SOURCE: Michelson, Bruce. “Wit, Wyt, and Modern Literary Predicaments.” In Literary Wit, pp. 125-45. Amherst, Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press, 2000.

In the following essay, Michelson assesses the value and meaning of ‘wit’ in the context of its modern and medieval meanings through his examination of Edson's Wit and, to a lesser extent, John Redford's 1530 drama The Play of Wyt and Science.

I do so loathe explanations.

—J. M. Barrie

Francis Bacon was right: the program that began in doubt has produced certainties beyond a medieval mind's wildest dreams. But what was once a certainty now drifts in a gulf of doubt wider than the millennium itself.

—Richard Powers

As 1999 began, an off-Broadway production of an austere drama with the darkly witty title Wit, written by first-time playwright Margaret Edson, a teacher from Atlanta, was causing a stir in literary New York. The excitement held, and in April of...