SOURCE: Thompson, Peggy J. “Facing the Void in The Wives' Excuse; or, Characters Make Themselves.” Papers on Language and Literature 31, no. 1 (winter 1995): 78-98.

In the following essay, Thompson argues that The Wives' Excuse has gone unappreciated, both in its own day and by modern critics, because the play delivers something completely different than what is expected of it.

Despite expectations raised by the subtitle of The Wives' Excuse; or, Cuckolds Make Themselves, no cuckolding takes place in this 1691 play by Thomas Southerne.¹ Mrs. Friendall ultimately rejects an affair with the seductive Lovemore and remains faithful to her foolish, philandering husband, thus disappointing her would-be lover and his rakish friends, as well, apparently, as the original theater audience. In the voice of a spark who “struts, and cocks” and claims Mrs. Friendall “should not ha' got clear of me so soon” (ll. 32-33), Southerne's epilogue anticipates and parodies the...