飲食是生命賴以維續之重要行為，亦為文學上之重要母題（motif）。但是，卻也 因其重要性被視為太理所當然，所以飲食母題（ eating motif ）受到的探討不多，有亦屬 鳳毛麟角。班強生（ Ben Jonson ）在英國文學史上以喜歡宴飲為人所矚；為文時更自視為 宴會之東道，而讀者觀眾為食客。 動物為飲食上的一大主體。巧的是，班強生其形高大，為人霸氣，評論家咸認為其氣質上有 動物般的活力；更巧的是，「動物」一詞非唯被用來形容班強生，亦被班強生用來指稱讀者 觀眾－稱其為禽獸，有待教化！ 職是之故，班強生其人，其作品，飲食母題，與動物意象四者之間便存在著極微妙的關係。 本文擬從班強生的「好吃」，與其作品中飲食母題充斥的現象著手探討，繼然闡述狐伯尼一 劇中，班氏如何巧妙經營飲食母題與動物意象二者之組合，達到教化劇場觀眾與讀者的目的 。 飲食、物、與飲食動物之間的微妙關係，就班強生與讀者觀眾而言，都應該是寓意深遠的。 Long time since the seventeenth century, criticism on Volpone has been mainly focused on the consistency of plot and characters whithin the frame of the play. Little is mentioned concerning the relationship between Ben Jonson the person and his work. As a matter of fact, through Volpone as an intermediate, Ben Jonson's relationship with his audience is peculiarly personal and direct. According to T.S.Eliot, there is a transfusion of Ben Jonson's personality in most of his works. For one thing, Ben Jonson is very fond of parties; for anther, Ben Jonson believes in the moral responsibility of a playwright to instruct his audience; and for the other, Ben Jonson despises the opinion of his audience by calling them "the beast." The purpose of this critical trial is to discuss Ben Jonson's personality transfused in Volpone as eating motif and animal imagery for moral instruction: man is animal if given to insatiability. A nineteenth century critic, Edwin Whipple. describes Ben Jonson as a joint product of "English mind and English larder." Jonas A. Barish observes that Ben Jonson often imagines himself as a "host welcoming specators to a banquet" while presenting his plays. Robert Herrick, one of Ben Jonson's admirers in the seventeenth century, also praises that Ben Jonson's verse is "lyric feast." Eating is indeed conspicuous in Jonson's works, especially in Volpone. I will proceed my discussion by analysing eating in Jonson as a start, follow by an explication of the moral funcition of eating in Volpone.
