Musings from the Pissing Conduit

A Chaste Maid in Cheapside

We have seen Jonson and Middleton each exploit Puritans in their satircal tableaus of urban life in London. How do their depictions differ, however? What is at stake for representations of gender in A Chaste Maid considering the Puritan ladies imbibe and carouse with the "gossips" and those that are not of the "faithful"?

The Honest Whore

The world of the play grows less and less stable as the action goes on. Sobriety and propriety are substituted with insanity, disguises, betrayal, and the space of the madhouse. As a follow up to Ann's query about Candido as a proto-capitalist, does sacrificing one's other interests and values for economic ones come to represent a kind of madness in the play? Does Candido go mad in part because of his desire to satisfy customers? Bethlem Monastery houses a large population who have been driven insane by lost wealth and fortune. As he is about to be taken away in 4.3, Candido muses on some apparent paradoxes:

Is change strange? 'Tis not
The fashion unless it alter! monarchs turn
To beggars, beggars creep into the nests
Of princes, masters serve their prentices,
Ladies their serving-men, men turn to women.

Change and rapid, radical flux, as Candido describes it here, occurs all over The Honest Whore. What sense can we make of it in relation to economic and social concerns in the play?