Recording of a lecture delivered by Louis Petrich on April 12, 2019, as part of the Formal Lecture Series. The beginning of the recording includes music. A PowerPoint presentation was given at the beginning of the lecture. A typescript of Mr. Petrich's lecture is also available on the St. John's College Digital Archives.
Mr. Petrich describes his lecture:
"My lecture Friday, on Henry IV, Part 1,
gives voice, image, and preponderant meaning to Falstaff,
that colossal comic genius of Shakespeare’s bosom.
It should at least succeed to entertain the willing.
If the matter in the lecture carries conviction,
as I fear it does, then what can’t be helped--
I mean the abominable misleading of youth—
and why not of elders still assailable?--
may nonetheless be stomached (one always hopes)
as affirmation of life—
lived large—
followed by re-edification, in the question period.
I’ve put enough in to risk everyone’s good opinion at least once,
and left plenty for imagination to assist good will to gratify.
The audience must rise or fall to the matter
on whatever staffing they’ve been provided to carry them
from bed to board, from board to bed.
To deliver the lecture any differently would not become my title,
Falstaff Riseth Up,
which, by the way, comes authorized by Shakespeare.
(Henry IV, Part 1, V. iv. 110—for those who like to text.)
I think this will do—
to usher in the sweet morsels of a Friday night
and not leave them unpicked,--
but that’s for taste in leisure to decide
and put to proof--
of eye and ear,
with tongue and thigh..."
