IV (1461-1483); and as to authenticity, it is regarded by some as the translation of a Dutch play, Elckerlijk. The author of this original has been traced by Dr. Henri Logeman to one Petrus Dorlandus of Diest, who was probably some theologian, judging by the sectarian spirit breathed throughout the play. Karl Goedeke (Everyman, Homulus, and Hekastus) has traced, from the standpoint of international literature, the direct forebears and contemporaries of Everyman. It has been shown by him that the central idea of our Morality --- that of proving one's friends --- is tracable in many of the early parables from various countries. Everyman, we find, was itself appended to the Legenda Aurea of Jacobus Voragine (d. 1298), writes Ward, "as a later additon in a brief form derived from the Speculum Historiale, a compilation of the XIIIth century by Vincentius of Beauvais. But there can be no doubt that the story itself is a parable narrated in the religious romance of Barlaam and Jehosaphat, which has been ascribe to John of Damascus, who died in 780, but is now held to be more probably the work of his younger namesake, afterwards Patricarch of Antioch, who died in 1090." Contemporaneously with Everyman stands the Dutch Elckerlijk already mentionsed, upon which Christian Ischyrius (cira 1526) based a Latin version entitled Homulus. This in turn was translated into Dutch and Low German. Ward notes that "the publisher of the Latin Homulus sought to add to its attraction by prefixing to it a series of scenes, taken in part from the contemporary Latin comedy of Hekastus, by Macropedius, which was independently derived from the same sources as Everyman, and which was itself followed by a long series of reproductions and imitaions in Germany." Four early imprints of Everyman are at present known:
(b) A second fragment in the Bodleian Library "Imprynted at London in Flete Strete at the Synge of the George by Rycharde Pynson prynter unto the Kynges noble grace." (c) Two manuscripts edited by John Skot, one contained in the library of a Mr. Hutt, and the other in the Salisbury Cathedral. (d) Another Skot edition in the Britwell Library. "Imprynted at London in Poules chyrche yarde by me John Skot." Of these, Pynson's manuscripts are the older. He came to England from Normandy, circa 1490, and in 1509, was appointed special printer to King Henry VIII. ..... Montrose J. Moses. |
HERE BEGYNNETH A TREATYSE HOW THE HYE FADER OF HEVEN SENDETH DETHE TO SOMON EVERY CREATURE TO COME AND GYVE A COUNTE OF THEYR LYVES IN THIS WORLDE, AND IS IN MANER OF A MORALL PLAYE. |
GOD DETHE EVERYMAN FELAWSHYP KYNDREDE GOODES GOOD DEDES KNOWLEGE CONFESSYON BEAUTE STRENGTHE DYSCRECYON FVYE WYTTES AUNGELL DOCTOUR |
And here this mater with reverence. By fygure a morall playe; The somonynge of Everyman called it is, That of our lyves and endynge shewes How transytory we be all daye. This mater is wonders precyous, But the entent of it is more gracyous And swete to bere awaye. The story sayth -- Man, in the begynnynge Loke well, and take good heed to the endynge, Be you never so gay; Ye thynke synne in the begynnynge full swete, Whiche in the ende causeth the soule to wepe, Whan the body lyeth in claye. Here Shall you se how Felawshyp and Jolyte, Bothe Strengthe, Pleasure, and Beaute, Wyll fade from the as floure in Maye; For ye shall here how our heven kynge Calleth Everyman to a generall rekenynge. Gyve Audyence and here what he doth saye. |
God speketh:
How that all creatures be to me unkynde, Lyvynge without drede in worldly prosperyte; Of ghostly syght the people be so blynde, Drowned in synne they know me not for theyr God; In worldely ryches is all theyr mynde. they fere nor my ryghtwysnes, the sharpe rood; My lawe that I shewed whan I for them dyed; They forgete clene, and sheynge of my blode rede; I hanged bytwene two it can not be denyed; To gete them lyfe I suffred to be deed; I heled theyr fete, with thones hurt was my heed. I coude do no more than I dyde truely, And nowe I se the people do clene forsake me: They use the seven deedly synnes dampnable, As pryde, coveytyse, wrath, and lechery, Now in the worlde be made commendable. And thus they leve of aungelles the hevenly company; Every man lyveth so after his owne pleasure, And yet of thery lyfe they be nothynge sure. I se the more that I them forbere The worst they be fro yere to yere; All that lyveth appayreth fastem, Therefore I wyll in all the haste Have a rekenynge of every mannes persone. [We know skip forward to the reason for this page.] Thoughe that on my fete I may not go, I have a syster that shall with you also, Called Knowledge, whiche shall with you abyde, to helpe you to make that dredeful rekenynge. In thy moost nede to go by thy syde. |
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