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Summary of Richard Sheridan’s The Rivals:
C(caps)aptain Absolute, the son of Sir Anthony Absolute, falls in love with Lydia Languish, the niece of Mrs. Malaprop. But Lydia prefers Lieutenant to the heir of a baronet of three thousand a year. He assumes at birth the character of Ensign Beverley. Lydia would lose part of her fortune if she marries without her Aunt's approval and Mrs. Malaprop will not say a word to a beggarly ensign. Sir Anthony arrives at Bath, unaware of his son's intention to propose a match with Lydia Languish, a proposal favourably disposed to by Mrs. Malaprop.
Humour sets in as Captain Absolute hides his deception of Lydia while Bob Acres remain his rival. The latter has heard of Ensign Beverley and of how Sir Lucius Trigger has been encouraged to go into a relationship with Lydia. Lucius Trigger asks Captain Absolute to challenge Beverley. Sir Lucius has been deceived to believe that the letters received from Mrs. Malaprop are from Lydia; he meets and challenges Captain Absolute. When Acres finds that Beverley is his friend, Absolute bows out of the fight. Sir Lucius is disabused by the arrival of Mrs. Malaprop and Lydia; the latter quarrels and forgives her lover who makes it possible for her to elope.
3.5 Themes:
There are some interesting themes in Richard Sheridan’s The Rivals. Some of them are:
3.5.1 Gender Discrimination:
The playwright recreates this problem that was prevalent in the English society of the period. The society believed that there is always a stop line for the female gender in the English society, that she cannot do as much as her male counterpart. The prevailing social vices among children can hinder the educational goals and desires of parents for them. Young women do not have the freedom and power to make a choice of spouse for themselves; it is the exclusive right of their parents.
3.5.2 Class Conflict and Materialism:
The English/rich class ensures that her wards and children are within the desired social class of the society. Girls/women of a particular social class are forbidden to cross the ‘red dotted line’ that demarcates or separates the classes. The rule must be adhered to by any eligible spinster of the English society; even when her parents dies, she will exercise the right to her parent’s will based only on her strict adherence to the code of conduct required by her parents. This is exemplified in the case of Lydia; Mrs. Malaprop, her administrator, reminds her of such needful compliance. Also, Julia Melville obeys her father who wishes she must get married to Mr. Faulkland before he dies.
Even Sir Anthony wondered why Lydia should have a contrary view of what is a societal norm in England. He criticises Lydia’s defiance on the ground of her education that teaches girls to probe common societal norms. Mrs. Malaprop also argues that on no account will she ever encourage any of her daughters to be educated because education, which to her is “diabolical knowledge”, gives girls excessive freedom. The play reveals a great deal about discrimination that girls suffer in the English society for reasons of materialism and social advantage.
3.5.3 Female Restriction:
Sheridan presents Lydia as a character who is unyielding and incorrigible, not willing to agree to societal practice. She rejects Beverley whom she later discovers to be Captain Absolute, and Mrs. Malaprop exhibits the adamancy of the age to certain norms as she consistently cautions and harasses Lydia, insulting her and trying to force her to accept arranged love proposals. At a time she chastises and queries Lydia:
"She’s as headstrong as an allegory on the bank of Nile. Thou unblushing rebel - didn’t you tell this gentleman to his face that you loved another better? Lydia, Lydia, you ought to know that lying didn’t become a young woman! Didn’t you boast that Beverley- that stroller Beverley- possessed your heart?" (p. 19)
The society restricts women, particularly spinsters, who must accept unquestionably the love proposals presented to them. Girls are also denied education so as to limit their social-economic visions and participation in the English society. Apart from getting them perpetually devalued, the restrictions do not bother about implications such practice can have on women and the English society generally.
3.5.4 Inheritance as Bait for Marriage:
Lydia has a thirty thousand pound inheritance; she is betrothed to Fankland by her father while Captain Absolute plays around, using deception to win over Lydia but he fails as Lydia prefers to lose her inheritance and marry a man of her choice, putting every suitor on his toes, including Captain John Absolute, the first son and heir apparent to Sir Anthony.
3.6 Style:
The playwright uses various dramatic techniques in the exploration of the English society of his time.
3.6.1 Comedy of Manners:
The play is an example of comedy of manners because it satirises the follies, vanity and social foibles of the English society of the Victorian age. The play is humorous as it ridicules the conventions and practices of the Victorian society in which the members of the society pay little attention to virtue in marriage; rather they employ deceit and reduce marriage to a worthless article of trade that can be bought at will. To them, emotion has little or no place in love and marriage; the question of personal choice becomes unnecessary. For instance, Sir Anthony Absolute is kept in the knowledge of Captain Absolute’s proceedings as he proposes a match between his son and Miss Lydia Languish, Mrs. Malaprop’s niece, with a huge inheritance of thirty thousand pounds. Mrs. Malaprop hears Ensign Beverley is in love with Lydia, and has intercepted their correspondence but had not seen him. But Mrs. Malaprop is also eager to get Lydia. The involvement of most of the characters in the issue of love, playing with the hearts of spinsters reduces love and marriage to a ‘humorous tragedy’, as they provoke laughter in the play.
3.6.2 Suspense:
Sir Lucius O. Trigger challenges Captain Absolute. Sir Lucius draws a sword while pretending to be on behalf of Mr. Bob Acres. It is surprising that he later directs his challenge to Captain Absolute. But, the truth is obvious to the audience who knows that Captain Absolute has no business to do with Delia or Celia, as Lydia, Lucy and Mrs. Malaprop have indicated. Lucy reveals Sir Lucius’s dilemma.
3.6.3 Paired Characters as Comedy:
Characters are paired, not by any arrangement or logic, but by the desires of other characters in the play, by age, social and class rankings. For instance, Lydia is paired with Absolute and Julia with Faulkland, to deliberately create contrast and charge the atmosphere of the play to cause conflicts among the different lovers. For instance, where Captain Absolute is cool, calm, self-confident, and unassuming, Faulkland is apprehensive and restless. Mrs. Malaprop describes Captain Absolute to Miss Lydia and Miss Lydia to Captain Absolute by Sir Anthony as ravishing and to provoke immediate and anticipated results on the character to whom a subject is described.
3.6.4 Allusions:
There is the use of Biblical and classical allusions and apostrophe. In the play, Faulkland anxiously addresses love as if it is ever physically present.
“O love-tormentor friend whose influence likes the moon acting on men of dull soul makes idiots of them but meeting subtler spirits, betray their course”, “Love Thomas who had been a masquerader ever since the days of Jupiter”. Reference is made to one of the planets, Jupiter, a classical Greek god who sometimes assumes the shape of a bull in hot pursuit of a woman. This classical reference reveals the rivalry among the lovers in the play.
Sir Anthony describes Miss Lydia: “her eyes shall be the Promethean torch to you” if Lydia marries Captain Absolute. Prometheus is a being which, according to Greek legend, has two horns. This means Lydia’s glazy eye balls that outsmart that of the gods will give life to Captain Absolute. Sheridan’s introduction of the name Mrs. Malaprop, aligns the play with the literary techniques of malapropism as a character. Julia foreshadows Mrs. Malapropism with the careful manner in which she selects and uses words with precision, accuracy and comparison, particularly metaphors. She describes Miss Lydia’s attitude and refusal to yield to any match as “headstrong as an allegory on the banks of the Nile, progeny learning”.
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