A Critical Analysis Of Sheridan's 'the Rivals' As A Parody Of 18th Cen
A significant influencing factor on drama of the eighteenth century was the changing nature of the audience. By the middle of the eighteenth century, a straitlaced middle class audience had imparted to drama its vision of morality and disapproval of anything immoral. Comedy had become watered down and sentimentalized. Furthermore, the audience's rejection of unappealing facts following the ugly reality of the French Revolution and the American War of Independence, made emotionalism and tearfulness the order of the day. Oliver Goldsmith and Richard Brinsley Sheridan were two playwrights who saw that if comedy were allowed free reign along this path of sentimentalism, it would signal the end of mirth. Both appreciated the power of pure comedy and the spirit of joyous laughter and wrote plays with situations that had no call for showing the redeeming features of vice and folly at the end, but just good healthy fun.
The Rivals too denounces the hollow morality and hypocrisy......
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Approximate Word Count: 1580
Approximate Pages: 7 (250 words per double-spaced page)
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A significant influencing factor on drama of the eighteenth ...
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