Three Restoration Comedies: The Man of Mode, The Country Wife, Love for love:

Wycherley, William,Congreve, William,Etherege, George

ISBN 10: 014043027X / ISBN 13: 9780140430271

Published by Penguin Classics, 2004

About this Item

Most items will be dispatched the same or the next working day. A copy that has been read but remains in clean condition. All of the pages are intact and the cover is intact and the spine may show signs of wear. The book may have minor markings which are not specifically mentioned. A tan to the pages.

Seller Inventory # rev1292525793

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Three Restoration Comedies: The Man of Mode, The Country Wife, Love for love:
• Publisher: Penguin Classics
• Publication Date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 014043027X
• ISBN 13: 9780140430271
• Binding: Soft cover
• Condition: Good
• Weight: 280 grams

About this title

Synopsis

After the restoration of King Charles II to the British throne in 1660, dramatists experienced new freedom in an age that broke from the strict morality of puritan rule and in which elegance and wit became the chief virtues. Irreverent, licentious and cynical, the three plays collected here hold up a mirror to this dazzling era and satirize the gulf between appearances and reality. In Etherege''s The Man of Mode (1676), the womanizing Dorimant meets his match when he falls in love with the unpretentious Harriet, while Wycherley''s The Country Wife (c. 1675) depicts the rakish Horner who fakes impotence to fool trusting husbands into giving him easy access to their wives. And in Congreve''s Love for Love (1695), the extravagant Valentine can only win his beloved Angelica if he loses his inheritance.

About the Author

George Etherege (1636-1689) invented the comedy of intrigue, and led the way for the masterpieces of Congreve and Sheridan. William Wycherley (1640?-1716) is famous for his brilliant wit and savagely clever satire which give him a prominent place in the history of English Restoration drama. William Congreve (1670-1729) was apprenticed under the tutelage of John Dryden. Congreve's wit and his characters' sexual freedom and experimentation were at odds with the thinking of certain moralists of the day. However, he has since been considered one of the most intellectually accomplished of English playwrights. Gamini Salgado was born in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), and came to England in 1947 to attend the University of Nottingham. He became an expert on Elizabethan and Jacobean literature, and was appointed to the Chair of English at Exeter University in 1977. He died in 1985.