WILLIAM CONGREVE

'William Congreve' (January 24, 1670 – January 19, 1729) was an English playwright and poet.

Contents

Early life

Playwright career

Later life

Famous lines

"Music has charms to soothe a savage breast"

"Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned"

Bibliography

See also

References

External links

Early life

Congreve was born in Bardsey, West Yorkshire, England (near Leeds). His parents were William Congreve (1637–1708) and his wife, Mary (''née'' Browning; 1636?–1715); a sister was buried in London in 1672. He spent his childhood in Ireland, where his father, a Cavalier, had settled during the reign of Charles II. Congreve was educated at Trinity College in Dublin; there he met Jonathan Swift, who would be his friend for the remainder of his life. Upon graduation, he matriculated in the Middle Temple in London to study law, but felt himself pulled toward literature, drama, and the fashionable life. Artistically, he became a disciple of John Dryden.

Playwright career

William Congreve wrote some of the most popular English plays of the Restoration period of the late 17th century. By the age of thirty, he had written four comedies, including ''Love for Love'' (premiered April 30, 1695) and ''The Way of the World'' (premiered 1700), and one tragedy, ''The Mourning Bride'' (1697)
Unfortunately, his career ended almost as soon as it began. After writing five plays from his first in 1693 until 1700, he produced no more as public tastes turned against the sort of high-brow sexual comedy of manners in which he specialized. He reportedly was particularly stung by a critique written by Jeremy Collier (''A Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage''), to the point that he wrote a long reply, "Amendments of Mr. Collier's False and Imperfect Citations." A member of the Whig Kit-Kat Club, Congreve's career shifted to the political sector, where he held various minor political positions despite his stance as a Whig among Tories.

Later life

Congreve withdrew from the theatre and lived the rest of his life on residuals from his early work. His output from 1700 was restricted to the occasional poem and some translation (notably Molière's ''Monsieur de Pourceaugnac''). Congreve never married; in his own era and through subsequent generations, he was famous for his friendships with prominent actresses and noblewomen, including Anne Bracegirdle, for whom he wrote major parts in all his plays, and Henrietta Godolphin, 2nd Duchess of Marlborough, daughter of the famous general, John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, whom he had probably met by 1703 and with whom he had a daughter, Mary (1723–1764).
As early as 1710, he suffered both from gout and from cataracts on his eyes. Congreve suffered a carriage accident in late September 1728, from which he never recovered (having probably received an internal injury); he died in London in January 1729, and was buried in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey.

Famous lines

Two of Congreve's turns of phrase from ''The Mourning Bride'' (1697) have entered the English language.

"Music has charms to soothe a savage breast"

ACT I. SCENE I. begins with these words:
A Room of State. -
The Curtain rising slowly to soft Musick, discovers ALMERIA in Mourning, LEONORA waiting in Mourning. -
After the Musick ALMERIA rises from her Chair, and comes forward.
ALM. 'Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast,'

To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak.

I've read, that things inanimate have mov'd,

And, as with living Souls, have been inform'd,

By Magick Numbers and persuasive Sound.

What then am I? Am I more senseless grown

Than Trees, or Flint? O force of constant Woe!

'Tis not in Harmony to calm my Griefs.

Anselmo sleeps, and is at Peace; last Night

The silent Tomb receiv'd the good Old King;

He and his Sorrows now are safely lodg'd

Within its cold, but hospitable Bosom.

Why am not I at Peace?" [1]

"Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned"

Act 3, Scene 2 ends with these words:
ZARA. Thou shalt die.
OSM. I thank you.
ZARA. Thou ly'st; for now I know for whom thou'dst live.
OSM. Then you may know for whom I'd die.
ZARA. Hell! Hell!

Yet I'll be calm- Dark and unknown Betrayer!

But now the Dawn begins, and the slow Hand

Of Fate is stretch'd to draw the Veil, and leave

Thee bare, the naked Mark of Publick View.

OSM. You may be still deceiv'd; 'tis in my Pow'r.
ZARA. Ha!
Who waits there? -
Enter PEREZ. -
As you'll answer it, take heed

This Slave commit no Violence upon

Himself. I've been deceiv'd. The Publick Safety

Requires he should be more confin'd; and none,

No not the Princes self, permitted to

Confer with him. I'll quit you to the King.

Vile and ingrate! too late thou shalt repent

The base Injustice thou hast done my Love:

Yes, thou shalt know, spite of thy past Distress,

And all those Ills which thou so long hast mourn'd;

'Heav'n has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn'd,'

'Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn'd.' [2]

Bibliography

★ ''The Old Bachelor'' (1693)

★ ''The Double Dealer'' (1693)

★ ''Love for Love'' (1695)

★ ''The Mourning Bride'' (1697)

★ ''The Way of the World'' (1700)

See also

★ Restoration comedy

References

★ Macaulay, Thomas Babington. ''The Comic Dramatists of the Restoration.'' London, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1853.

External links

★

★ Biography

★ Find-A-Grave profile for William Congreve

★ The Mourning Bride - Full Text