“The Changeling” by Thomas Middleton and William Rowley

A couple months ago, I mentioned a book of plays that I had loaned to my mom. I didn’t think I’d ever bring that story up on this site again, but in fact, this week I’m examining a passage from one of the book’s plays. The play, by Thomas Middleton and William Rowley, is titled “The Changeling,” and is an intriguing read (though, again, you have to be into 17^th-century literature). However, it is often downright violent at parts, and therefore, the play is rife with deaths of various characters. The play’s brief epilogue, spoken by one of the characters that does survive (named Alsemero), reflects on sorrow after a loss, and how nothing can be done to stop its arrival:

All we can do to comfort one another,

To stay a brother’s sorrow for a brother,

To dry a child from the kind father’s eyes,

Is to no purpose; it rather multiplies.

Your only smiles have power to cause relive

The dead again, or in their rooms to give

Brother a new brother, father a child:

If these appear, all griefs are reconciled.

Thomas Middleton

The language, of course, seems odd to modern readers, but it conveys a very basic message: that sadly, grief after a death is inevitable, and that only time can heal it. Alsemero jokes that if the people that have died can be made to live again, then all grief will disappear. But apart from that, grief simply must occur. Any attempt to “stay” (or stop) someone’s sorrow after they have lost someone is futile: it “is to no purpose.” Trying to ease someone else’s pain after a death is a kind gesture, but it can make things worse (“it rather multiplies”).

The playwrights note that “only smiles have power” to bring our departed loved ones back to life. This could be interpreted to mean that recalling happy memories with your loved one is a form of keeping them close to you even after their death, or that eventually leaving the grieving period and moving on to the stage of acceptance is what your loved one would want you to do after they passed. They would rather you be happy that you knew them at all, not sad because they are gone. If you can manage to do these things, “all griefs are reconciled.” Essentially, time must pass before your sorrow will go away. And while this is a painful part of life, it’s an important part too. Grief may be unavoidable, but it does get better; we just have to remember that.

*Top photo credit: tech.org

Related Reading:

• Learn more about “The Changeling“
• “‘To Whom Shall I Tell My Grief?’” (SevenPonds)