laughter by his caprices and absurd sentimentality.

There is incessant
Q: The Rivals: Comedy of Manners
Sheridan is by far the greatest writer of comedy in the eighteenth
century.He appeared on the literary horizon at a time when the
sentimental comedy had gained ground.The writers of sentimental
comedy exhibited tears in place of laughter,distressing situations in place
of intrigue and pathetic heroines and serious lovers in place of
rogues,gallants and damsels.These dramatists were great moralists and
their main purpose was to instruct the theatre-goers instead of
entertaining them.That is why their characters were "man as the ought
to be,not as they are."With the result,realism was driven out of the
comedy.It was against this misnomer of comedy that Goldsmith and
Sheridan raised their voice.But Goldsmith was only "an elder,not a
better soldier than Sheridan."Sheridan criticized the sentimental
comedies in almost all his plays.Sheridan successfully avoided the
"goddess of the woeful countenance" in his plays.He rehabilitated
wit,fun laughter and mild satire in their respectable place in his
comedies.He started writing satiric,humorous and witty plays reflecting
the social manners and the spirit of the age.In this respect he took
inspiration fromthe writers of comedy of Manners.
laughter enjoyed at the cost of Mrs. Malaprop due to her inappropriate
use of words.The true spirit of comedy ,fun and frolic,humour and wit
and even boisterous laughter reign supreme in this play.
Sheridan's models were the Restoration masters;who in their comedies
were guided by a witty ,humorous and satirical portraiture of their
society .Sheridan,also, writes in the same vein-is equally satirical in
characterization ,witty and brilliant in his dialogues.
Volpone Summary
Volpone and his servant Mosca pretend that Volpone is dying
and encourage Venetian fortune hunters to vie for Volpone’s
favor in hopes of being named his heir. All visit Volpone,
prompted by Mosca to bring gifts to convince Volpone of their
kind concern for his health. Volpone is, of course, perfectly well,
but he and Mosca put on such a good act that the legacy

The Comedy of Manners had its origin in Ben Jonson's Comedy of hunters are completely fooled. The greedy victims include
Humours.Ben Jonson was the follower of the classical ideal of comedy Corbaccio, an old, deaf miser; Voltore, a conniving lawyer;
using laughter as a corrective.For this purpose he invented the Corvino, a rich merchant who jealously guards his young,
characters who had a dominant humour of their own and were mostly
attractive wife, Celia; and Lady Would-be, the wife of a ridiculous
named after it.This comedy represented not the qualities of an age but
of humanity.The Restoration dramatists revived this comedy English knight.
representing the qualities of their immediate field.It differed from the
earlier species in its lighter handling.unconcerned with morals and Complications arise when Mosca convinces Corbaccio to claim
realistic portrait of a particular age.It was called the Comedy of Manners
that he is drawing up a new will disinheriting his son, Bonario,
because it did not aim at presenting the human nature but the manners
of the particular society.It depicted the manners of the contemporary and naming Volpone his heir. After Corbaccio agrees, Mosca
aristocracy,with their elegance,fashion and vices,pomp and taunts Bonario and challenges him to go to Volpone’s house to
show,polished behaviour,all sorts of intrigues,gallantry,cultivation of wit overhear Corbaccio confirm the fact. Meanwhile, Volpone, who
and brilliant conversation.The scenes of these comedies were generally
has been scheming to seduce Corvino’s wife, has Mosca talk
laid in London.
the foolish merchant into leaving Celia alone with Volpone, who
"The Rivals" is certainly a Comedy of Manners according to its general then attempts to force himself on her. Bonario catches him in the
definition.It depicted the manners of the contemporary Eighteenth act, rescues Celia, and denounces Volpone and Mosca.
century English society,particularly the life of Bath.The life lived at Bath
was a gay life of intrigues,gossips,scandals ,flirtations and frivolity.Their
intrigues are the most profound occupations of their lives ;may he be a Fearful that the game is ended, Volpone throws himself down in
Captain Absolute or Lydia Languish or Mrs. Malaprop.Almost all the despair, but Mosca devises a new scheme to escape trouble. He
characters are entangled in love affairs and have nothing more
convinces Corbaccio that his son is out to kill him, tells the
important to do than to pay social visits,learn fashionable dances
,devour romances and fight duels.The ideal country landlords came their
suspicious Voltore that Bonario has made Celia swear that
to ape the fashions of the town.Bob Acres is an example of wit.He learns Volpone had raped her, and gets Corvino to denounce Celia as
the fashionable French dances,although he finds himself utterly unfit.The a lewd woman. Celia and Bonario, totally innocent, are brought
gay youth flogged in Bath to pursue beautiful belles and heiress to
to court, and through the testimony of the legacy hunters and
fortune.Captain Absolute is such a case.Lydia Languish presents all girls
Voltore’s cunning, are found guilty in an obvious travesty of
at Bath-who lay idling,reading romances and dreaming of romantic
elopements.For the old ladies also Bath provides such matrimonial justice.
chances and attractions.Mrs. Malaprop is awe-fully hungry for a
marriage before she bids a final good-bye to her sweet passions.
The pair of tricksters then go too far. Determined to vex the fools
Sheridan manipulates his plot with the stock devices of the Comedy of
Manners, the mistaken identity,the tyrannical parents (as both Lydia and further, they spread the news that Volpone has died. Each
Captain Absolute) the overbearing father threatening to disinherit his would-be heir then comes to Volpone’s house to claim the
son if he does not obey him. magnifico’s legacy, only to be told that Mosca is the heir. Mosca
knows that Volpone himself is now vulnerable and quickly
Since Sheridan was writing on the lines of the Comedy of Humour of Ben
Jonson and the Restoration Comedy of Manners,he named his characters makes plans to cheat him.
in that fashion.Most of his characters are named by the 'humour' they
represent --Sir Anthony Absolute -has the absolute temper,Lydia Seeking revenge on Mosca, the would-be heirs return to the
Languish -is the typical languishing beauty luxuriating in the ideal
court to claim that Bonario and Celia have been falsely charged
dreams,Sir Lucius O' Trigger --of his revolver to shoot his adversary and
Mrs. Malaprop ---glorifies herself in the inappropriate use of words. and that Mosca has practiced criminal deceptions. Mosca is
The characters are comic.Mrs. Malaprop,Bob Acres,Sir Anthony and Sir called to court, and when he refuses to confirm that Volpone is
Lucius are comic in everything they do or say.Faulkland produces
actually alive, he impels Volpone, disguised as an officer of the
court, to reveal himself rather than be tricked. At last discovering
the truth, the judges sentence both the tricksters and the fools to
appropriate but very harsh, uncomic punishments. Mosca is to
be whipped and sent to the galleys. Volpone, his wealth
confiscated and given to a hospital for incurables, is to be
imprisoned until he does in fact become sick and lame.
Jonson’s work is based on a popular beast fable of the fox that
feigned death, but its complexity can be fully explained only by
reference to the Roman institution of legacy hunting and such
diverse works as Aesop’s Fables, the Bible, and Desiderius
Erasmus’s Mori encomium (1511; The Praise of Folly, 1549).
The comedy can also be seen as a morality play within its beast-
fable guise. Volpone, like the fox pretending to be dead, traps
unwary birds of prey, who are, of course, greedy men hoping to
benefit from his death. Jonson’s theme and real concern is the
unnaturalness of sin. His strong moral intent is driven home by a
constant reference to the beast fable in the speeches of Volpone
and Mosca.
The dramatist’s artistic purpose, as the play’s prologue confirms,
is to entertain and enlighten the audience while observing the
unities of time, place, and action. Strictly speaking, however,
Jonson violates his own artistic rules. The action all takes place
in Venice within the course of a single day, but classical
symmetry is destroyed by the inclusion of a subplot involving Sir
Politic Would-be and his fellow Englishman, Peregrine.
The setting of the play, Venice, was probably chosen by Jonson
for its reputation as a city full of carnival-like attractions, much
like Jonson’s own London. Volpone’s household includes
abnormal human pets, and at one point he disguises himself as
a mountebank or quack to catch a glimpse of Celia. It is a
Venice teeming with Renaissance life, zestful and curious, a
magnet for English travelers such as Peregrine and the Would-
bes.
that the fox is nearly in a coma, or the scene in which Mosca
must yell at the deaf and feeble Corbaccio to get him to
understand anything at all.
Threaded through the play, the farcical subplot of Sir Politic and
Peregrine offers a humorous counterpoint to the fierce,
unrelenting satire on compulsive greed in the main plot. In Sir
Pol, Jonson pokes fun at harmless fanatics who find conspiracy
afoot everywhere. Among other fantastic disclosures, Sir Pol
tells Peregrine that he knows how to sell Venice to the Turks.
After Peregrine becomes convinced that Sir Politic is actually a
pimp for his wife, Lady Pol, he decides to get revenge on him. In
the disguise of a merchant, he leads Sir Pol to believe that
Peregrine is really a Venetian secret agent who now plans to
arrest him. He then helps Sir Pol hide inside a ridiculous
contraption made of a tortoise shell before revealing his true self
and mocking the silly knight.
Sir Pol’s asinine delusions and his fanciful “projects” are in the
tradition of burlesque and mimicry, appropriate to the parrot, his
beast-fable counterpart. Lady Pol, in the fortune hunt, is more
directly related to the main plot, but she, too, is a mimic, aping
the dress and manners of Venice and trying the Italian seduction
game as if it were a mere extension of Venetian fashions. The
topicality of the Sir Politic plot makes it easy to overlook its
important function in the play. It contrasts English folly with
Italian vice and adds texture and density to the whole. It also
clarifies the relationship between vice and folly, showing how
each is a species of the unnatural, which is, after all, Jonson’s
central, unifying theme.
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The atmosphere is right for the deceit and trickery practiced by

Volpone and Mosca on the callous, hypocritical legacy hunters.
Volpone is, of course, no less perverse than his victims. In fact,
his opening salutation to his gold, which he venerates as a saint,
grotesquely distorts normal human values. As long as his victims
are greedy fools, however, Volpone’s ingenuity makes him more
rogue than villain. Only when Bonario and Celia become
enmeshed in his intrigue does he grow ripe for the comic
unmasking that marks the play’s grim finale.

Volpone works through an admirable use of sustained dramatic

irony, which is a powerful theatrical device. The audience,
recognizing the deceptions practiced by Volpone and Mosca,
delights in their clever manipulation of their victims. The irony
leads to some hilarious moments, as, for example, when Mosca
prompts Corvino to vilify Volpone to his face after convincing him