Biography Essay

William Congreve is, by common consent, the greatest writer of comedies in the late seventeenth century. The Way of the World (1700), above all, has come to represent the standard against which all other comedies of the period have to be measured, the crowning glory of Restoration comedy and of "the comedy of manners," whatever that title may be supposed to represent. His dialogue, usually praised in ecstatic terms for its dazzling or even coruscating wit, and the comedy of his fools who pretend to wit, have been the prime qualities that have secured his preeminence. Yet every revival, especially of The Way of the World, is greeted by theater reviewers with an automatic response of incomprehension at the daunting complexities of Congreve's plots, the price the audience supposedly has to pay to be allowed to listen to the subtlety and sophistication of his lovers' speeches. Recent...