Comment on the significance of the Prologue of She Stoops to Conquer.

Prologue is an opening of a story that establishes the setting, and gives background details, it
tells some earlier story, and connects it to the main story. The ‘Prologue’ to She Stoops to
conquer was written by David Garrik, a member of Dr. Johnson’s literary circle, and a friend
of both Johnson and Goldsmith. The prologue was meant to be read by a popular
contemporary actor, Woodward, who was also supposed to have played the key part of Tony
Lumpkin. However, although Woodward withdrew from the play, the ‘prologue’ was read by
him. Unlike many other prologues of contemporary dramas, the ‘prologue’ to She Stoops to
conquer is not a declamation but it is in the nature of a dramatic scene. In it, he tells the
audience that Goldsmith’s play is meant to rescue comedy, which he argues is no longer well-
represented among theatrical productions of the day. Personifying Comedy as a sick woman,
the prologue suggests that the play that follows is the cure prescribed to her by a doctor, the
playwright. If the audience likes the play, then the doctor’s prescription can be said to have
worked, and Comedy will be saved. The play consists of 46 lines in rhyming couplets. The
extended metaphor that dominates the Prologue reflects an 18th-century debate on two types
of comic play: "sentimental comedy" and "laughing comedy." Sentimental comedy—the
word sentiment or a form of it appears three times in the Prologue—arose in the late 1600s as
a reaction to the scandalous morals and situations of some Restoration comedies, such as
William Wycherley's The Country Wife (1675). Sentimental comedy was designed to elicit
tears rather than laughter.

The trend of sentimental comedy was challenged, in turn, by traditionalists who believed the
goal of comedy was to entertain by making the audience laugh. Both Oliver Goldsmith and
Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751–1816) were firmly in this camp, and so, it would seem, was
David Garrick. Goldsmith himself deals with the issue in his brief essay "A Comparison
Between Laughing and Sentimental Comedy" (1773). Goldsmith, like Garrick, fears humor is
"departing from the stage" and warns "it is not easy to recover an art when once lost."

Classical dramatists believed drama served the social function of catharsis, which is an
emotional or spiritual release that transpires while experiencing or responding to a work of
art. Audiences who were under tremendous daily pressures could attend a play, have their
emotions artificially heightened to a breaking point, and then experience a release that carried
over into their daily lives. Thus, drama served to cure some of society's ills. In sentimental
comedy, Goldsmith finds characters to be too pure, too good, and too sympathetic to truly
move an audience. Instead, he wishes the audience to see characters more like themselves,
replete with vices and follies, so they may learn how to amend them.

“Excuse me, Sirs, I pray- I can't yet speak-

I'm crying now- and have been all the week.”

Woodward enters the stage dressed in black, the colour of mourning, holding a handkerchief
to his eyes, and the very first thing he says is that the reason why he is crying is that the Muse
of Comedy (Thalia), who had been ailing for a long time, is now on the verge of death, “ The
Comic Muse, long sick, is now a- dying! / And if she goes, my tears will never stop;” If she
really dies, his tears will not stop flooding, for it would mean the end of his carrier as an
actor, well versed in the art of comic characterization.
“For as a player, I can't squeeze out one drop:
I am undone, that 's all shall lose my bread”
After the death of comedy, he would have to play tragic roles, and he knows that he would
not succeed in them, since he cannot shed even a single tear when playing a role.
“When the sweet maid is laid upon the bier,
Shuter and I shall be chief mourners here.”
When the Muse is dead, he and Edward Shuter (a famous comic actor who personated
Hardcastle in this play) shall be the chief mourners.
“To her a mawkish drab of spurious breed,
Who deals in sentimentals, will succeed!
Poor Ned and I are dead to all intents;”
The Muse of comedy will be succeeded by a value is doubtful drama of mongrel breed which
deals in sentimentality. He and his friend have grown nervous, and console themselves with
frequent cups of wine. The only alternative for them would be to play sentimental roles and
he tries to see whether he can play them. Pressing his heart and fixing his gaze on the ground
he assumes a sententious look and delivers common in sentimental drama, but he gives up the
attempt in disgust.
The ‘prologue’ makes an important critical point by commending Sentimental drama, much
agog on the contemporary stage, which might seize hold of the stage if pure comedy were
banished. ‘Sentimental is labeled mongrel’ because it is neither comedy nor tragedy. The
‘prologue’ brands it as “a mawkish drab of spurious breed”. The point made in the ‘prologue’
about the threat which ‘Sentimental Comedy’ posed for genuine comedy, as well as for comic
actors, is quite serious. The type of acting which was required for sentimental plays is nicely
ridiculed by the speaker:
            “My heart thus pressing- fix’d my face and eye-
With a sententious look, that nothing means
(Faces are blocks in sentimental scenes)”.

‘Sentimental Comedy’ not only contained sentimentality but also much moralizing in the
form of maxims. Woodward imagines himself playing in such scenes and parodies the typical
sententiousness in such plays:
            “Thus I begin, All is not gold that glitters,
             Pleasure seems sweet, but proves a glass of bitters.
            When ignorance enters, Folly is at hand;
              Learning is better far than house and land,
            Let not your virtue trip, who trips may stumble,
            And virtue is not virtue, if she tumble”.
The last two lines contain a sexual allusion which makes the parody all the more ridiculous
Woodward gives up the attempt to play and speak in the manners of sentimental characters.
He again makes an implicit criticism of hybrid comedy by saying that he would rather prefer
to play in tragic role even when he would be performing his favourite task of making the
audience laugh.

“One hope remains hearing the maid was ill,

A Doctor comes this night to show his skill.”

            The speaker finally asserts that there is still a ray of hope for him, as a certain doctor
is going to try five doses of a powerful but harmless medicine.

“To cheer her heart , and give your muscles motion ,”

The aim is to cheer up the heart of a dying maid and brings strength in her failing muscles. It
is a kind of magic charm which he assures the audience, spectators to decide whether the
playwright is a successful practitioner of medicine or not.

“He, in Five Draughts prepar’d, presents a potion :

A kind of magic charm for be assur’d,

If you will swallow it , the maid is cur’d :”

The doctor to whom the speaker refers is the playwright Oliver Goldsmith (1728–74), whose
medical studies as a young man in Edinburgh allowed him to be called "doctor" even though
he did not practice medicine. The "five draughts" (the five acts of his play, She Stoops to
Conquer) of the potion the doctor prescribes for the Comic Muse's recovery are the five acts
of the play. The atmosphere of grave illness is enhanced by the realistic hints of mourning
and sorrow: for example, the speaker's black costume and the handkerchief held to his eyes to
wipe away tears of grief.

“Should he succeed , you'll give him his degree ;

If not , within he will receive no fee !”
In fact, the prologue ends with a guarantee: if Goldsmith's play is funny, the audience will
"give him his degree," or assert that the play is good— otherwise "he [Goldsmith] will
receive no fee!"

Anti-sentimental comedy this forms is becomes popular with the comedies that were
presented by Oliver Goldsmith’s ‘she stoops to conquer’ it’s a kind of comedy representing
complex and sophisticated code of behavior correct in fashionable circle of the society. The
title of this novel refers to the “stooping down” of Kate Hardcastle from her position in high
society to the position as a barmaid. She does this in order to test the feelings of Marlow, to
make sure that he loves her for herself and not for her money. In the end, she gets what she
wants, and proves a point. She learns that Marlow’s feelings are genuine and demonstrates
that love is not controlled by social position. By “stooping down”, she conquered society.
The ‘prologue’, then is significant because it throws light upon the nature of comedy that
Goldsmith aims to write. Goldsmith is purpose is to revive the springs of comedy that is fun,
wit and laughter, from the bondage of dearful sentimental comedies that were rampant on the
English stage causing major damage to the pure comic spirit. The ‘prologue’ is thus a kind of
advertisement, and a preamble to the play.

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