The Pretentious Young Ladies by Molière
page 12 of 57 (21%)
page 12 of 57 (21%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
Carlos and his servants, disguised as Turks. They are carried to a
country house, and made to believe they are in the Grand Turk's seraglio. There is also an underplot, in which Isabella, Francisco's proud and vain daughter, is courted by Guilion, a supposed Count, but in reality a chimney-sweep, whose hand she accepts. In the end everything is discovered, and Guilion comes to claim his wife in his sooty clothes. Thomas Shadwell, a dramatist, and the poet-laureate of William III., who has been flagellated by Dryden in his _MacFlecknoe_ and in the second part of _Absalom_ and _Achitophel_, and been mentioned with contempt by Pope in his _Dunciad_, took from the _Precieuses Ridicules_ Mascarille and Jodelet, and freely imitated and united them in the character of La Roch, a sham Count, in his _Bury-Fair_, acted by His Majesty's servants in 1689. This play, dedicated to Charles, Earl of Dorset and Middlesex, was written "during eight months' painful sickness." In the Prologue Shadwell states: That every Part is Fiction in his Play; Particular Reflections there are none; Our Poet knows not one in all your Town. If any has so very little Wit, To think a Fop's Dress can his Person fit, E'en let him take it, and make much of it. Whilst, in The _Pretentious Young Ladies_, Mascarille and Jodelet impose upon two provincial girls, in _Bury-Fair_, La Roch, "a French peruke-maker" succeeds in deceiving Mrs. Fantast and Mrs. Gertrude under the name of Count de Cheveux. The Count is very amusing, and though a coward to boot, pretends to be a great warrior. His description of war |
|