William Congreve was an
EnglishEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
playwrightA playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
and
poetA poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
.
Careless she is with artful care,Affecting to seem unaffected.
"Amoret", line 7 (1710).
Invention flags, his brain goes muddy,And black despair succeeds brown study.
"An Impossible Thing", line 105 (1720).
Defer not till tomorrow to be wise,Tomorrow's sun to thee may never rise.
"Letter to Cobham", line 61. Compare: "Be wise to-day, 't is madness to defer", Edward Young, Night Thoughts, night i. line 390.
In my conscience I believe the baggage loves me, for she never speaks well of me herself, nor suffers any body else to rail at me.
Act I, scene iii.
Hannibal was a very pretty fellow in those days.
Act II, scene 2.
I find we are growing serious, and then we are in great danger of being dull.
Act II, scene vii.
Eternity was in that moment.
Act IV, scene vii .
If this be not love, it is madness, and then it is pardonable.
Act IV, scene x.
Men are apt to offend ('tis true) where they find most goodness to forgive.
Act IV, scene xi.
Thus grief still treads upon the heels of pleasure;Married in haste, we may repent at leisure.
Act V, scene viii. Compare: "Who wooed in haste, and means to wed at leisure", William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew, Act iii, scene 2.
William Congreve was an
EnglishEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
playwrightA playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
and
poetA poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
.
Early life
Congreve was born in
Bardsey, West YorkshireBardsey, West Yorkshire, England is a small village in the City of Leeds metropolitan borough, north east of Leeds city centre. The village is in the LS17 Leeds postcode district. It is part of the civil parish of Bardsey cum Rigton...
, England (near
LeedsLeeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
). His parents were William Congreve (1637–1708) and his wife, Mary (
née Browning; 1636?–1715); a sister was buried in London in 1672. He spent his childhood in Ireland, where his father, a
CavalierCavalier was the name used by Parliamentarians for a Royalist supporter of King Charles I and son Charles II during the English Civil War, the Interregnum, and the Restoration...
, had settled during the reign of
Charles IICharles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...
. Congreve was educated at
Trinity CollegeTrinity College, Dublin , formally known as the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin, was founded in 1592 by letters patent from Queen Elizabeth I as the "mother of a university", Extracts from Letters Patent of Elizabeth I, 1592: "...we...found and...
in
Dublin; there he met
Jonathan SwiftJonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...
, who would be his friend for the remainder of his life. Upon graduation, he matriculated in the
Middle TempleThe Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers; the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn...
in
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
to study law, but felt himself pulled toward literature, drama, and the fashionable life. Artistically, he became a disciple of
John DrydenJohn Dryden was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who dominated the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in literary circles as the Age of Dryden.Walter Scott called him "Glorious John." He was made Poet...
.
Literary career
William Congreve wrote some of the most popular English plays of the
RestorationThe Restoration of the English monarchy began in 1660 when the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were all restored under Charles II after the Interregnum that followed the Wars of the Three Kingdoms...
period of the late 17th century. By the age of thirty, he had written four comedies, including
Love for Love (premiered 30 April 1695) and
The Way of the WorldThe Way of the World is a play written by British playwright William Congreve. It premiered in 1700 in the theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields in London...
(premiered
1700The year 1700 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* May 5 - Within a few days of John Dryden's death , his last written work, The Secular Masque, is performed as part of Vanbrugh's version of The Pilgrim....
), and one tragedy,
The Mourning Bride (
1697The year 1697 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* George Farquhar arrives in London from Dublin.* Thomas Corneille publishes his translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses into the French language....
)
Unfortunately, his career ended almost as soon as it began. After writing five plays from his first in 1693 until 1700, he produced no more as public tastes turned against the sort of high-brow sexual
comedy of mannersThe comedy of manners is a genre of play/television/film which satirizes the manners and affectations of a social class, often represented by stock characters, such as the miles gloriosus in ancient times, the fop and the rake during the Restoration, or an old person pretending to be young...
in which he specialized. He reportedly was particularly stung by a critique written by
Jeremy CollierJeremy Collier was an English theatre critic, non-juror bishop and theologian.-Life:Born in Stow cum Quy, Cambridgeshire, Collier was educated at Caius College, University of Cambridge, receiving the BA and MA . A supporter of James II, he refused to take the oath of allegiance to William and...
(
A Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage), to the point that he wrote a long reply, "Amendments of Mr. Collier's False and Imperfect Citations." A member of the
WhigThe Whigs were a party in the Parliament of England, Parliament of Great Britain, and Parliament of the United Kingdom, who contested power with the rival Tories from the 1680s to the 1850s. The Whigs' origin lay in constitutional monarchism and opposition to absolute rule...
Kit-Kat Club, Congreve's career shifted to the political sector, where he held various minor political positions despite his stance as a Whig among Tories.
Later life
Congreve withdrew from the theatre and lived the rest of his life on residuals from his early work. His output from 1700 was restricted to the occasional poem and some translation (notably
MolièreJean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...
's
Monsieur de Pourceaugnac). Congreve never married; in his own era and through subsequent generations, he was famous for his friendships with prominent actresses and noblewomen, including
Anne BracegirdleAnne Bracegirdle was an English actress.Little is known of Bracegirdle's early life. Her precise date of birth is a source of great dispute due to conflicting records of her life. She was baptised in Northampton on 15 November 1671, although her tombstone says that she died at the age of 85...
, for whom he wrote major parts in all his plays, and Henrietta Godolphin, 2nd Duchess of Marlborough, daughter of the famous general,
John Churchill, 1st Duke of MarlboroughJohn Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, Prince of Mindelheim, KG, PC , was an English soldier and statesman whose career spanned the reigns of five monarchs through the late 17th and early 18th centuries...
, whom he had probably met by 1703 and with whom he had a daughter,
MaryMary Osborne, Duchess of Leeds , daughter of Henrietta Godolphin, 2nd Duchess of Marlborough and Francis Godolphin, 2nd Earl of Godolphin...
(1723–1764).
As early as 1710, he suffered both from gout and from cataracts on his eyes. Congreve suffered a carriage accident in late September 1728, from which he never recovered (having probably received an internal injury); he died in London in January 1729, and was buried in
Poets' CornerPoets' Corner is the name traditionally given to a section of the South Transept of Westminster Abbey because of the number of poets, playwrights, and writers buried and commemorated there. The most recent additions were a memorial floor stone unveiled in 2009 for the founders of the Royal Ballet...
in
Westminster AbbeyThe Collegiate Church of St Peter at Westminster, popularly known as Westminster Abbey, is a large, mainly Gothic church, in the City of Westminster, London, United Kingdom, located just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is the traditional place of coronation and burial site for English,...
.
Famous lines
Two of Congreve's turns of phrase from
The Mourning Bride (1697) have become famous, albeit frequently in misquotation:
- "Music has charms to soothe a savage breast," which is the first line of the play, spoken by Almeria in Act I, Scene 1. (The word "breast" is often misquoted as "beast", and 'has' sometimes appears as 'hath'.)
- "Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned," spoken by Zara in Act III, Scene VIII. (This is usually paraphrased as "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned")
Congreve coined another famous phrase in
Love for Love (1695).
- "O fie, miss, you must not kiss and tell."
External links