Volpone Literary Elements

drama; comedy

English

17th-century Venice, Italy

There is no singular narrator present throughout the play.

satirical, ironic, farcical, bleak

Volpone (despite his flaws) is the protagonist of the play. The three legacy-hunters Corvino, Corbaccio, and Voltore are the antagonists.

The central conflict of the play is that the legacy-hunters believe Volpone is sick and dying and planning to name one of them as his heir. In reality, Volpone is in fine health and is conning the legacy-hunters for gifs.

The climax of the play occurs in Act Five, when Volpone reveals himself to the Avocatori.

The names of the characters (Italian terms for various animals) foreshadow how the characters will behave toward one another.

Celia uses understatement when she asks, " Is that, which ever was a cause of life, / Now placed beneath the basest circumstance?" (3.7). Here, Celia refers to love and sex as the "cause of life," keeping her language modest to reflect her Christian virtue.

The play makes frequent allusions to the Christian Bible through the character of Celia. It also makes allusions to the Metamorphoses, a mythical poem by Roman poet Ovid which depicts the origins of the world.

Important imagery in the play includes parasitism, gold, luxury, and animals.

An important paradox (and irony) of the play is that Volpone detests and condemns the behavior of the legacy-hunters while himself engaging in schemes, cons, and duplicity.

Mosca serves as a parallel character to the three legacy-hunters, as he is after the same goal (being named Volpone's heir) but does so from the inside, serving as Volpone's slave while simultaneously assuming the role of heir for himself.

The play uses reverse personification, called zoomorphism, to compare its human characters to animals: the fox (volpone), the fly (mosca), the raven (corbaccio), the crow (corvino), and the vulture (voltore).

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