Love And Marriage In Restoration Comedy

roll in the hay And Marriage In getting even harlequinadeA comedy is unremarkably a light, rather amusing, meet that deals with contemporary life and manners. Such a drama often has a satirical slant, scarcely ends happily. Among the many sub-genres to a lower place comedy, wholeness can find the comedy of manners, which originated in France with Molieres Les Precieuses ridicules (1658). Moliere saw this humourous form as a way to correct social absurdities.In England, the comedy of manners is represented by the plays of William Wycherley, George Etherege, William Congreve, and George Farquhar. This form was later classed quondam(a) Comedy hardly is now known as Restoration Comedy because it coincided with the return of the Charles II to England. The main goal of these comedies of manners in the cessation of Restoration is to mock decree, or in other(a) ways fosterage up society for scrutiny, which could cause negative or positive results. In the end, audience will lau gh at themselves and society.The definition of comedy and the earth of the Restoration Comedy help to explain the themes that run through place these comedies of manners. cardinal of the major themes is pairing and the game of neck. However, if wedding is a mirror of society, the couples in the plays show something very dark and sinister approximately order. Many critiques of marriage that we see in the play be devastating, but the game of cope is not much more than hopeful. Although the endings argon happy and the man eer gets the womanhood, one can see marriages without fill in and love affairs that are rebellious breaks with tradition.This study will focus on cardinal plays of Restoration comedies, William Wycherleys The body politic Wife (1675) and William Congreves The Way of the homo (1700), to show how dramatically society has progressed. A dramatic change, in moral attitudes about marriage and love has taken place.In Wycherleys Country Wife, the marriage betwe en Pinchwife and Margery represents a at loggerheads marriage between an old (or older man) and a young woman. The couple, Pinchwife, is the central point of the play, at least as couples go, and Margery affair with Horner only adds to the wittiness of the play. Horner runs around cuckolding all of the husbands, while he pretends to be a eunuch. This ruse brings the women swarming to him. He is a master at the game of love, though he is emotionally impotent. He cannot love, which makes him an interesting character for analysis. The relationships in the play are dominated by jealousy or cuckoldry, with the exception of the gay couple, Alithea and Harcourt, but they are really pretty boring.The element of jealousy in marriage seems to be especially prevalent in the play. In Act IV, exposure ii, Mr. Pinchwife says, in an asideMr. PINCHWIFE. So, tis plain she loves him, yet she has not love adequacy to make her conceal it from me but the sight of him will increase her offense for me and love for him, and that love instruct her how to deceive me and satisfy him, all retard as she is.He insults her, not to her face of course, but hes serious. He wants her to be stupid, not able to deceive him. further even in her unmistakable innocence, he doesnt believe she is innocent. To him, every woman came out of natures hands plain, open, silly, and check into for slaves, as she and Heaven intended em. As he says, No woman can be forced. But he also says, in another(prenominal) asideMr. PINCHWIFE. Why should women have more invention in love than men? It can only be because they have more desires, more soliciting passions, more lust and more of the devil.Mr. Pinchwife isnt especially bright, but in his jealousy, he becomes a dangerous character. He becomes passionate in his mad ravings, cerebration Margery had conspired to cuckold him. Little did he know that he was correct, but if he had known the truth, he would have killed her in his madness. As it is, when she disobeys him, he saysMr. PINCHWIFE. formerly more write as Id have you, and question it not, or I will spoil thy writing with this. I will nip out those eyes that cause my mischief.He doesnt ever hit her or stab her in the play (such actions wouldnt make a very good comedy), but Mr. Pinchwife continually locks Margery in the closet, calls her names, and in all other ways, acts like a complete jerk (to put it nicely). Because of his abusive nature, Margerys affair is not a surprise. In fact, it is accepted as a social norm, along with Horners promiscuity. At the end, the whole scene with Margery learning to lie is also taking in stride because the idea has already been set up when Mr. Pinchwife voiced his fears that if she love Horner more, she would conceal it from him. And with that, social order is restored.In Congreves The Way of the World, the trend of regaining continues, but marriage becomes more about contractual agreements and greed, then about love. Millamant and Mirabe ll iron out a pre-nuptial agreement before they agree to marry. hence Millamant, for an instant, seems willing to marry her cousin, Sir Wilful, so that she can keep her money. It is a bout of the wits it is not a battlefield of emotions. In that way, The Way of the World can be likened to Shakespeares Much Ado About Nothing, where Beatrice and Benedict play at love in their battle of wits.Its comical to see the two wits going at it, but, when we look deeper, there is an edge of seriousness behind their words. After they list conditions, Mirabell saysMIRABELL. These provisos admitted, in other things I may prove a tractable and complying husband.Love may be the posterior of their relationship, as Mirabell appears honest however, their alliance is a sterile romance, devoid of the touchy, feely stuff, which one should hope for in a courtship. Mirabell and Millamant are two wits sodding(a) for each other in the battle of the sexes nevertheless, the pervading sterility and greed re verberates as the relationship between the two wits becomes much more confusing. But then, that is the way of the world.Confusion and deception are the way of the world, but compared to The Country Wife and other earlier drama, Congreves play shows a different cordial of chaos, one marked with contracts and greed instead of the hilarity and mix-up of Horner and other rakes. The evolution of society, as mirrored by the plays themselves is apparent.Sources1. Drabble, Margaret , The Oxford Companion to side literary works2. The Norton Anthology of English Literature, The Major Authors, Sixth form3. Abjadian, Amrollah, Dr., A Survey of English Literature (II)4. Patterson, Michael, The Oxford Dictionary of Plays5. Abrams, M.H., A Glossary of Literary Term, Eighth Edition6. William Wycherley, The Country Wife, 16757. William Congreve, The Way of the World, 1700