THE COUNTRY WIFE by William Wycherley, Tiffany Stern (Editor), James Ogden (Editor) ( 9781408179895 )

Item Details

Title:

THE COUNTRY WIFE

By:

William Wycherley, Tiffany Stern (Editor), James Ogden (Editor)

Format:

Paperback

List price:

£9.99

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£8.74

Discount:

12.5% off

You save:

£1.25

ISBN 10:

140817989X

ISBN 13:

9781408179895

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Stock:

Currently 5 available

Publisher:

BLOOMSBURY PUBLISHING PLC

Pub. date:

13 February, 2014

Edition:

2nd Revised edition

Series:

New Mermaids 40

Pages:

184

Description:

The Country Wife is a satirical comedy, which exposes the immorality of Restoration society in a way that has been both condemned and admired since it was written.

Synopsis:

'He's a fool that marries, but he's a greater fool that does not marry a fool.' This bawdy, hilarious, subversive and wickedly satirical drama pokes fun at the humourless, the jealous, and the adulterous alike. It features a country wife, Margery, whose husband believes she is too naive to cuckold him; and an anti-hero, Horner, who pretends to be impotent in order to have unrestrained access to the women keen on 'the sport'. A number of licentious and hypocritical women request Horner's services - the country wife among them. The Country Wife has provoked powerfully mixed reactions over the years. The seventeenth century libertine king Charles II saw it twice, and is said to have joined the 'dance of the cuckolds' at the end of one performance; the eighteenth century actor-playwright David Garrick declared it 'the most licentious play in the English language'; the Victorian Macaulay compared it to a skunk, because it was 'too filthy to handle and too noisome even to approach'. Twentieth century productions heralded it a Restoration masterpiece.Sexually frank, and as ready to criticise marriage as infidelity, the virtuosity, linguistic energy, brilliant wit, naughtiness and complexity of this ribald play have made it a staple of the modern stage. This student edition contains a lengthy, entirely new introduction, by leading scholar, Tiffany Stern, with a background on the author, structure, characters, genre, themes, original staging and performance history, as well as an updated bibliography and a fully annotated version of the playtext.

Publication:

Imprint:

Methuen Drama

Returns:

Returnable

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