The “comedy of manners” genre is a form of comedy that lampoons the life, manners, and pretensions of upper class society. The characters in this genre use social artifice with each other while revealing to the audience their true intentions. This genre was usually characterized by a flamboyant display of bawdy, ribald dialogues, sharp repartee and ripostes, bedroom intrigues, double entendre, sexual innuendoes, foppishness, and rakish, sexually promiscuous behavior.
Our first exhibit of this remarkable genre is William Wycherley’s The Country Wife—a delightful tale about the hostile, May/December marriage between Margery and Bud Pinchwife, and Margery’s affair with local rake, Harry Horner. Horner, a married man, pretends to be impotent to get close to wives of his friends. His friends don’t mind, since they consider him to be impotent, while is he cuckolding them at the same time, including the aforementioned Bud Pinchwife.
The Country Wife embodies all the characteristics of the comedy of manners genre. It uses absurd, over-the-top wordplay to achieve these characteristics. Consider the following question by Lady Fidget to Horner (Scene II, Act I, Lines 658-64):
Another outstanding example of this genre is William Congreve's The Way of the World, where we have Mirabell, a witty and ironic man-about-town who is in love with and who is loved back by Millament, the ward of vain, crusty, and formidable Lady Wishfort—an old bat with pretensions to beauty. To be able to marry Millament, Mirabell must first win over her aunt. To this end, he embarks on a seduction of Lady Wishfort who returns his sexual advances in kind. When Mrs. Marwood, a woman whose love for Mirabell was not returned, threatens his scheme, Mirabell reveals one of Mrs. Marwood’s past indiscretions to Lady Wishfort – Mrs. Marwood was Lady Wishfort’s son-in-law Fainall’s mistress. Lady Wishfort becomes eternally indebted to Mirabell for saving her daughter from the scandal of a divorce and consents to Mirabell’s marriage to Millament.
This play excellently documents the hypocrisy, double standards, and the two-facedness of the English upper class from the period. Take the following claim made by Lady Wishfort about having raised her daughter to hate men (Act V, Scene V, Lines 161-169):
In this manner, we see how both The Country Wife and The Ways of the World both embody and epitomize the many wonderful characteristics of the “comedy of manners” genre.
Our first exhibit of this remarkable genre is William Wycherley’s The Country Wife—a delightful tale about the hostile, May/December marriage between Margery and Bud Pinchwife, and Margery’s affair with local rake, Harry Horner. Horner, a married man, pretends to be impotent to get close to wives of his friends. His friends don’t mind, since they consider him to be impotent, while is he cuckolding them at the same time, including the aforementioned Bud Pinchwife.
The Country Wife embodies all the characteristics of the comedy of manners genre. It uses absurd, over-the-top wordplay to achieve these characteristics. Consider the following question by Lady Fidget to Horner (Scene II, Act I, Lines 658-64):
…cou’d you be so generous? so truly a Man of honor, as for the sakes of us Woman of honor, to cause yourself to be reported no Man? No Man! and to suffer your self the greatest shame that could fall upon a Man, that none might fall upon us Women by your conversationThe much-married Lady Fidget has had a sexual affair with Horner, but now preposterously demands that he confirm to her and to the world that he is truly impotent, so that her reputation may be untarnished! Note the author’s use of the innocuous word “conversation” to mean sex!
Another outstanding example of this genre is William Congreve's The Way of the World, where we have Mirabell, a witty and ironic man-about-town who is in love with and who is loved back by Millament, the ward of vain, crusty, and formidable Lady Wishfort—an old bat with pretensions to beauty. To be able to marry Millament, Mirabell must first win over her aunt. To this end, he embarks on a seduction of Lady Wishfort who returns his sexual advances in kind. When Mrs. Marwood, a woman whose love for Mirabell was not returned, threatens his scheme, Mirabell reveals one of Mrs. Marwood’s past indiscretions to Lady Wishfort – Mrs. Marwood was Lady Wishfort’s son-in-law Fainall’s mistress. Lady Wishfort becomes eternally indebted to Mirabell for saving her daughter from the scandal of a divorce and consents to Mirabell’s marriage to Millament.
This play excellently documents the hypocrisy, double standards, and the two-facedness of the English upper class from the period. Take the following claim made by Lady Wishfort about having raised her daughter to hate men (Act V, Scene V, Lines 161-169):
…I chiefly made it my own care to initiate her very infancy in the rudiments of virtue, and to impress upon her tender years, a young Odium and Aversion to the very sight of men….she’d never look at a man in the face but her own father, or the chaplain.But, in reality, Lady Wishfort herself is in active pursuit of a man to marry, despite her many protestations to the contrary! Despite her projected self-righteousness, she has no moral qualms about being predatory and ruthless to further her own marital interests. At one point, she tells Mrs. Marwood, “what’s Integrity to an Opportunity”!
In this manner, we see how both The Country Wife and The Ways of the World both embody and epitomize the many wonderful characteristics of the “comedy of manners” genre.
No comments:
Post a Comment