The Restoration Period T-5

Syllabus topics (RTMNU)

• Reasons for the Rise of Satire
• Restoration Tragedy
• The Sentimental Comedy

Reasons for the Rise of Satire

The Restoration (1660) brought Charles II back to the throne after the Puritan rule. The age that followed (1660–1745, including the Augustan age of Pope and Swift) is called the age of satire. Satire is writing that attacks the follies and vices of people or society through ridicule, wit and irony, aiming to correct them.

Reasons

• Political conflict – fierce fights between Whigs and Tories; writers attacked opponents (Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel, 1681).
• Religious quarrels – Anglicans, Catholics and Dissenters.
• Reaction against Puritanism – mocking Puritan hypocrisy (Butler's Hudibras).
• Rise of reason – the Age of Reason valued common sense; anything foolish became a target.
• Corrupt and loose court and society gave much material.
• Growth of coffee-houses, pamphlets and periodicals – quick public debate.
• Classical models – Horace and Juvenal admired; the heroic couplet suited sharp, balanced satire.
• Literary rivalry – writers attacked dull writers (Mac Flecknoe, The Dunciad).

Restoration Tragedy

The main form was the Heroic Tragedy (Heroic Drama), led by John Dryden (The Conquest of Granada, 1670; Aureng-Zebe, 1675).

• Theme of love versus honour.
• Larger-than-life heroes, exotic settings, battles and rant (bombastic speeches).
• Written in rhymed heroic couplets at first.
• Later Dryden turned to blank verse in All for Love (1677), on Antony and Cleopatra.
• Thomas Otway's Venice Preserved (1682) is another important tragedy.
• Mocked by Buckingham's burlesque The Rehearsal (1671).

The Sentimental Comedy

In the early 18th century, after Jeremy Collier attacked the immorality of the stage (1698), comedy became moral and tearful. This is Sentimental Comedy. Leading writers: Colley Cibber, Richard Steele (The Conscious Lovers, 1722), Hugh Kelly.

• Aim: to make the audience weep and feel virtue, not to laugh.
• Good, virtuous middle-class characters; their distress and final reward.
• Emotion (sentiment) and moral lessons; little wit.
• Reaction: Goldsmith (She Stoops to Conquer, 1773) and Sheridan (The Rivals, The School for Scandal) brought back "laughing comedy". Goldsmith attacked it in his "Essay on the Theatre: or, A Comparison between Laughing and Sentimental Comedy" (1773).

Likely exam questions

1. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Discuss the reasons for the rise of satire in the Restoration and Augustan age.
2. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) What is Sentimental Comedy? How did Goldsmith react against it?
3. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Write a note on Restoration heroic tragedy.
4. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Why is the heroic couplet suited to satire?
5. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Write a note on Jeremy Collier's attack on the stage.

Syllabus topics (RTMNU)

• She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith

She Stoops to Conquer – Oliver Goldsmith

Oliver Goldsmith (1728–1774) – Irish-born poet, novelist and dramatist: The Vicar of Wakefield (novel), The Deserted Village (poem), The Good-Natur'd Man and She Stoops to Conquer (first staged 1773). Its subtitle is "The Mistakes of a Night".

Story in brief (our own words)

1. Mr Hardcastle, an old-fashioned country gentleman, wants his daughter Kate to marry Charles Marlow, son of his friend Sir Charles Marlow. Young Marlow is shy and tongue-tied with ladies of his own class but bold with barmaids and servants.
2. Tony Lumpkin, Mrs Hardcastle's spoilt son, meets Marlow and his friend Hastings at an inn (The Three Pigeons). As a joke he tells them Hardcastle's house is an inn.
3. Marlow and Hastings treat Hardcastle like an innkeeper – rude orders, complaints about the menu. Hardcastle is shocked at their "modern" manners.
4. Kate, in a plain dress, is mistaken by Marlow for a barmaid. She "stoops" (lowers herself) to play the maid, and Marlow talks freely and falls in love with her. This is how she "conquers".
5. Subplot: Hastings loves Constance Neville, Mrs Hardcastle's niece, whom Mrs Hardcastle wants to marry Tony (for her jewels). Tony helps the lovers; he drives his mother round in circles at night, pretending they are lost far away, when they are in her own garden.
6. Sir Charles arrives; misunderstandings are cleared. Tony learns he is of age and refuses Constance, so she can marry Hastings. Marlow and Kate are united.

Themes

• Mistaken identity and comedy of errors.
• Town vs country manners.
• Class and its effect on behaviour (Marlow's double nature).
• Love and marriage; parents vs children.

Characters

• Kate Hardcastle – clever, lively heroine; she controls the plot.
• Marlow – shy with ladies, bold with servants; comic contradiction.
• Tony Lumpkin – mischievous, idle, but good-natured; the cause of the mistakes.
• Mr and Mrs Hardcastle – he loves old things; she longs for London fashion.

As an anti-sentimental "laughing comedy"

Goldsmith wrote it to bring back hearty laughter, natural characters and humorous situations instead of tears and moral preaching.

Likely exam questions

1. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Discuss She Stoops to Conquer as a laughing comedy / reaction against sentimental comedy.
2. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Explain the title She Stoops to Conquer and the role of Kate Hardcastle.
3. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Write a character sketch of Tony Lumpkin.
4. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Why is the play subtitled "The Mistakes of a Night"?
5. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Write a note on the double nature of Marlow.

Syllabus topics (RTMNU)

• Macflecknoe by John Dryden

Mac Flecknoe – John Dryden

About the poet

John Dryden (1631–1700) – the leading writer of the Restoration: poet, dramatist and critic; Poet Laureate from 1668. Dr Johnson called him the "father of English criticism". Satires: Absalom and Achitophel, Mac Flecknoe, The Medal.

Background

Mac Flecknoe was written about 1676–78 and published in 1682. It attacks Thomas Shadwell, a rival dramatist who claimed to be the follower of Ben Jonson and with whom Dryden had literary and political (Whig vs Tory) quarrels. "Mac Flecknoe" means "son of Flecknoe" – Richard Flecknoe was a poor Irish poet thought to be a byword for dullness.

Summary (our own words)

1. Old Flecknoe, the king of the realm of Nonsense, grows old and must choose an heir. He decides that Shadwell alone is perfectly like himself – "Shadwell alone, of all my sons, is he / Who stands confirmed in full stupidity."
2. Flecknoe praises Shadwell's dullness: other writers sometimes show sense, but Shadwell "never deviates into sense". He calls Flecknoe and Heywood and Shirley his forerunners ("types").
3. The coronation takes place in a poor area of London, among cheap bookshops and theatres for children; the streets are lined with unsold books used as wrapping paper.
4. Shadwell is crowned with poppies (symbol of dullness), holds a mug of ale instead of the orb, and swears to maintain dullness.
5. Flecknoe gives a prophetic speech advising Shadwell to write dull plays, to drop his false claim to Jonson's tradition, and to try acrostics and anagrams. While he speaks he is dropped through a trap-door, and his mantle falls on Shadwell, like Elijah's on Elisha.

Features

• Mock-heroic / mock-epic: a trivial subject (a dull poet) treated in grand epic style – coronation, prophecy, heroic similes.
• Heroic couplets; sharp, balanced lines.
• Irony – praise that really means blame.
• Personal satire that becomes general satire on bad writing.
• Influenced Pope's The Dunciad.

Likely exam questions

1. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Discuss Mac Flecknoe as a mock-heroic satire.
2. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) How does Dryden ridicule Shadwell in Mac Flecknoe?
3. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Why does Flecknoe choose Shadwell as his successor?
4. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Describe the coronation of Shadwell.
5. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) What is a mock-heroic poem?

Syllabus topics (RTMNU)

• Essays by Addison and Steele: 1. Of the Club
• 2. Sir Roger at Home
• 3. His Account of His Dissatisfaction in Love
• 4. On the Shame and Fear of Poverty

Addison and Steele – the periodical essay

Richard Steele (1672–1729) started The Tatler (1709). With his school friend Joseph Addison (1672–1719) he started The Spectator (1711–12), a daily paper of essays read in coffee-houses. Their aim was "to enliven morality with wit, and to temper wit with morality" – to improve manners and taste in a pleasant way. Addison's style is graceful and gentle in humour; Steele's is warmer, more emotional and quick.

Of the Club (The Spectator Club)

The essay (Spectator No. 2, by Steele) introduces the members of the imaginary club who meet with "Mr Spectator":

• Sir Roger de Coverley – a kind, old-fashioned country gentleman of Worcestershire, a bachelor because he was crossed in love by a "perverse beautiful widow"; loved by his servants and tenants.
• The Templar – a lawyer of the Inner Temple who prefers plays and literature to law.
• Sir Andrew Freeport – a rich merchant; represents trade and commerce.
• Captain Sentry – a brave but modest soldier.
• Will Honeycomb – an ageing gallant who talks of fashions and women.
• A Clergyman – a learned, holy man.

The club represents different classes of English society – land, law, trade, army, fashion and church.

Sir Roger at Home

Mr Spectator visits Sir Roger's country house (Addison, Spectator No. 106). Sir Roger lets him come and go as he likes. All the servants are old and devoted; they love their master, who treats them like family. His chaplain is a plain, good man chosen for his good sense and kindness; Sir Roger gave him a set of good sermons to preach rather than his own. The essay shows a happy, harmonious household and the ideal of a kind landlord.

His Account of His Dissatisfaction in Love

Sir Roger tells Mr Spectator about his old love for the widow. As a young man and sheriff of the county he met this beautiful, learned widow at the county court. She was clever and argued with him like a philosopher, and he could never speak his heart properly; her confidante made matters worse. She kept him in hope but never accepted him, and he remained a bachelor. The essay mixes gentle humour with sympathy for the good old knight.

On the Shame and Fear of Poverty

The essay discusses how people are ashamed of being poor and fear poverty so much that they spend beyond their means to look rich. The writer argues that this false shame makes people dishonest and unhappy. One should live within one's income, be content, and judge oneself by virtue and honesty rather than by show of wealth. Message: honest poverty is no disgrace; vanity and debt are.

Likely exam questions

1. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Describe the members of the Spectator Club.
2. (Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Draw a character sketch of Sir Roger de Coverley from the essays prescribed for you.
3. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) What was the aim of The Spectator?
4. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Write a note on Sir Roger's love for the widow.
5. (Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) What does the essay say about the shame and fear of poverty?