The Genesis of the Strozza Subplot in George Chapman's "The Gentleman Usher"

• Published in: PMLA : Publications of the Modern Language Association of America 1968-10, Vol.83 (5), p.1448-1453
• Main Author: Smith, John Hazel
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Case histories; Diseases; Neoplatonism; Notes, Documents, and Critical Comment; Physicians; Poetry; Speeches; Theater criticism; Villains; Wisdom; Wordplay
• ISSN: 0030-8129; 1938-1530
• DOI: 10.2307/1261318

George Chapman's source for every important incident in the Strozza subplot of "The Gentleman Usher" was Chapter x of De Abditis Nonnullis ac mirandis morborum & sanationum causis liber, a collection of medical case histories written in Latin by Antonio Benivieni, a fifteenth-century Florentine physician and associate of Ficino. Both works are informed with Neo-Platonism. Chapman took from Benivieni's work several key phrases and incidental details. Possibly echoing Italian political names, he added a villain, Medice, and changed the name of the protagonist from Gaspar to Strozza; to establish a Platonic parallel with Vincentio and Margaret of the main plot, he replaced Gaspar's spiritual counselor, a friend named Marioctus, with a wife, Cynanche, who serves the same function. The names Strozza and Cynanche contribute significant lexical meanings to the play: strozza is Italian for "throat," and κυνάγχη Greek for both "sore throat" and "dog collar"; primarily, Cynanche is a collar to her husband in the common Renaissance symbol of discipline. Poetic elaboration aside, Chapman's only other important alteration was to allow Strozza to retain, in an apparently weakened form, the prophetic gift which Gaspar lost immediately after his miraculous cure.