George Etherege

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George Etherege (* around 1635 in Maidenhead , Berkshire , † around 1691 in Paris ) was an English playwright during the Restoration period .

Life

Little is known about the life, especially the early years, of George Etherege. He was the eldest son of Captain George Etherege and Mary Powney, who had seven children. Etherege is said to have spent a few years in France, later he attended Lord Williams's School in Thame, Oxfordshire; it may be that he was educated at Cambridge, but John Dennis claimed to know that Etherege did not speak either Greek or Latin, so it is doubtful whether Etherege studied there.

He was a paralegal at Beaconsfield and later devoted himself to law at Clement's Inn, London, one of the Inns of Chancery . Presumably, he traveled to France at a young age with his father, who had followed Queen Henrietta Maria into exile during the civil war. Etherege is believed to have seen Molière's early comedies in Paris ; an allusion in one of his pieces reveals that he knew Roger de Rabutin, the Comte de Bussy, personally.

The comedies

Etherege's first play, The Comical Revenge, or Love in a Tub (1664), was a stage hit and secured him a place in society. Around this time he made the acquaintance of Charles Sackville (Lord Buckhurst, later Earl of Dorset) and belonged to the circle of Court Wits , with which John Wilmot (Earl of Rochester), Charles Sedley , George Villiers (Duke of Buckingham), John Sheffield (Earl of Mulgrave) et al. a. set the tone.

Contemporaries called Etherege “gentle George” and “easy Etheredge”. She would if she could , a classic restoration comedy full of wit and esprit, took the stage in 1668 . With this piece at the latest, Etherege had made a name for itself. Between 1668 and 1671, Etherege was secretary to the ambassador Sir Daniel Hervey in Constantinople, a post associated with stage success.

It was quiet around him for eight years until he came up with his next play: The Man of Mode or, Sir Fopling Flutter , a comedy that is one of the best plays of the era and paved the way for authors like William Congreve . The play was a huge success, perhaps due to the fact that certain well-known courtiers were satirically targeted. Sir Fopling Flutter was a portrait of Beau Hewit, Dorimant is a reference to John Wilmot, Medley is either Etherege himself or Sir Charles Sedley.

The time after the theater

Etherege was known to be friends with John Wilmot, the Earl of Rochester, and was involved in an argument with Rochester in the course of which someone was seriously injured; both men had a child with actress Elizabeth Barry . The three are among the characters in the film The Libertine (2005), based on a play by Stephen Jeffreys .

Etherege turned his back on literature and lost much of his fortune gambling. Approx. In 1679 he was raised to the nobility and married a wealthy widow, Mary Sheppard Arnold. From 1685 he was ambassador to the Perpetual Reichstag in Regensburg . After three and a half years of service there and after the Glorious Revolution , he went to Paris and joined the exiled James II . His letters from the time in Regensburg, which express how bored and lonely Etherege was, are kept in the British Museum; they were edited in 1927 by Sybil Rosenfeld (1928), later by Frederick Bracher. Etherege died in Paris, probably in 1691, because Narcissus Luttrell notes in February 1692 that Sir George Etherege, former ambassador of King James in Vienna , died in Paris.

expenditure

  • The Man of Mode . Ed. John Barnard. London and New York, 1979 [1993].
  • The Plays of Sir George Etherege. Ed. Michael Cordner. Cambridge, London, New York 1982.
  • The Poems of Sir George Etherege. Ed. J. Thorpe. Princeton 1963.
  • The Letters of Sir George Etherege. Ed. Frederick Bracher. London, 1974.

literature

Web links

Wikiquote: George Etherege  - Quotes

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ HFB Brett-Smith: The Dramatic Works of Sir George Etherege. Introduction. Basil Blackwell, Oxford 1927, pp. Xi-lxxxiiii.
  2. ^ William Oldys: Biographia Britannica. Vol. III. 1750, p. 1841.
  3. ↑ John Dennis: A Defense Of Sir Fopling Flutter, A Comedy . Pamphlet, London, November 2, 1722.
  4. ↑ cf. EM Thompson (Ed.): Correspondence of the Family of Hatton . vol 1. Camden Society, 1878, pp. 133-134
  5. ↑ Cambridge Guide to Literature in English .
  6. ^ Karl Bauer: Regensburg Art, Culture and Everyday History . MZ-Buchverlag in H. Gietl Verlag & Publication Service, Regenstauf 2014, ISBN 978-3-86646-300-4 , p. 409-411 .
personal data
SURNAME Etherege, George
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English playwright of the Restoration period
DATE OF BIRTH around 1635
PLACE OF BIRTH Maidenhead , Berkshire
DATE OF DEATH around 1691
Place of death Paris