SOURCE: Gagen, Jean. “The Design of the High Plot in Etherege's The Comical Revenge.” Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Theatre Research 1, no. 22 (winter 1986): 1-15.

In the essay below, Gagen discusses The Comical Revenge, focusing on how Etherege's satirical treatment of the high plot differs from the more conventional approach of other early Restoration playwrights.

The tremendous success which Etherege's The Comical Revenge, or, Love in a Tub¹ received when it was first performed (c. March, 1664) is a matter of theatrical history. Later critics, however, have often accused Etherege of incongruously mixing two dramatic modes—a high plot written in heroic couplets and dealing seriously and sedately with love and honor conflicts among aristocrats and several low or comic plots written in prose and concerned with characters who never seriously consider honor.² The heroic rimed drama of the high plot “modeled on Davenant and Lord Orrery” has been said to conflict...