Mankind Play Sparknotes

Mankind is a Medieval Morality play which is an allegory to the fall of Adam as it centres around its main character Mankind who is the representation of humankind and how he succumbs to the temptation and his repentance from this sin. The play distinctively plays around the theme of religion, good vs evil, hard-work vs idleness, body vs soul while dealing with its characters, their dialogues, and the word-play within it and by parodying Latin language and the beliefs associated with it. Mankind is not a little comedy of rural life, but a Morality play, written, as were all Morality plays, for the purpose of teaching, through the medium of allegory, a lesson for guidance of life. In this play we find a great proportion than usual of scenes given up to jesting and horse-play – the regular Morality method of depicting the vicious side of life. As Mackenzie has pointed out Mankind has more than usual scenes of jesting and horse-play which is mainly seen in the character’s dialogues and their puns. The play highlights the distinction of dialogues between Mercy, Mankind as opposed to the vices. The latter repeatedly uses puns and vulgar language such as ‘peson’ – to signify penis in line 248,
For instance, when Newguise uses the word ‘jewels’ to talk about his testicles he could have used several other words to create the pun. But the specific use of ‘jewels’ showcases the materialistic aspect of the character and therefore relates to another theme – hard-work vs idleness. Wealth without hard-work is another evil temptation Mercy warns Mankind against. Similarly, if Newguise’s use of the word jewels represents idleness as he does not work then Mankind using his spade to hit them symbolises labour. The spade is what he uses on his land to make a living and not live a free life like that of the