Critics, Values, and Restoration Comedy

Critics, Values, and Restoration Comedy PDF Author: John T. Harwood
Publisher: Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press
ISBN:
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 202

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Book Description
Granting that literature delights, Harwood addresses the moral questions that have been hotly debated by critics for the 300 years since Restoration comedy flourished: “In what way does literature teach? How do be­liefs about its effects on audiences shape crit­ics’ responses to and judgment of literature?” Harwood begins with a survey of the “major rhetorical strategies by which many critics transform themselves, at least mo­mentarily and perhaps unconsciously, into moralists when they deal with restoration comedy.” Then he places various moral responses in a broader critical context by analyzing ways in which critics have traditionally handled aesthetic problems, which inevitably entail an ethical assessment of literature. Third, he analyzes the moral dimensions of four controversial Restoration comedies: William Wycherley’s Country Wife; Edward Ravenscroft’s London Cuckolds; Thomas Ot­way’s Souldiers Fortune; and Thomas Shadwell’s Squire of Alsatia.

Critics, Values, and Restoration Comedy

Critics, Values, and Restoration Comedy PDF Author: John T. Harwood
Publisher: Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press
ISBN:
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 202

Get Book Here

Book Description
Granting that literature delights, Harwood addresses the moral questions that have been hotly debated by critics for the 300 years since Restoration comedy flourished: “In what way does literature teach? How do be­liefs about its effects on audiences shape crit­ics’ responses to and judgment of literature?” Harwood begins with a survey of the “major rhetorical strategies by which many critics transform themselves, at least mo­mentarily and perhaps unconsciously, into moralists when they deal with restoration comedy.” Then he places various moral responses in a broader critical context by analyzing ways in which critics have traditionally handled aesthetic problems, which inevitably entail an ethical assessment of literature. Third, he analyzes the moral dimensions of four controversial Restoration comedies: William Wycherley’s Country Wife; Edward Ravenscroft’s London Cuckolds; Thomas Ot­way’s Souldiers Fortune; and Thomas Shadwell’s Squire of Alsatia.

Critics, Values, and Restoration Comedy

Critics, Values, and Restoration Comedy PDF Author: John T. Harwood
Publisher: Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press
ISBN:
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 204

Get Book Here

Book Description
Granting that literature delights, Harwood addresses the moral questions that have been hotly debated by critics for the 300 years since Restoration comedy flourished: “In what way does literature teach? How do be­liefs about its effects on audiences shape crit­ics’ responses to and judgment of literature?” Harwood begins with a survey of the “major rhetorical strategies by which many critics transform themselves, at least mo­mentarily and perhaps unconsciously, into moralists when they deal with restoration comedy.” Then he places various moral responses in a broader critical context by analyzing ways in which critics have traditionally handled aesthetic problems, which inevitably entail an ethical assessment of literature. Third, he analyzes the moral dimensions of four controversial Restoration comedies: William Wycherley’s Country Wife; Edward Ravenscroft’s London Cuckolds; Thomas Ot­way’s Souldiers Fortune; and Thomas Shadwell’s Squire of Alsatia.

William Wycherley and the Comedy of Fear

William Wycherley and the Comedy of Fear PDF Author: John A. Vance
Publisher: University of Delaware Press
ISBN: 9780874137088
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Book Description
"This is a study of the four plays of William Wycherley - long considered one of England's most important playwrights especially of the theatrically rich Restoration period, 1660-1700. The subject of many a study by the period's leading scholars, Wycherley has been perceived as a vigorous satirist, setting out "quite openly to teach his audience" about a multitude of personal and social sins." "This study takes issue with such impressions. It argues that Wycherley was not so much an attacking playwright but rather a thinking one - little concerned with larger social, political, and moral matters but one fascinated instead by the workings and motivations of fallible and insecure men and women - by that which is constant, pervasive and obsessive."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Coyness and Crime in Restoration Comedy

Coyness and Crime in Restoration Comedy PDF Author: Peggy Thompson
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 1611483727
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 203

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Book Description
Coyness and Crime examines the extraordinary focus on feminine coyness in forty English comedies by ten diverse playwrights of the late seventeenth-century. In contexts ranging from reaffirmations of church and king to emerging interests in liberty and novelty, these plays consistently reveal women caught in an ironic and nearly intractable convergence of objectification and culpability that allows them little innocent sexual agency; this is both the source and the legacy of coyness in Restoration comedy.

Restoration Comedy and the Critics, 1698-1930

Restoration Comedy and the Critics, 1698-1930 PDF Author: Clara Elisabeth Carson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 182

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Book Description


Perspectives on Restoration Drama

Perspectives on Restoration Drama PDF Author: Susan J. Owen
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 9780719049675
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
This book introduces students to drama from the Restoration of Charles II in 1660 to the early 18th Century. Susan Owen offers representative coverage of new forms of drama in this period, and of ways in which old forms are altered. Her study covers heroic drama, comedy, tragedy, tragi-comedy, and Shakespeare adaptations, by focusing on specific 'dramatic highlights' and giving close reading of particular plays.

The Just and the Lively

The Just and the Lively PDF Author: Michael Werth Gelber
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 9780719061424
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 358

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Book Description
Recognition is often considered a means to de-escalate conflicts and promote peaceful social interactions. This volume explores the forms that social recognition and its withholding may take in asymmetric armed conflicts, examining the risks and opportunities that arise when local, state, and transnational actors recognise, misrecognise, or deny recognition of armed non-state actors.By studying key asymmetric conflicts through the prism of recognition, it offers an innovative perspective on the interactions between armed non-state actors and state actors. In what contexts does granting recognition to armed non-state actors foster conflict transformation? What happens when governments withhold recognition or label armed non-state actors in ways they perceive as misrecognition? The authors examine the ambivalence of recognition processes in violent conflicts and their sometimes-unintended consequences. The volume shows that, while non-recognition prevents conflict transformation, the recognition of armed non-state actors may produce counterproductive precedents and new modes of exclusion in intra-state and transnational politics.

The Cambridge Companion to Aphra Behn

The Cambridge Companion to Aphra Behn PDF Author: Derek Hughes
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521527200
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 286

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Book Description
Traditionally known as the first professional woman writer in English, Aphra Behn has now emerged as one of the major figures of the Restoration. She provided more plays for the stage than any other author and greatly influenced the development of the novel with her ground-breaking fiction, especially Love-Letters between a Nobleman and his Sister and Oroonoko, the first English novel set in America. Behn's work straddles the genres: beside drama and fiction, she also excelled in poetry and she made several important translations from French libertine and scientific works. This Companion discusses and introduces her writings in all these fields and provides the critical tools with which to judge their aesthetic and historical importance. It also includes a full bibliography, a detailed chronology and a description of the known facts of her life. The Companion will be an essential tool for the study of this increasingly important writer and thinker.

Without God Or Reason

Without God Or Reason PDF Author: Christopher J. Wheatley
Publisher: Bucknell University Press
ISBN: 9780838752432
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 220

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Book Description
"This book deals with Restoration ethics and - at length - with the works of Thomas Shadwell, author of extraordinarily successful plays including The Squire of Alsatia (1688). In Squire, the hero discards a mistress with whom he has had a child, seduces the daughter of a lawyer, lies to father and guardian, and, in the fifth act, promises to reform and be a faithful husband to a convenient heiress. Modern critics have argued that Shadwell was either a fool or a knave when he claimed, in the prologue to the play, to be writing morally instructive drama. Yet - as Christopher J. Wheatley points out - in his own lifetime Shadwell (frequently a target of satire on political, religious, and aesthetic grounds) seems not to have been attacked for moral hypocrisy despite his repeated claims that drama should be morally instructive. In investigating the real reasons for Shadwell's waning popularity, Wheatley uncovers much about the history of ethics." "The introduction to this book examines the ways in which critical misconceptions about the history of ethics and literary representations of ethical beliefs hinder an understanding of Restoration literature. The first chapter posits that ethical obligation in The Squire of Alsatia is based on one's role in society. It also holds that the foundations of such a role-based ethos are custom and prudential judgments about social consequences, rather than divine law or universality of ethical principles. The second chapter examines a wide variety of sources (philosophical and theological works, courtesy books, and popular literature) to explore how a dialectical tension between traditional ethical systems and skepticism about God and reason could make a role-based ethic an acceptable option for dramatic representation to a Restoration audience." "Subsequent chapters show that an ethic based on social role and custom is consistent with the body of Shadwell's works and the didactic component of Shadwell's drama undergoes little change even after the "Glorious Revolution" of 1688 that made him Poet Laureate. The book also argues that the emergent concept of "mutual love" is central to Shadwell's ethics as the force that draws gentlemen from destructive rakish behavior to their role as guardians of community stability. The last chapter examines the logical incoherence a role-based ethic generates in Shadwell's plays, particularly in the portrayal of women. Wheatley speculates that the divorce of role from obligation becomes the dominant ideology, at least as represented on the stage in the seventeenth century, and that this shift in ethical belief contributes to the decline of Shadwell's reputation."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

The Fop and Fashion in Restoration Comedy

The Fop and Fashion in Restoration Comedy PDF Author: William Russell Taliaferro
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 652

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Book Description