2019-2020

She Stoops to Conquer |

Themes

‫حسن محمد عبدالجبار‬

‫مرحله ثالثه \ مسائي‬

ALMUSTANSIRIYA | college of art
Country versus City
The dialogue between Mr. and Mrs. Hardcastle in the first
scene establishes the theme of country versus city. Mr.
Hardcastleregards the city as a center of folly and foppery,
while Mrs. Hardcastle finds the city an intriguing center of
style and fashion. From her statements, an audience can
infer Mrs. Hardcastle is bored. She reveals her
dissatisfaction in their social life by singling out the
"allegorical names" of Mrs. Oddfish, the curate's wife, and
Cripplegate, the dancing-master, as the Hardcastles' most
frequent visitors. In fact, this lack of entertainment is soon
confirmed by Hardcastle's drilling of the servants
before Charles Marlow's visit—a training session made
necessary because the Hardcastles entertain visitors so
infrequently.
Wedded to tradition, Hardcastle is the quintessential country
squire. For him, London is a center of "follies" and
"fopperies." He professes to be fond of everything "old,"
including his wife. Traditional and conservative, he
disapproves of his stepson Tony Lumpkin's unconventional
lifestyle, and his irritation gradually but unmistakably mounts
at his young city visitors' "impudent" behavior.
Perhaps the clearest, as well as the most humorous, display
of the "country versus city" theme occurs in Act 2, when Mrs.
Hardcastle questions George Hastings on the manners and
current fashions in London. Mrs. Hardcastle is plainly
fascinated by the great city: "There's nothing in the world I
love to talk of as much as London and the fashions, though I
was never there myself," she avows. Hastings, the suave
visitor from the capital, flatters Mrs. Hardcastle amiably,
saying he had assumed she was thoroughly acquainted with
the ways of the town. Mrs. Hardcastle demurs: "We country
persons can have no manner at all." She goes on to discuss
hair styles in some detail, casually referring to her husband
as "a piece of antiquity by my side."
Oliver Goldsmith's theme of country versus city may be
situated within a context that stretches back, theatrically and
socially, for more than century. The theme was one of the
mainsprings, for example, for William Wycherley's rollicking
Restoration comedy, The Country Wife (1675). Three years
before the debut of She Stoops to Conquer, Goldsmith himself
had published a lengthy poem of social commentary, The
Deserted Village, in which he lamented the decline of village
life and traditional country ways. This poem echoed the
somber, elegiac tone of Thomas Gray's "Elegy Written in a
Country Churchyard" (1751), which became a minor classic
before the end of the 18th century. Such idealization of
village life, however, was not uncontested.
Goldsmith's Deserted Village, for example, received a stinging
poetic response in "The Village" (1783) by George Crabbe
(1754–1832), who was at pains to remind his audience that
English country life was, all too often, degraded by poverty
and hardship.

Social Class and Snobbery

The social stratification of English life is a key theme in She
Stoops to Conquer. The play's title implies social distinctions—
Kate Hardcastle "conquers," in the courtship game, by
"stooping" when she pretends to be a humble barmaid to
secure Charles Marlow's affections.
Numerous scenes in the play highlight the theme of social
stratification. At the beginning of Act 2, for example,
Hardcastle coaches his servants in social refinements,
cautioning them not to assume they are part of the visiting
company, who are their "betters." Hastings and Marlow
display considerable snobbery when they discuss what they
think are the "innkeeper" Hardcastle's pretensions. Kate
courts Marlow by leading him to believe she is a humble
barmaid because he seems to have a preference for young
women of lower social class. Mrs. Hardcastle is virtually
obsessed by fashion and style, as she reveals in her
conversation with Hastings. Before Kate finally reveals she is
Hardcastle's daughter, Marlow dismisses the possibility of a
match since he is still under the impression that Kate is a
"poor relation," as she tells him in Act 4. Indeed, a present-
day audience might have some difficulty accepting Marlow's
"positive" qualities, for his inherent snobbishness and
attitude toward those he considers his inferiors—like
Hardcastle as "innkeeper"—may emphasize Hardcastle's
original opinion and diminish Kate's.

Generational Conflict
The clash between generations underlies much
of Goldsmith's plot. The most graphic illustration of this
theme is the character of Tony Lumpkin, Mrs. Hardcastle's
son from her previous marriage. Tony is rebellious from his
first entrance in the play, when he refuses to conform to his
mother's wish that he refrain from going to the Three
Pigeons, the local alehouse. Hardcastle, Tony's stepfather,
states his disapproval of the young man's behavior.
In Act 1, Scene 2 Tony is depicted as a barfly who leads his
companion in a tuneful paean to the joys of drinking. Later in
the scene, he becomes a prankster, misleading the
young London visitors, George Hastings and Charles
Marlow, about local geography, as well as deceiving them
into thinking the Hardcastle residence is an inn. He does so,
at least in part, to be "revenged on the old grumbletonian,"
as he refers to Hardcastle. Furthermore, Tony continually
resists his mother's attempts to make a romantic match
between him and Constance Neville, whose jewels Mrs.
Hardcastle would like to keep in the family.
Tony is not the only young person in rebellion. Constance,
too, has been avoiding her aunt's attempts at matchmaking,
though she chooses to do so in a subtler way. In fact, a
major plot strand involves the romance between George
Hastings and Constance Neville, which they are determined
to pursue by eloping—with Tony's help. Admittedly, they
relinquish this plan in the end, but for much of the play they
conspire to evade Mrs. Hardcastle's guardianship, gain
possession of the jewels that comprise Constance's
inheritance, and escape the control of their elders. The
couple's rebellious outlook is concisely captured in the letter
to Tony, in which George refers to Mrs. Hardcastle as "the
hag" (Act 4).
However, the conflict between generations is not only one of
young people rebelling against their elders but also of older
people deceiving their children. In an attempt to control her
son, Mrs. Hardcastle, together with her husband, has kept
his true age a secret. At the end of the play, Tony is
delighted to learn he is of legal age and can live
independently on his income. Of course, how he chooses to
live is another matter entirely.
The notable exception to this pattern is the warm and
trusting relationship between Kate Hardcastle and her father.
Yet, even here, there are some pressure points, as signaled
by the dialogue at the beginning of Act 3, when Kate and her
father express strongly contrasting opinions of Charles
Marlow.

Mistaken Identity
The theme of mistaken identity is established when Tony
Lumpkin decides in Act 1, Scene 2 to play a practical joke on
the travelers from London, Charles Marlow and George
Hastings. Tony unloads a complicated, and amusing, set of
directions on the visitors, telling them the Hardcastle home is
really an inn. Marlow holds this mistaken assumption
throughout most of the play.
An important corollary of this theme is Kate Hardcastle's
disguised identity. In Act 2 Charles Marlow is so bashful he
never looks at Kate's face. This quirk sets up the opportunity
for Kate to pretend to be a barmaid, and then a "poor
relation" of the family, to secure Marlow's affection. Thus,
she "stoops" in social rank in order "to conquer."
Another offshoot of Tony Lumpkin's practical joke is the
social positioning of Hardcastle as a humble innkeeper
instead of a well-to-do country squire. Much of the play's
humor and social satire depends on this aspect of mistaken
identity.
Finally, the theme reaches an amusing climax in Tony's
outlandish prank in Act 5. Pretending to escort his mother
and Constance to the house of Aunt Pedigree by night, Tony
actually leads them around in a circle so that they become
confused and disoriented. Completely befuddled, Mrs.
Hardcastle is ready to believe she is about to be assaulted
by a highwayman (who is, in fact, her own husband out on
one of his nighttime walks).

Wit
From the Restoration-era plays of William Wycherley (1641–
1716), John Dryden (1631–1700), John Vanbrugh (1664–
1726), and George Farquhar (1677–1707) onward, wit was a
leading theme on the English comic stage. Etymologically
derived from the ancient Greek verb oida, meaning "I know,"
wit was a predominantly intellectual concept, referring to
intelligence, cleverness, and facility of understanding. This
springboard was the rationale for wit's connection to humor
and laughter.
Wit is often produced by the arrangement of words in a pithy
phrase or the clever use of antithesis, a rhetorical device that
shapes a pointed contrast. Young Marlow offers an example
in Act 2: "An impudent fellow may counterfeit modesty, but
I'll be hanged if a modest man can ever counterfeit
impudence."