SOURCE: Hayman, John G. “Dorimant and the Comedy of A Man of Mode.” Modern Language Quarterly 30 (1969): 183-97.

In the essay below, Hayman contends that the “comic movement” of The Man of Mode rests on Dorimant's “initial skill and subsequent failure in fulfilling the requirements of polite society and turning them to some ulterior end.”

I will take for granted, that a fine Gentleman should be honest in his Actions, and refined in his Language. Instead of this, our Hero, in this Piece, is a direct Knave in his Designs, and a Clown in his Language.

(Richard Steele, The Spectator, No. 65, May 15, 1711)

Dorimont not only pass'd for a fine Gentleman with the Court of King Charles the Second, but he has pass'd for such with all the World, for Fifty Years together. And what indeed can one mean, when he speaks of a fine Gentleman, but one who is...