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William Congreve and Oscar Wilde 2 Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature Lenka Drbalová Comedy of Manners: William Congreve and Oscar Wilde Bachelor‟s Diploma Thesis Supervisor: prof. Mgr. Milada Franková, CSc., M.A. 2014 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography. …………………………………………….. Author‟s signature Acknowledgement I would like to thank prof. Mgr Franková , CSc., M.A. and PhDr. Věra Pálenská, CSc. for their guidance, advice and kind encouragement. Table of Contents Preface ...............................................................................................2 Introduction ......................................................................................3 Chapter I – The Way of the World 1.1 In General ..................................................................................8 1.2 True Wit and False Wit ............................................................9 1.3 Courtship and Love .................................................................14 1.4 Invention vs. Reality ................................................................18 Chapter II – The Importance of Being Earnest 2.1 In General ................................................................................22 2.2 True Wit and False Wit ..........................................................23 2.3 Courtship and Love ................................................................28 2.4 Invention vs. Reality ...............................................................32 Conclusion .....................................................................................36 Résumé ...........................................................................................40 Notes ...............................................................................................41 Works Cited....................................................................................44 Preface The comedy of manners is a genre which, since its beginnings in the Restoration comedy, enjoyed much attention from both the writers and the audience. Its reputation however suffered at times from accusations of many critics, who condemned it as being improper, shallow and immoral. However, it reflects various tendencies permeating the society in which it was created, be it the Restoration society or the one during the late Victorian period, as those saw the creation of the plays discussed in the thesis. They thus serve as a testament of not only what the authors created, but additionally, what the audience wished to see. The aim of the thesis is to explore the origins of the genre and highlight how it contributed to theatrical environment as a whole. In addition it analyses two plays of the comedy of manners, both from a different period, which illustrate how the genre evolved and to what ideas it subscribed. The thesis consists of an introduction, which focuses on the foundation of the comedy of manners and elaborates on the atmosphere in which those plays were created to ultimately provide basis for understanding the two plays discussed in the following chapters. The main part of the thesis consists of a study of two plays: The Way of the World (1700) by William Congreve (1670-1729) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) by Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), which both bear elements of the genre of the comedy of manners. The attention is paid to the notion of wit, which is a crucial aspect in understanding the plays, to the process of courtship and finally, it discusses to what degree the plays reflect the existing world in which they were created or whether they are a mere artistic invention. 2 Introduction Restoration Comedy of Manners For this part of the thesis the studied materials consist of The Comedy of Manners by John Palmer, The History of Restoration Drama by Allardyce Nicoll and English Drama: Restoration and Eighteenth Century, 1660-1789 by Richard W. Bevis. Each of them presents the genre from a slightly different angle, focusing on the critical reception, the audience or the changes regarding the architecture of the theatres. Together they offer a complex overview of the Restoration comedy as a genre and create foundation for understanding the plays discussed in the thesis. The beginnings of the genre trace back to the Restoration period. As Palmer writes: “The English comedy of manners began with Etherege, rose to perfection in Congreve, declined with Vanbrugh and Farquhar and was extinguished in Sheridan and Goldsmith” (Palmer 2). It presents a unique explosion of wit, social satire and mannerism that lasted from 1660, when Charles II was restored to the English throne, and reached its peak with Congreve‟s masterpiece The Way of the World, performed for the first time in 1700. Beginnings of the Restoration comedy were based on “the comic tradition of Jacobean and Caroline drama, which gave it an earthly grounding [and it] acquired its elegance and polish from French influences, notably Molière” (Thomas 16- 17). French and Italian performances that were staged in London also introduced new elements of stage tricks or stage character to the English playwrights. Altogether, the Restoration period served as a melting pot, where old ideas met with the new ones and created a different and unique theatrical environment. 3 Such progression was partially possible due to the fact that it was “drama of a small and selected few” (Nicoll 4), and therefore the theatres profoundly depended on the lasting favour of a limited audience, which essentially constituted “infinitesimal portion of one town in the whole Britain” (Nicoll 4). Nicoll presents an account of typical theatre goers, who were: courtiers and their satellites, the noblemen in the pits, the fops and beaux and wits and would-be-wits who hung on to their society, the women of the court, deprived and licentious as the men, the contesans [... ] (8). The theatre was for and about the small upper-class and as a consequence the relationship between the audience and the theatre was a very close one as the theatre kept adjusting to its tastes and interests. To please such audience a constant change in the programme was crucial to fill the theatres. Nicoll mentions that no play “could count on a run of over a few days” (26). This did not solely create a great thirst for new plays, but it was also extremely challenging for the actors as they had to memorize a great amount of lines in short time. In addition, actors also became public personas and were familiar to both the dramatists and the audience and as a consequence tended to be typecast, thus strengthening the establishment of “stock characters”1 that are typical for this period. Nicoll mentions an actor Sanford, who was so well known for his brilliance in the portrayal of evil characters that the audience would not accept him in any different role and demanded to see him as they were accustomed to (Nicoll 64). In addition, the Restoration theatre introduced actresses on the stage for the first time; however, they did not enjoy high social status and were not ranked much higher 1 a character in literature, theatre, or film of a type quickly recognized and accepted by the reader or viewer and requiring no development by the writer. (www.dictionary.reference.com) 4 than prostitutes. Nevertheless this enabled not only a fresh look on the representation of female characters from the previous period, who were finally portrayed by women, but in addition those actresses had some influence on the contemporary playwrights as well and consequently some roles were specially written for them. Such was the case of Mrs Anne Brace Girdle and the role of Millamant in The Way of the World, which Congreve wrote intentionally for her. Concerning the housing of the theatres, during the most of the Restoration period there were two companies that received patents from Charles II and opened in the summer of 1660: Theatre Royal, Drury Lane and Royal Opera House, Convent Garden. They competed for the audience, but eventually united in 1681. As Nicoll remarks: “The first years of Restoration certainly saw the birth of the modern stage” (4), in contrast to the theatres of the Renaissance era, they were completely roofed, employed more diverse scenery and also reduced the platform stage into a picture-frame stage. However, they were not altogether an example of the modern theatre, but entailed as Nicoll suggests a “compromise between the Globe of 1600 and the Covent Garden of 1900” (31). The names of the theatres alone indicate their royal patronage. Indeed, the King himself was a frequent theatre-goer. As was mentioned before, the Restoration theatres were extremely close to the court and therefore reflected its sentiments. They benefited from the fact that they enjoyed a cultured audience in possession of wit and elegance and also of some theatre experience from abroad. Consequently those qualities were also reflected on the stage to entertain the audience with the delicacy of language and wit. Indeed, Nicoll notices that “[t]here is nothing like the ease and refinement of dialogue in preceding dramas . the characters are true aristocrats” (Nicoll 25). 5 However, theatres did not only benefit from the refined audience, but also indulged in the immoral life of the court, which was reprehended by many critics and started a debate about propriety of such drama on stage. James Collier was the first one to invent the moral criterion for the plays
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