Comedy of intrigue and Comic Devices - She Stoops To Conquer

She Stoops To Conquer

 Play by Oliver Goldsmith

She Stoops to Conquer is more a comedy of intrigue than a character. Do you agree ?

-OR-

Examine Goldsmith use of comic devices in She Stoops to Conquer

-OR-

"The incidents in She Stoops to Conquer are so designed as not to seem improbable." Do you agree ?

Goldsmith used for his plot of "She Stoops to Conquer" a reputed experience of his own as a school boy when having lost his way he asked for an inn and was directed by a practical joker to the local squirer's house. So, the main events of the play tends to be a farce arising from rodiculous situation and incidents. No doubt some of them seem to be improbable and obscured at first sight. The dramatist has taken great pain to make them credible and convincing by employing a number of 'comic devices' in the form of 'intrigues.' So R.F. Patterson goes on to say it "a splendid comedy of intrigue."

A comedy of introgue depends on an intricate plot full of surprises. The form originated in Spain and was largely the work of four famous dramatists — Vega, Molina, Alareon amd Moreto. A comedy of introgue is largely situational and situations have element of force and comic device ensuring hilarity. The knowledge of the audience about a situation and ignorance of the players on the stage results in dramatic improbability, often the characters talk and act at cross-purpose with each other to the great delight of the audience and readers.

There are number of intrigues in She Stoops To Conquer. They are comic devices by which the dramatists make the farcial situations probable and convincing. These intrigues may be enumerated as follows:
  • Tony plays trick upon Marlow and Hastings. In the end he also plays a trick upon his own mother.
  • The intrigue of Kate who Stoops to the level of a barmaid in order to conquer the heart of Marlow.
  • Neville—Tony intrigue to delude Mrs. hardcastle into thinking that they are in love.
  • Hardcastle —Mrs. Hardcastle intrigue to keep Tony under the illusion that he has not yet come to age though infact he attained majority much earlier.
Dr. Johnson thinks, "the introgues and incidents are so prepared for, as not to seem improbable." The intrigues move forward swiftly, the story is all absorbing in its interest, suspense is kept up throughout and the spectators remain unconscious about the improbabilities. It was Horace Walpole who first criticized the play, among other thins, for its many improbabilities. No doubt, some of the incidents and introgues seem to be improbable at first sight but a close reading of the play shows that the dramatist has used appropriate comic devices to make them credible.

In She Stoops to Conquer introgues and improbalities are so managed as to create fun and amusement. Introgues depend on situation and in a comedy these are situational funas well as the humour of characters. The play is remarkable for creating this situational fun through intrigues and the characters have significant role in developing the knotty situations. Here characters are deceived and the humour arises out of the different levels of awareness both of the characters and the audience.

Recommendations:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Compare and contrast Sergius and Bluntschli - Arms And The Man - The Uncovered English

Arms And The Man Play by George Bernard Shaw Compare and Contrast the characters of Sergius and Bluntschli. The central theme of the play 'Arms And The Man' is the different attitudes to war and love. While some of the characters are rallying for romantic sentimental notions, some are pragmatic and anti-romantic. In the true sense of the term Sergius and Bluntschli are studies in contrast and they constitute the central pair of the plot. They are both soldiers and lovers but their attitudes are poles apart. While Sergius is a self - comscious egoist and a dreamer of dreams, Bluntschli is a plain prident man of the world with a strong common sense. While Sergius regards himself as a hero of romance and bears a romantic attitude to love and war, Bluntschli is replete with practical intelligence and has contempt for romantic poses and idealistic views of things like war, heroism , love and marriage. Sergius is bas...
Read more

Epic Similes - Paradise Lost Book 1 - The Uncovered English

Paradise Lost Book - I John Milton The Epic Similes in Paradise Lost Book 1 are more functional than decorative. Discuss. The most striking feature of Milton's style Paradise Lost Book - 1 is the profuse employment of epic similes. Milton follows in this respect the example of Homer, Virgil, Statius, Lucan, Spenser, Tasso etc and even borrows in some cases Similes already used by these epic predecessors. Where original, His Similes are drawn out of a vast range of studies and cover a wide horizon of human experience. In Book - 1 Similes are not employed for decoration and ornamentation but to provide a subtle internal commentary on characters actions, to give a welcome relief to the reader and to enhance the poetic merit of the poem. Hanford observed "A striking feature of Milton's style is his use of the epic or expanded Simile. These digression are for him a welcome means of pouring forth the treasures o...
Read more

Imagery and Symbol in Mrs Dalloway - The Uncovered English

Mrs Dalloway Novel by Virginia Woolf Imagery and Symbol Symbols and imagery are an essential part of the novel, Mrs Dalloway, as they are connotative as well as emotive and evocative. They convey not only Woolf's meaning, but also they carry a rich aura of emotion and associations. Mrs Dalloway has a greater degree of inwardness than most other novels in English language, and hence symbol and imagery run through the very design of the novel. The use of symbol and imagery enables the novelist to render the psyche of her characters as well as deliver her indictment of a spiritual hollow civilization. Virginia Woolf evolved her own theories of symbol and imagery and explained, "What interests me most in the last stage is the freedom and boldness with which my imagination picked up used and tossed aside all images and symbol." So far as the use of symbols and images in Mrs Dalloway is concerned, it has been po...
Read more