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Conventions of Platonic Drama in the Heroic Plays of Orrery and Dryden

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Kathleen M. Lynch
Kathleen M. Lynch*
Affiliation:
Mount Holyoke College
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Extract

In a recent article on “The Sources of the Restoration Heroic Play,” Mr. William S. Clark discusses Elizabethan and French influences on heroic drama and supports the claim made by Sir Walter Scott, a century ago, that the heroic plays must be regarded as “the legitimate offspring” of the French heroic romances. Concerning the English influence, Mr. Clark observes: “In the face of this extensive dependence upon French suggestions the resemblances between the heroic plays and the English drama of earlier periods come to have much less significance.” Indeed, he regards as erroneous the opinion of scholars who have maintained that earlier English drama influenced “to a large degree” the heroic drama of the Restoration.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 44 , Issue 2 , June 1929 , pp. 456 - 471
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1929

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References

Note 1 in page 456 The Review of English Studies (January, 1928), IV, pp. 49-63.

Note 2 in page 456 Ibid., p. 62.

Note 3 in page 456 III, i.

Note 4 in page 457 The Conquest of Granada by the Spaniards, Part II (Works, ed. Scott and Saintsbury, Edinburgh, 1882-1893, IV), Defence of the Epilogue, p. 242.

Note 5 in page 457 Before the Restoration, Leonard Willan had written in heroic couplets his pastoral drama Astraea (pr. 1650), based on D'Urfé's Astrée. D'Avenant experimented with rimed couplets in The Siege of Rhodes. Both dramatists must have been influenced by Corneille's rimed tragedies.

Note 6 in page 459 A Collection of the State Letters of the Right Honourable Roger Boyle, The First Earl of Orrery (Dublin, 1743), I, p. 76.

Note 7 in page 459 In a number of Dryden's other plays, written chiefly in blank verse, such as Secret Love (1667), Don Sebastian (1689), Cleomenes (1692), and Love Triumphant (1693), there are some passages, often in heroic couplets, showing the influence of early Platonic drama. But in a comparison which must be brief these occasional Platonic passages may be disregarded.

Note 8 in page 460 It is worth noting that Boyle's younger brother Francis married Elizabeth Killigrew, sister of Thomas Killigrew. To this sister, who at the Restoration became Lady Shannon, Killigrew dedicated, in the 1664 edition of his plays, his early tragi-comedy Claricilla.

Note 9 in page 460 A Collection of the State Letters of the Right Honourable Roger Boyle, The First Earl of Orrery, I, p. 77.

Note 10 in page 460 In my recent book, The Social Mode of Restoration Comedy (New York and London, 1926), I have attempted to trace the indebtedness of the Restoration comic dramatists to D'Urfé and to early Platonic drama.

Note 11 in page 460 An Essay of Dramatic Poesy (Works, XV), p. 291.

Note 12 in page 460 V, iii.

Note 13 in page 461 Part II, II.

Note 14 in page 461 IV, i.

Note 15 in page 461 D'Avenant, The Unfortunate Lovers, III.

Note 16 in page 461 Dryden, Tyrannic Love, III, i.

Note 17 in page 462 III, i.

Note 18 in page 462 III, iv and v.

Note 19 in page 462 V, i.

Note 20 in page 462 Part I, II.

Note 21 in page 463 IV.

Note 22 in page 463 V.

Note 23 in page 463 V (revised act).

Note 24 in page 463 V, iii.

Note 25 in page 463 IV, i.

Note 26 in page 463 III.

Note 27 in page 464 II.

Note 28 in page 464 III.

Note 29 in page 464 Dryden, The Indian Emperour, II, i.

Note 30 in page 464 Dryden, The Conquest of Granada by the Spaniards, Part II, IV, iii.

Note 31 in page 464 IV.

Note 32 in page 464 Part II, III, i.

Note 33 in page 464 III.

Note 34 in page 464 III.

Note 35 in page 465 D'Avenant. The Unfortunate Lovers, V.

Note 36 in page 465 II, i.

Note 37 in page 465 III.

Note 38 in page 465 Part I, V, ii.

Note 39 in page 466 Compare with the Queen's speech in Orrery's Mustapha, IV:

I am for Mustapha's true Love in Debt,

Which I will never pay with counterfeit.

Note 40 in page 466 Compare with Orrery's Tryphon, I:

'Tis the least Miracle, which Love can do,

To change dissembled Virtue into true.

Note 41 in page 467 IV.

Note 42 in page 468 Part I, V, ii.

Note 43 in page 468 See The Royall Slave, III, v and The Rival Ladies, IV, i.

Note 44 in page 469 He usually urges his lady to encourage his friend's suit. In Carlell's The Fool Would Be a Favourit Philanthus exhibits a perfect friendship by requiring the woman who loves him to marry his friend. He feigns death and his supposed ghost enforces the marriage.

Note 45 in page 469 Alvaro in D'Avenant's Love and Honour and Gonsalvo in Dryden's The Rival Ladies pay their debts of gratitude by marrying the ladies who have so unselfishly served them.

Note 46 in page 469 Dryden's interest in evil women exceeds that of the earlier dramatists. Cartander in Carlell's Arviragus and Philicia is considerably less formidable than Zempoalia in The Indian Queen, Almería in The Indian Emperour, and Nourmahal in Aureng-Zebe.

Note 47 in page 470 This last type of service is stressed by Dryden. It is illustrated by Gonsalvo in The Rival Ladies, Placidius in Tyrannic Love, and Arimant in Aureng-Zebe.

Note 48 in page 470 V.

Note 49 in page 470 In the early Platonic plays little attention is paid to local color, although the scenes are laid in such varied localities as France, Poland, Spain, Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, Tartary, and Persia.

Note 50 in page 470 See Of Heroic Plays (Works, IV), pp. 27-28.

Note 51 in page 470 In Of Heroic Plays, p. 20, Dryden censures D'Avenant for his deficiency in “fulness” of plot.

Note 52 in page 471 Part I, II.