George Etherege
Sir George Etherege | |
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Born | c. 1636 Probably English Restoration Comedy |
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Sir George Etherege (c. 1636 – c. 10 May 1692) was an English
Biography
Early life
George Etherege was born in Maidenhead, Berkshire, in about 1636, to George Etherege and Mary Powney, as the eldest of their six children.[5] Educated at Lord Williams's School, where a school building was later named after him, he was rumoured to have attended the University of Cambridge,[6] although John Dennis states that to his certain knowledge Etherege understood neither Greek nor Latin,[4] thus raising doubts that he could have been there.[7]
Etherege served as an apprentice to a lawyer and later studied law at Clement's Inn, London, one of the
Stage success
Soon after the
The success of this play was very great, but Etherege waited four years before repeating the experiment. Meanwhile he gained a high reputation as a poetical beau and moved in the circle of
In 1668, he brought out She Would If She Could, a comedy of action, wit and spirit, although by some thought to be frivolous and immoral. Here Etherege first showed himself as a new power in literature. He presents an airy and fantastic world, where flirtation is the only serious business in life. Etherege himself was living a life no less frivolous and unprincipled.[4]
The Man of Mode
Between 1668 and 1671 Etherege went to
Life after the theatre
Etherege was part of the circle of John Wilmot; both men had a daughter by the unmarried actress Elizabeth Barry.[8] (Recently all three have appeared as characters in the 2005 film The Libertine, based on a play by Stephen Jeffreys.)
After his success, Etheredge retired from literature, and a few years later lost much of his fortune to gambling. He was knighted at some time before 1679, and married a wealthy widow, Mary Sheppard Arnold. In March 1685, he was appointed resident minister to the Imperial German Court at Ratisbon. After three-and-a-half years' residence there, and after the Glorious Revolution, he left for Paris to join James II in exile. He died in Paris, probably in 1691,[4] as Narcissus Luttrell notes this as a recent event in February 1692, identifying Sir George Etherege as the late King James's Ambassador to Vienna.[4]
Etherege's manuscript despatches are preserved in the British Museum, where they were discovered and described by Gosse in 1881.[4] Later editions were produced by Sybil Rosenfeld (1928) and Frederic Bracher (1974).
Legacy
Etherege holds a distinguished place in English literature[4] as one of the "big five" in Restoration comedy, who invented the comedy of manners and led the way to the achievements of Congreve and Sheridan.
Etherege's portraits of fops and beaux are considered to be the best of their kind. He is noted for his delicate touches of dress, furniture and scene, and a vivid replication of the fine airs of London gentlemen and ladies which may even better Congreve's. His biography was first written in detail by Edmund Gosse in Seventeenth Century Studies (1883).[4]
References
- ^ "Sir George Etherege (British dramatist) - Encyclopædia Britannica". Britannica.com. 3 November 2013. Retrieved 25 February 2014.
- ^ A widow whom Etherege is rumoured to have married for her money. (The Dramatic Works of Sir George Etherege, ed. H. F. B. Brett-Smith, 2 vols (1927)).
- ^ [1][dead link]
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k public domain: Gosse, Edmund (1911). "Etheredge, Sir George". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 9 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 807. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the
- ^ H. F. B. Brett-Smith, The Dramatic Works of Sir George Etherege. Introduction. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1927. pp. xi-lxxxiiii.
- ^ a b William Oldys, Biographia Britannica. Vol. III, 1750. p. 1841.
- ^ John Dennis, A Defence Of Sir Fopling Flutter, A Comedy. Pamphlet, London, 2 November 1722.
- ^ Cambridge Guide to Literature in English
External links
- Works by or about George Etherege at Internet Archive
- Works by George Etherege at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)