Book Description

Excerpt from Eighteenth Century Literature: An Oxford Miscellany There is an essay of Goldsmith's, on the theatrical productions of his time, which a writer on the Sentimental Comedy would like to quote in extenso. And for this reason - that this kind of comedy, which Goldsmith described with great humour but with perfect justice in the piece in question, is a thing exceedingly difficult to define. Perhaps it is too near to us. We know it too well to be able to define it. Every one can recognize it at a glance. If you dip into a play written after 1710 or so, and find such a passage as this: - Oh, my child! my child! [Embraces her, and a comic servant or trusted butler sheds manly tear.] Child. All-gracious Heaven! is it possible! Do I embrace my father? you will know without the need of any definition that you have struck a genuine spring of that dolorous fountain of sham tears and sham wit - La Comedie Larmoyante, The Comedy of Sighs (that shall be changed to cries of joy in the Fifth Act), the subject of our essay - The Sentimental Comedy invented by the great essayist Sir Richard Steele. This is how Goldsmith describes it. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."