JACOBEAN AND RESTORATION DRAMA

BEN JONSON
1573- 1637

Life

  • born in Westminster where he received his education although he did not go to University and joined the army in the Flanders
  • back tonEngland he started his career as an actor and playwright
  • 1598 he killed a fellow actor in a duel and was tried for murder bur he escaped the gallows (forca) by pleading benefit for clergy
  • during his emprisonment he converted to Roman Catholicism only to convert back to Anglicanism ten years later in 1610
  • success with the publication of his humourous comedies in the late 1590s but his reputation as a playwright mainly rests upon the comedies and masques he wrote between 1605 and 1614 which won him King James I's favour
  • 1616 appointed Poet Laureate
  • 1637 he died and was buried in Westminster Abbey with the epitaph "O rare Ben Jonson" on his grave

Works
characterised by:

  • admiration of classical models defended unities of action, place and time + a clear distinction between comedy and tragedy
  • representation of contemporary life whose excesses he ridiculed, moral purpose of drama

Comedy of Humours

satirical comedy involving eccentric characters, each representing a temperament / humour of humanity. Based on the medieval theory of the four humours black bile or melancholy, yellow bile or choleric, and phlegm. According to this theory the balance or predominance of one of this fluids over the others in the body determined the disposition of an individual. Jonson's character became types = ridiculous and farcical caricatures representing personifications of vices (avarice, vanity, duplicity, ecc..)


The theorynof the 4 humours related to the theory of four elements earth, air, fire and water, each having qualities in common with the four humours: dry, cold, moist and hot. Cold + dry= earth and melancholic type; hot+moist = air and the sanguine; hot+dry = fire and the choleric; cold+ moist= water and the phlegmatic

Masques

Form of courtly entertainment involving music, dancing, singing and acting with allegorical and mythological content. It also made use of elaborate costumes and scenery. It derives its name from the French "masque" and Italian "mascherata"


During his life Jonson wrote 30 masques, many of them for the King and in collaboration with Indigo Jones, pupil and follower of Andrea Palladio, who introduced in England the picture-stage framed in a proscenium arch, reproducing the Neoclassical style with the use of perspective. They were usually introduced by an anti-masque which staged the presence of the forces of evil in opposition to the following proper masque with the apparition of the nobility as order and harmony

tragedies

  • Sejanus 1603
  • Catiline 1611

Both dealing with Roman history

Most important comedies:


  • Every Man in His Humour 1598 comedy of intrigue, absurdities of the characters. The prologue contains an exposition of his theory of four humours
  • Every Man out of His Humour 1599 sequel to the first comedy it portrays eccentric characters whose names indicate their humour (Buffone, Fastidius, Sordido)
  • Cynthia's Revels 1600 satire on contemporary court types depicted through mythological characters, Cynthia = Queen Elizabeth
  • The Poetaster 1601 dealing with the Wars of the Theatres, a controversy that represented the quarrels and rivalries of the dramatists of the time. It satirizes Dekker and Marston, 2 contemporary playwrights, under the name of Crispinus and Demetrius while Jonson himself figures as Horace
  • Epicoene, or the Silent Woman 1609 a comedy in prose relating the story of a man unable to stand noise, who lives surrounded by silence but eventually decides to marry a young silent girl who turns to be an incessant talker
  • The Alchemist 1610 a satirical comedy dealing with a pretended alchimist whose victims are attracted by the hope of easy gold
  • Bartholomew Fair 1614 a satire on the hypocrisy of the Puritans and the licentiousness of London

VOLPONE, OR THE FOX 1605
greatest success

plot

Volpone is an avaricious Venetian man without heirs who is surrounded by equally greedy friends trying to secure his estate upon his death. With the help of his servant Mosca, he pretends to be dying and tricks his friends by inducting them to bring him expensive gifts in the expectation to become heirs. Eventually both Volpone and Mosca are exposed and punished by the Senate

Features and interpretation

It is about the sordid greed of the Venetian society which was the symbol of decadence, corruption and deceit in Renaissance England. The play makes use of fable-like symbolism in association of the characters'names with animals: a cunning Fox and a mischevious Fly trick carrion-birds such as Voltore (a vulture ), Corvino (a crow) and Corbaccio (a raven) into losing their feathers (their wealth). Moral purpose of the play is that avarice, hypocrisy and greed do not pay as they make everyone into a fool.

  • The Masque of Blackness 1605 written at the request of King James I's consort, Queen Anne of Denmark, who wished the masques to be disguised as Africans. She was one of the performers along with her court ladies who appeared in blackface makeup. The masque deals with the ladies arriving at the English Court to be "cleansed" of their blackness by King James. 1608 he also wrote the sequel The Masque of Beauty


  • The Masque of Queens 1609 in honour of James I and Queen Anne


  • Oberon, the Fairy Prince 1611 where he exalted the divine nature of the king

DOMESTIC TRAGEDY AND REVENGE TRAGEDY

JACOBEAN COMEDY AND TRAGICOMEDY

City Comedy
new theatrical genre

Thomas Dekker
Portrayed London low life as he suffered poverty

Thomas Middleton

Philip Massinger
Began his career as Fletcher's assistant andollaborated with other playwrights. In his comedies satirical picture of the new rich middle-class and the power of money

Tragicomedy

Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

collaboration between the 2 dramatists = success. In their tragicomedies passion and honour, power and love are the main themes

Fletcher probably collaborated with Shakespeare in 2 plays: The two noble kinsmen and Henry VIII

Domestic tragedy play employing ordinary middle-class or lower-class individuals, in contrast with classical tragedy where the protagonists belong to the aristocracy and their downfall is as an affair of state. Domestic tragedies are based on real events that happen to common people, mainly middle-class husbands and wives. They stage the social and human crisis of the patriarchal family

Revenge tragedy. whose tradition was established by Kyd with his Spanish Tragedy. Centred on political and religious conflicts set in Italy connected to Catholicism and Machiavellism and could therefore be associated with evil, superstition and bloody violence. It examines the morality and psychology of revenge and presents a world that is corrupt and evil. Emphasis on death, the macabre and sexual perversion.

Thomas Heywood A Woman Killed with Kindness + The English Traveller

Cyril Tourneur The Revenger's Tragedy and The Atheist's Tragedy

John Marston remembered formhis satires, comedies and revenge tragedies. WAR OF THE THEATRES literary feud between Marston, Jonson, Dekker that took place around 1599 and 1602


Antonio and Mellida, Antonio's Revenge, The Malcontent

George Chapman

John Webster The Duchess of Malfi and The White Devil based on real events that occurred in Italy

John Ford

JOHN DRYDEN
1631 - 1700

Heroic plays
Elaborate type of verse drama written in imitation of chivalric romance and heroic epic poems. Main theme: conflict between love and duty, honour and patriotism. Setting: usually exotic background. Written in rhymed iambic pentameter called heroic couplets, in a highly formal style which was widely used in poetry and drama also as a consequence of Charles II's admiration of its use in French tragedy. Popularity of heroic plays lasted only a decade.

Tragedy

Comedy of manners
Best expression of the spirit of the Restoration. It staged the social behaviour of the upper classes of the town and of the middle-classes in a witty, critical and cynical way. It was insoired by Ben Jonson comedy of humours. While Jonson ridiculed human types, Restoration playwrights satirised social models. The comedy of manners focused no longer on the moral faults of the characters but rather on their social behaviour. The plot was concerned with scandalous love affairs, marriage, cynism, sexual intrigue and licentiousness. Characterised by witty and sparkling dialogues and a brilliant prose. Produced by aristocracy for a selected audience and presented aristocratic values in a positive, though ironical way, whereas it ridiculed the behaviour of the Middle classes. Favourite themes love and battle of the sexes

  • The Indian Queen 1664 deals with the Spanish fighting for possession of Indian lands in the Americas. The protagonist Montezuma falls in love with a beautiful princess also contended by a prince that commits suicide and a wicked man who is killed by Montezuma.
  • The Indian Emperor 1665 a sequel set 20 years later and showing the moral conflicts of Montezuma again. The play deals with the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire under Hernan Cortes. Tyrannic Indian rulers contend with warring tribes and Spanish invaders
  • The Conquest of Granada Part I 1670 and Part II 1671 most successful heroic play. It deals with the battleof Granada between the Moors and the Spanish and the historical fall of Granada in 1492. It contains elements of heroic drama: rhetorical and pompous speeches, poetry, battle, murder and sudden death

All for Love or The World Well Lost 1677
Black verse tragedy adapted from Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra according to the neoclassical taste of the Restoration stage. It adheres to the unities of time, place and action

  • The Wild Gallant 1663


  • Marriage à la Mode 1671 it portrays that make the marriage the conventional and pivotal institution of a nation. Two plots dealing with the relation between passion, sex and marriage


  • The Tempest or the Enchanted Island 1670 adaptation from Shakespeare's The Tempest in collaboration with Sir William Davenant

Aphra Behn

first fully professional woman writer in English living entirely by her own earnings.
Greatly contributed to the rise of the novel during the Restoration

clear sense of female power, considered scandalous and unwomanly. Her early dramas include tragicomedies, The Forced Marriage story of Erminia who is forced by her fatherand the king to marry a young warrior that she doesn't love, although she is reunited with the man she really loves: the King's son.
Her most prolific period was between 1676 and 1682 she managed to write more carefully constructed plays which continued to challenge conventional morality. She also tried to document the political climate of her time by blending comedy, farce and politics. Her favourite themes: marriage, love and sexual freedom

WILLIAM CONGREVE
1670-1729
last greatest Restoration playwright

Life

  • born in Yorkshire and educated in Ireland his father was a Cavalier army officer for Charles II
  • attended Trinity College where he met Johnatan Swift and back to London he studied Law at the Middle Temple but soon gave up law and started writing plays
  • became a disciple of John Dryden who encouraged him to write translation from the classics and his first play The Old Bachelor who was performed at Drury Lane in 1693
  • stopped writing in 1700 for hea,th problems and because of the attacks of Jeremy Collier who had condemned the immorality and cynism of the theatre of the time
  • he died in London in 1729 and was buried in the Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey

Comedy of manners

They reached perfection. He wrote them in the new political and social context following the Glorious Revolution. Typical elements of the comedy of manners but in a different light: sharp criticism against burgeois values and the defence of the aristocratic world.
They ar emarked by a brilliant language and witty dialogues that faithfully reflect the upper-class life of his time

  • The Old Bachelor 1693 revolving g around an old bachelor who despises women. Marriage, intrigues and disguises


  • The Double Dealer 1694 a sentimental comedy


  • Love for Love 1695 with mistaken impressions, disguises, deception and humourous situations. Complicated plot + clever dialogue. Themes: good government, sexual ethics, gender roles, difference tween being and seeming

The Way of the World 1700
His masterpiece written in reply to Jeremy Collier's essay

Plot

2 characters:Mirabell, a reformed libertine whose name suggests a person that loves beautiful things, and Milla and, a young heiress whose name stands for "the woman of thousands lovers". In order to get married and receive Millamant's dowry, Mirabell must receive the blessing of Millamant's aunt who has planned to marry her to her own nephew. Various complications lead to the happy ending for the young couple.

Features and interpretation

Culmination and turning point of Restoration comedy. Features:

  • complex use of plot and sub-plot
  • sharp satire of the artificially and follies of the Restoration
  • stereotyped characters
  • a refined witty language


New sensibility reflecting the new values of the age. Millamant and Mirabell express a new idea of marriage seen as a social contract based on mutual respect, consent and independence. Millamant refuses the role traditionally attributed to wives and advances conditions of her own for the sake of her freedom, while Mirabell declares his "provisos" (condizioni), mocking the convention and habits of the ladies, such as wearing masks, strait-lacing (moralismo puritano) or playing the coquet. Although they dicuss their union in terms of a contract, they reveal their belief in true love in marriage.