The Fair Penitent
The Fair Penitent is
In making his adaptation, Rowe eliminated characters and simplified the action "to create a more focused play than the original." He pursued "neoclassical simplicity" but in the process sacrificed the "underlying moral principles" of the original.[2] Rowe shifted the setting from Dijon to Genoa, and changed the main characters' names.
Characters
Fatal Dowry | Fair Penitent |
---|---|
Rochfort | Sciolto |
Charalois | Altamont |
Romont | Horatio |
Novall Junior | Lothario |
Pontalier | Rossano |
Beaumelle | Calista |
Bellapert | Lucilla |
Rowe also accentuated the role of the female protagonist, making the play much more a vehicle for a female star performer, a "better acting piece" for a prominent actress.[3] Where the original "concentrates largely on the legal and political affairs of the cuckolded husband," Rowe focused far more directly on the domestic tragedy of Calista's infidelity.[4]
The original
The play was revived at both of the major London theatres of the era,
Legacy
The eponym "Lothario," meaning "a man who seduces women," stems from the character in this play. However, a character named Lothario as a seducer predates the play. It first appeared in 1605 in Miguel de Cervantes novel Don Quixote. In this story Lothario is urged by his lifelong friend Anselmo to attempt to seduce his wife in order to test her faithfulness. At first most unwilling, he eventually enters into the scheme with skill and success.
Malcolm Goldstein edited The Fair Penitent for a modern edition in 1969. Critics, both traditional and modern, have debated whether Calista is actually "penitent" for her infidelity.[7]
Notes
Sources
- Brawley, Benjamin Griffith. A Short History of English Drama. New York, Harcourt, Brace, 1921.
- Freeman, Lisa A. Character's Theater: Genre and Identity on the Eighteenth-Century English Stage. Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001.
- Goldstein, Malcolm, ed. The Fair Penitent. Regents Restoration Drama series; Lincoln, NE, University of Nebraska Press, 1969.
- Howe, Elizabeth. The First English Actresses: Women and Drama 1660–1700. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992.
- Logan, Terence P., and Denzell S. Smith, eds. The Later Jacobean and Caroline Dramatists: A Survey and Bibliography of Recent Studies in English Renaissance Drama. Lincoln, NE, University of Nebraska Press, 1978.
- Marsden, Jean I. Fatal Desire: Women, Sexuality, and the English Stage, 1660–1720. Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2006.