Sir Arthur W. Pinero's play The Second Mrs. Tanqueray
Sir Arthur W. Pinero's play The Second Mrs. Tanqueray was written in 1893 and was constructed around the conventions of the well-made play. The well-made play originated in France as the pièce bien faite, and is characterized by a detailed, practical intended organization of plotting. The logical precise construction of the well-made play is characterized by a number of conventions: the audience is quickly introduced to the characters and their relevant histories, there is a complication usually a withheld secret, known to the audience but unknown to the characters, which, when revealed at the climax, is an unreal coincidence and it reverses the fortunes of the play's hero. The hero's fortune fluctuates during this conflict with the antagonist until finally, at the climax, the plot unravels, quickly, the secret is revealed in the final dénouement, or resolution. The Second Mrs. Tanqueray is an effective well-made play because of its structure and the way it impacts the audience in the end. As the elements of the well-made play entail, we are introduced to all of the characters and have an understanding of their history and the troubles that their history can cause. More precisely this is a story of a very non-conventional woman of this audience's time and by going through the play I will identify its key representations of the well-made play.
Aubery Tanqueray, a self-made man, is a Widower at the age of Forty two with a beautiful teenage daughter, Ellean whom he seems very protective over. His deceased wife, the first Mrs. Tanqueray was "an iceberg," stiff, and assertive, alive as well as dead (13). She had ironically died of a fever "the only warmth, I believe, that ever came to that woman's body" (14). Now alone because his daughter is away at a nunnery he's found someone that can add a little life to his elite, high class existence; a little someone, we learn, that has a past that doesn't quite fit in with the rest of his friends.
The problems begin in Act One, the exposition, on the night before Aubery's wedding to an unknown individual. Aubery has drinks and dinner with his three closest friends, Cayley Drummel a bachelor, Doctor Gordon Jayne, and Frank Misquith, Q.C., M.P. His conversation seems to be that of a farewell, "We'll end a pleasant chapter here tonight, and after tonight start afresh.
“Winter lies too long in country towns; hangs on until it is stale and shabby, old and sullen” (“Brainy Quotes” 1). In Edith Wharton’s framed novel, Ethan Frome, the main protagonist encounters “lost opportunity, failed romance, and disappointed dreams” with a regretful ending (Lilburn 1). Ethan Frome lives in the isolated fictional town of Starkfield, Massachusetts with his irritable spouse, Zenobia Frome. Ever since marriage, Zenobia, also referred to as Zeena, revolves around her illness. Furthermore, she is prone to silence, rage, and querulously shouting.
Her lionhearted clothes reflected her valiant and strong attitude. However – Elisa Allen hid her true feelings. She was deceitful in interpersonal communication. Her tongue spilled bittersweet black smut like that of industrialized coal engines. However – it was compassionate, her concern and subtle behavior. A girl screaming to escape maiden life, but only knew it was disrupt order. “Her face was eager and mature and handsome; even her work with the scissors was over-eager, over-powerful. “The chrysanthemum stems seemed too small and easy for her energy.” Verily, she had the heart of a lion and the appearance of a virgin.
In this essay we will be comparing two female characters from different texts and different time periods. We will be looking in depth at Lady Macbeth from Shakespeare's play 'Macbeth', and Sheila from J.B. Priestley's 'An Inspector Calls'. We will be looking at their roles in their respective plays, and how their characters develop over time.
The heroine, Mrs. P, has some carries some characteristics parallel to Louise Mallard in “Hour.” The women of her time are limited by cultural convention. Yet, Mrs. P, (like Louise) begins to experience a new freedom of imagination, a zest for life , in the immediate absence of her husband. She realizes, through interior monologues, that she has been held back, that her station in life cannot and will not afford her the kind of freedom to explore freely and openly the emotions that are as much a part of her as they are not a part of Leonce. Here is a primary irony.
Shakespeare’s Much Ado about Nothing is, on the surface, a typical romantic comedy with a love-plot that ends in reconciliation and marriage. This surface level conformity to the conventions of the genre, however, conceals a deeper difference that sets Much Ado apart. Unlike Shakespeare’s other romantic comedies, Much Ado about Nothing does not mask class divisions by incorporating them into an idealized community. Instead of concealing or obscuring the problem of social status, the play brings it up explicitly through a minor but important character, Margaret, Hero’s “waiting gentlewoman.” Shakespeare suggests that Margaret is an embodiment of the realistic nature of social class. Despite her ambition, she is unable to move up in hierarchy due to her identity as a maid. Her status, foiling Hero’s rich, protected upbringing, reveals that characters in the play, as well as global citizens, are ultimately oppressed by social relations and social norms despite any ambition to get out.
The novel shadows the life of Janie Crawford pursuing the steps of becoming the women that her grandmother encouraged her to become. By the means of doing so, she undergoes a journey of discovering her authentic self and real love. Despise the roller-coaster obstacles, Janie Crawford’s strong-will refuses to get comfortable with remorse, hostility, fright, and insanity.
Then, she moves into the history of dating starting in about the 1900s with the calling era. During the calling era, the woman was in charge. The girl and her mother would talk about a boy and if the mother saw him as fit, she would call him to come over and he would meet the family. If he was approved by the woman’s family, then the end result was marriage. This would only happen in wealthier households at this time because t...
Dorothea Brooke is a very bright and beautiful young lady that does not much care for frills or getting ahead in society. She wants more than anything to help those around her, starting with the tenants of her uncle. She desires to redesign their cottages, but Arthur Brooke, her elderly uncle with whom she and her younger sister Celia Brooke lives with, does not want to spend the money required. So Dorothea shares her dream with Sir James Chettam, who finds her fascinating, and encourages her to use the plans she has drawn up for the tenants on his land instead. He falls in love with her, but does not share his feelings for her quickly enough. Edward Casaubon, an older scholarly clergyman asks Dorothea to marry him, she does not accept until she finds out Sir James means to seriously court her, then turns around and tells Casaubon yes. What she does not te...
Edna’s relationship with Adèle begins Edna’s process of “awakening” and self-discovery, which constitutes the focus of the book. The process accelerates as Edna comes to know Robert Lebrun, the elder, single son of Madame Lebrun. Robert is known among the Grand Isle vacationers as a man who chooses one woman each year—often a married woman—to whom he then plays “attendant” all summer long. This summer, he devotes himself to Edna, and the two spend their days together lounging and talking by the shore. Adèle Ratignolle often accompanies them.
Despite the Grandmother’s earlier preaching about the horrid character of the Misfit, when put in a back-to-the-wall situation she says, “I know you’re a good man”. The Grandmother’s strong concept of morality goes out the window when she is in a precarious situation. This is not unjustified, as she simply wants to make it out of the situation alive, yet it calls into question her character and the strength of her convictions. It also makes the readers themselves question their own morality; what would they do in a similar situation? The reader can feel sympathy for the Grandmother in this dangerous situation, yet it is her actions as the conversation progresses that cause the reader to pause and truly question the character of the Grandmother. The Misfit’s assistants systematically kill her family, as they are taken into the woods and shot. Throughout this time, the Grandmother seems to only be focused on self-preservation, with her only recognition of something awry being two isolated yells of “Bailey Boy!” O’Connor is showing the character of not just the Grandmother, but what she perceives to be the common trend in 1950’s culture. The idea of family unity and selflessness, even by those who propagate the idea, is forgotten when the individual is
Emily was kept confined from all that surrounded her. Her father had given the town folks a large amount of money which caused Emily and her father to feel superior to others. “Grierson’s held themselves a little too high for what they really were” (Faulkner). Emily’s attitude had developed as a stuck-up and stubborn girl and her father was to blame for this attitude. Emily was a normal girl with aspirations of growing up and finding a mate that she could soon marry and start a family, but this was all impossible because of her father. The father believed that, “none of the younger man were quite good enough for Miss Emily,” because of this Miss Emily was alone. Emily was in her father’s shadow for a very long time. She lived her li...
...ngagement, their re-engagement. Cecily is not the natural country girl. She possesses the self-assurance of the experienced woman. Without being cynical she makes her desires clear. And when Gwendolen and Cecily discover that their Earnests are impostors whose names are Jack and Algernon they decide that love can be restored only if Jack and Algy christen themselves Earnest.
Marie, who is a product of an abusive family, is influenced by her past, as she perceives the relationship between Callie and her son, Bo. Saunders writes, describing Marie’s childhood experiences, “At least she’d [Marie] never locked on of them [her children] in a closet while entertaining a literal gravedigger in the parlor” (174). Marie’s mother did not embody the traditional traits of a maternal fig...
In actuality, she was defiant, and ate macaroons secretly when her husband had forbidden her to do so. She was quite wise and resourceful. While her husband was gravely ill she forged her father’s signature and borrowed money without her father or husband’s permission to do so and then boastfully related the story of doing so to her friend, Mrs. Linde. She was proud of the sacrifices she made for her husband, but her perceptions of what her husband truly thought of her would become clear. She had realized that the childlike and submissive role she was playing for her husband was no longer a role she wanted to play. She defied the normal roles of the nineteenth century and chose to find her true self, leaving her husband and children
Along with remarriage and the responsibility of a daughter, Henchard also adopts a work associate. Donald Farfrae, a young Scottish man, is appointed manager of Henchard’s dwindling corn business. In this point of the novel, the character development of Michael Henchard is proved through every outwardly observable aspect. Henchard holds postion of mayor, rekindles his marriage, and gains a friend. Alas this prosperity for Michael Henchard is not permanent. Although the managing skills of Donald Farfrae allow for a revival of Henchard’s corn business, Farfrae’s interest in becoming mayor drive the two apart. Henchard displays immense insecurity as he reverts to old habits and dismisses his colleague, Farfrae, despite the tremendous help he has provided Henchard with both his business as well as his well-being. This tendency is not odd though, Henchard also disowns his daughter, Elizabeth-Jane, for a similar reason. When Henchard is given the upsetting news of his daughter’s biological origins, he can no longer tolerate her presence in his household. Feeling as if he holds no importance in Elizabeth-Jane’s life, he lets insecurity and self-pity take control. Although Elizabeth-Jane was all Henchard had left after his wife’s death, the thought of caring for another man’s daughter was too much for Henchard to bear. Elizabeth-Jane eventually slipped out of Henchard’s life just as she had before that night at the furmity