In the following essay excerpt, Love explores the relationship between Valentine and Angelica, and how the townspeople affect that romance in Congreve's Love for Love.

The climax of Love for Love is Angelica's acceptance of the reformed Valentine. It comes in two words, 'Generous Valentine', which, although they were written for the mouth of Anne Bracegirdle, not Elizabeth Barry, call for all the eloquence of an 'Ah! poor Castalio!' 'Generous' here is a Virgilian characteristic epithet expressing to us the significant truth of Valentine, his singularity and distinction as a human being. It is also, as the concluding point of his education, our chief clue to what the substance of that education has been. The meaning of the word in the seventeenth century was more complex than its normal sense in modern English would suggest, but seeing Angelica's words were prompted by the speech of Valentine...