A comedy of humours is a form of comedy that focused on character representing a type of personality. In other words, the characters behave according to their respective humours in a comedy of humours. In Volpone, Ben Jonson has portrayed characters who are overpowered by a particular passion and greed for wealth. The characters represent a character type rather than a flesh and blood. There are some characters in this play that may abnormalities such as Nano, Castrone and Androgyno and yet they are not as out of balance as the ones who are mentally imbalanced such as Volpone, Mosca, Voltore, Corvino, Corbaccio, etc.
Character of Volpone
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Volpone is an imbalanced character. At the very beginning of the play, he worships gold as his God. His worshipping of gold suggests that he is utterly consumed by greed. Besides greed, he moves on to blasphemy calling his gold a saint. He also earns his wealth by duping the legacy hunters and wants beautiful Celia on his bed. However, his worshipping of gold as his God is the most humorous part of the play where he declares:
“Good morning to the day; and next, my gold!
Open the shrine, that I may see my saint.”
[Volpone, Act I, Scene-I]
Character of Mosca
Mosca is also greedy like his master. He appears in the play to be a greater rough than Volpone. He flatters his master and torments the legacy hunters to please him. At the end of the play, he appears in his true colours when he tries his best to cheat his master. Thus, he is mentally imbalanced.
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The legacy hunters
The predominant humour in Volpone is avarice which afflicts all the legacy hunters – Voltore, Corbaccio and Corvino. Voltore brings a costly antique plate as a gift to please Volpone. He is so obsessed with money that he can plead against his Maker if he were paid a fee of six sols more. He often addresses the judges as “honoured fathers”, “your fatherhood”, “your virtues” etc. to gain the sympathy of the judges. Corbaccio agrees to disinherit his own son Bonario in order to inherit Volpone’s wealth. Even he disclaims Bonario as his son and calls him “swine, goat, wolf, parricide”. Corvino is prepared to prostitute his own wife to secure his position as Volpone’s heir. To him, commercial benefit is greater than honour. He is prepared to risk his reputation for money. He declares:
“Honour! tut, a breath.
There’s no such thing in nature; a mere term Invented to awe fools.”
[Volpone, Act-III, Scene-VII]
Character of Sir Politic Would-be and his wife
The humours of Sir Politic Would-be and his wife are not inborn but acquired. The humour of Sir Politic is to affect great political skill and statesmanship. In addition to his political humour, he also suffers from the humour of a stereotypical traveler who took note of every trivial activity during his visit abroad. His wife Lady Politic Would-be is a medley or many affected humours. She pretends to possess infinite knowledge of various academic disciplines. Her theory of obsession and possession is a crude travesty of Platonic thinking. She is also very greedy. To acquire Volpone’s wealth, she is ready to offer her body.
Conclusion
We can see throughout the play that all the characters in Volpone are driven by a particular humor dominant in their characters. Their actions, activities, thoughts, behaviours and dialogues appear very peculiar and ludicrous under the influence of the dominant humour. Therefore, Volpone may be treated as a comedy of humours.
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