LITMIR.BIZ

      Published by Good Press, 2019

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      EAN 4057664098337

Table of Contents

       INTRODUCTION.

       LOVE IN A WOOD; OR ST. JAMES'S PARK.

       TO HER GRACE THE DUCHESS OF CLEVELAND.

       PROLOGUE.

       DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

       LOVE IN A WOOD; OR, ST. JAMES'S PARK.

       ACT THE FIRST.

       ACT THE SECOND.

       ACT THE THIRD.

       ACT THE FOURTH.

       ACT THE FIFTH.

       EPILOGUE

       THE GENTLEMAN DANCING-MASTER.

       PROLOGUE TO THE CITY

       DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

       THE GENTLEMAN DANCING-MASTER.

       ACT THE FIRST.

       ACT THE SECOND.

       ACT THE THIRD.

       ACT THE FOURTH.

       ACT THE FIFTH.

       EPILOGUE

       THE COUNTRY WIFE.

       PROLOGUE

       DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

       THE COUNTRY WIFE.

       ACT THE FIRST.

       ACT THE SECOND.

       ACT THE THIRD.

       ACT THE FOURTH.

       ACT THE FIFTH.

       EPILOGUE.

       THE PLAIN DEALER.

       TO MY LADY B——. [91]

       PROLOGUE.

       DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

       THE PLAIN DEALER.

       ACT THE FIRST.

       ACT THE SECOND.

       ACT THE THIRD.

       ACT THE FOURTH.

       ACT THE FIFTH.

       EPILOGUE.

       NOTES.

      As long as men are false and women vain,

       Whilst gold continues to be virtue's bane,

       In pointed satire Wycherley shall reign.

       Evelyn.

INTRODUCTION.

       Table of Contents

      William Wycherley was, before Congreve arose to surpass him, the most eminent master of that artificial school of Comedy which commenced with the restoration of Charles II., and which may be said to have perished, in a blaze as of a funeral pyre, with Sheridan. Abandoning the beaten paths of English drama, the writers of this school found, in the various intrigue of the Spanish theatre, in the verbal vivacity and piquant satire of the French, a new basis for their productions. Their works, as a class, have been designated the Comedy of Manners, a title which aptly distinguishes them from the Comedy of Human Life, set forth by Shakespeare. It is a title, nevertheless, of limited applicability. The manners portrayed in these comedies, if drawn from the life, illustrate but one side of human character, and that side the most superficial. To divert by wit and ingenuity being the writer's aim, all allusion to the deeper motives of humanity was rejected as impertinent, or admitted only as an occasional contrast to the prevailing tone. Thus the artificiality of the characters is the consequence rather of incompleteness than of untruth; they are, as it were, but half characters; the dialogue is no longer,

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