In both versions Actyf is prompted in part by the agere/pati topos (for which see Crampton 1974) implicit in the role of Patience, in part by the prominence earlier in the passus, and in the several previous passūs, of the “Do” triad (not to mention Patience’s and Conscience’s present conversation), in part by the food theme; and perhaps also by Psalm 14, as I have argued earlier in this note.
I don’t think Active vs. Contemplative, the rubric Pearsall invokes, is of much importance. In the phrase “Activa Vita,” “vita” probably just translates English “life,” that is, in a frequent Langlandian usage, “estate,” “occupation,” or even just “person.” So we should probably think of him as just “an Active Man,” rather than, allegorically, as “the Active Life.” But Pearsall’s note is in general good, and he stresses the way that in B Actyf is “a compelling portrait of sinful and repentant humanity,” in C mostly just set up to be instructed by Patience. In both versions his major purpose seems to be to serve as a foil for Patience, and as an opportunity for Patience to expound his views. In C he turns out to have a “leader,” Liberum arbitrium, who is not mentioned, and plays no role, until 16.158 when he suddenly replaces Patience and Conscience, but is presumably leading Actyf the whole time.
Curtis Perrin makes the excellent point that Actyf takes on Will’s earlier role of “clueless questioner” in a new “comedy of correction” (2006:169). Many critics, including Robertson and Huppé 1951:169, Carruthers 1973:121–22, and, most notably, Staley 2002 try to connect Actyf’s dirty coat to Matthew’s parable of the man without a wedding garment, unconvincingly to me.
190 (B.13.221) They mette with a mynstral: Not “We met.” Even in the C version, where Will says he followed Patience and Conscience, L seems bent on not letting him do anything in this episode but look and listen, until Liberum arbitrium, Actyf’s “leader,” arrives at 16.158. This helps make it possible to take Actyf as a stand-in for Will.
191 (B.13.222) apposede hym and preyede: one action, not two: the second phrase specifies the question asked, 191 (B.13.223) What craft þat he couthe. It is the standard question one asks of a new acquaintance in estates literature, as perhaps also in actual life: cf. the Host to the Canon’s Yeoman, “Telle what he is” (G616), i.e., what is his job?, and the implication in the General Prologue that the narrator has gone around asking everyone at the Tabard, “What are you?” Though apposede can carry the legal weight of “interrogated,” there is no reason to think of Patience’s question as anything but civil (though we should be aware of the sharp contrast between Actyf and Patience, agere et pati, which L exploits throughout the scene). It is the same word used of Reason’s interrogation of Will in 5.10, though there the aggressive nature of the questioning is insisted on: “thus resoun me aratede” 5.11.
Actyf describes his craft to Patience and Conscience (193–231, B.13.224–70)
193–98 (B.13.224–26) Ich am a mynstral … a waferer: Actyf is in the food business, as the verb conforte 194, which regularly means “feed” in this passus (15.61, 187; B.13.58, 218), suggests most clearly. In Gregory the Great’s definition of the active life (PL 76.953, referred to above, 188 [B.13.219]n), feeding the hungry comes first: “Activa enim vita est, panem esurienti tribuere.” (For the active life is: to give bread to the hungry). It goes on: teach the ignorant, correct the sinner, and so on, but feeding the hungry is first. I have quoted the full sentence at 16.324–36a (B.15.182–94)n below. To feed the hungry is also the first of the corporal works of mercy: see above, 114–18n and, again, 16.324–36n. Actyf, we may note, inhabits a world where bread is bread, not Agite penitenciam and the like.
Mynstral is used in its general sense of “minister,” that is “servant, functionary, someone who ministers (food, etc.) to others”; see MED minstral 2; DML ministrallus 1. In associating activa vita with minstrelsy, Langland has surely in mind Luke’s sentence about Martha, who served Jesus food and who became a standard symbol of the active life: “Martha autem satagebat circa frequens ministerium” (But Martha was busy about much serving, 10:40). (Cf. Gregory, Commentary on the First Book of Kings, PL 79.402, “activa vita, quae frequens circa ministerium satagit”; St Benedict’s Rule, “vitae activae ministerium” PL 66.445; Gerhohus Reicherspergensis, Expositio in Psalmos, PL 194.591, “activa vita, quae proximis in corporalibus ministrat”). Actyf is definitely not an entertainer, as he says emphatically in lines 202–7. His initial statement, “I am a minstrel,” probably means no more, in reply to Patience’s query about his craft, than “Actually, I’m not a craftsman, I provide a service”—though using the noun instead of saying “I minister” gives him the chance to dilate on his superiority to lordes munstrals (15.203), who provide less and get paid more.
Webb 1854:148–49, glossing a payment-entry to “wafferariis et menestrallis,” falsely associating the Germanic term with Latin vafer (artful, cunning), asserts that waferarii are “cunning artists who practiced tricks by sleight of hand,” but offers no evidence; everywhere else, wafrarius just means “waferer”: see the DML. There would be nothing unusual, however, about combining the functions of waferer and entertainer—waferers made and served their delicious specialty at the end of a feast, and served up entertainment along with the wafers—or about farting as part of the show (205; B.13.231); see Southworth 1989, pp. 47, 64, 80–81. Stock 1988:468, Kirk and Anderson (Donaldson, 1990:139) and Staley 2002:35 suggest a pun on “wayfarer,” i.e., homo viator. The second part of Patience’s question in B.13.223, “to what contree he wolde,” never being answered, is dropped in C.
As in the opening scene of Julius Caesar, and as in two places in the Canterbury Tales, the question, “What work do you do?,” brings a coy or riddling response. The Canon’s Yeoman, when the Host asks, “Is he a clerk, or noon? Telle what he is,” fumbles evasively, then blurts out that he could turn the whole road to Canterbury into silver and gold (G617–26); in the Friar’s tale, the Summoner, when the devil asks, “Are you a bailiff?,” replies “Yes” out of shame, and the devil declares wryly that he is another (cf. D1392–96). (Staley, partly on the basis of this similar question, though mostly on the basis of “foul clothes,” elaborates a whole theory of CYT as “in conversation” with the Actyf episode.) Will has also been evasive in his reply to Reason’s questions about his work in C.5. Similarly here, Actyf is a waferer but says he is a minstrel—his notion being that he “comforts” people, brings them pleasure, with his bread as minstrels do with their entertainment. (This explanation is made much clearer in C, where the bald statement in B, “I am a Mynstrall … a wafrer” 224–26 is expanded into eight lines, 193–200, including an exchange with Conscience.) In his response to Conscience Actyf readily explains the riddle: the only kind of minstrelsy I know is to make men merry with wafers: it’s a job that makes people happy. Why he gives this oblique answer is not quite certain, though L in fact capitalizes on this convention in several ways: it aligns Actyf with other vagabond-minstrel figures more clearly than wafering would; it suggests an analogy with Will the maker; it extends the subject of feasts; it prepares for Patience’s alternative substitution: Actyf likens wafering to minstrelsy, Patience likens it to the provision of spiritual food. It also reveals Actyf’s discontent with his lot, for he moves quickly enough to the complaint that lords’ minstrels are rewarded much more generously than he is though he provides a more essential service.
The analogy with Will is perhaps especially potent. B.13.284–90 sound uncannily like him. Actyf appears on the surface to be the very opposite of Will: though not an actual laborer, he is definitely in the food business, whereas Reason berates Will precisely for contributing nothing to the harvest. But Actyf seems to wish he were a minstrel, just as Will