Culture · 6 pages · 12 min
How comedy of manners spends class as a plot
The plot runs on who may do what, and in whose company.
When the purchase is complete, return to the original window. It will refresh.
From the opening
Comedy of manners spends social rank, and the codes that display it, as the engine of the plot rather than as background color. Who may court whom, who is admitted to a room, and whose manners count as real are the events, and the jokes are often the sound of those rules being used with skill or exposed as brittle. The opening covers how codes become plot moves, why wit can be the action, and where farce uses another engine.
The rest of the brief — the later sections and the reading notes — opens after Stripe confirms payment.
Inside
- How codes become plot moves
- Why wit can be the action
- Where farce uses another engine
- When the currency stops being felt
- Where the idea stops applying
- A distinction worth keeping
Sources
- Restoration comedy of manners and the marriage market
- Status codes as the machinery of the plot