I've mentioned a few times that it's my opinion that The Merry Wives of Windsor is an unjustly neglected play. Neglected by scholars and critics, I should say, not by audiences, who've always enjoyed its light-hearted fun. A lot of that fun comes at Falstaff's expense, and that has not sat well with some commentators who quite simply idolize the character - there's no other word for it - and thus close themselves off from an even-handed attempt at enjoying the play. And they may be be missing more than fun in doing so. In the introduction to the Oxford edition of The Merry Wives of Windsor, the editor, T.W. Craik argues the play's merits very convincingly, and at one point, in a footnote, actually, Craik quotes from Hugh Hunt's book called Old Vic Prefaces, in which Hunt recalls addressing the cast of a 1951 production of the play that was put on for The Festival of Britain. He asks them to take their work on the play seriously, and to consider the importance of humour: "I have, I think, good reason for insisting on a realistic interpretation, since this is our Festival play and there are some who would criticize the choice of so minor a play as The Merry Wives of Windsor for such an occasion. I would like to justify it by showing the English humour of the play - the merry England which has played so large a part in building our institutions and national character".

Note to regular readers of this blog: Because I'll be working on some other writing projects for the next little while, I'm going to be updating weekly, rather than daily, for a bit. This applies to my music blog (Put Your Ears On, linked on the right) as well.