Charles Cathcart
Borrowings and the Authorial Domain: Gostanzo, Polonius, and Marston’s Gonzago
Volume 37.2, Summer 2003

John Marston relied upon aspects of Gostanzo (from All Fools) and Polonius (Hamlet) in drafting the foolish duke and father Gonzago in The Fawn. What does the nature of this double borrowing tell us about the authorial domain at a point at which autonomy would seem most compromised? In contrast to Marston’s early work, the appropriation of material is handled with restraint and aptness. The creative synthesis may extend to a sensitivity to a relation of indebtedness between the two debtor plays. Marston’s management of this narrow debt within The Fawn in turn sheds light upon the apparently promiscuous dependence upon the works of Shakespeare in his early plays.

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