Oh, the IRONY.

After reading this lovely story, I am now truly a fan of Eliza Haywood.  After I got over the shock factor of how vivid she was in her sexual scenes of the story (I’m not reading Fifty Shades…right?), I found myself wanting to read this story again and again, because of its subtle wit, humor, and irony, as well as her main character’s obvious focus on women’s power.  Like we said in class, this story shows the power that women can have in the theater, which can be somewhat “dangerous” to the world.

Fantomina, the first character that the main character portrays, struck me as somewhat of a whim for the main character, but as the story went further it became obvious that this woman soon became too obsessed with having control over Beauplaisir. Her acting tricks soon became an addiction.

Haywood gives us hints of her inevitable character-playing from the beginning, telling us that this woman is, “naturally vain, and received no small pleasure in hearing herself praised,” (2567) which signals to us that this woman could easily find having power over a man a delight, since she does not need a man to actually make her feel comfortable with herself.  We know that the woman is of strong wit, and carries herself with pride right away, because Beauplaisir finds her to be unlike other loose women who are “for the most part gentlewomen by necessity, few of ‘em having had an education suitable to what they affect to appear” (2567).  The main character finds this role easy to take on because she has the smarts and wits to act out the part.

She deceives him beautifully, yet the irony is that she practically ruins her life by trying to ruin his.  Her actress-like ways have caused her to become pregnant, which causes her mother to exile her to a Monastery, where we are unaware if she will continue her ways as a performer.

It struck me as extremely amusing when she blames Beauplaisir for her sadness, when she is the maker of her own doom.  Obviously, in the end of the story she possibly understands that she has created something that she should be ashamed of, but right off the bat she blames Beauplaisar:

“No, my dear Beauplaisir, (added she) your love alone can compensate for the shame you have involved me in.” (2570)

Really?  The shame that he involved you in?  I’m pretty sure the shame is yours my dear.

It is equally as interesting later when her mother “commanded her to reveal the name of the person whose insinuations had drawn her to this dishonor,” (2583).

And later: “to whom you owe your ruin? Or have you deceived me by a fictatious tale?” (2584)

Oh the irony.

She might as well just say her own name, in my opinion, because she has drawn herself to her own dishonor.

What is also ironic and almost humorous is when Beauplaisir signs the letter to Incognita, “Your everlasting slave,” (2580).  We know as readers, this is the truth for him, but also for her who devotes her life to her acting throughout all of these women just to deceive him.  I had to laugh when Beauplaisir answers her letter with, “Never was woman formed to charm like you: never did any look like you,- write like you, -bless like you,” (2576).  It cannot get any more ironic than this statement.  Poor Beauplaisir.

I cannot say that I don’t find her way with this man extremely powerful and intelligent, as I believe Haywood hopes to portray about theater, especially that she could deceive him that these are different women actually having sex with him, but it is still wrong.  I started to think throughout the story that he may not have been much more of a “player” than any other man, and that her acting as these women was the very source of his demise to a scum of a lover.

She believes that she is living the dream by making up these characters, “How do some women (continued she) make their life a hell, burning in fruitless expectations, and dreaming out their days in hopes and fears,” but really she is the one living without actually knowing real love (2577).

I was on her side at some points when he was proven to be very dishonorable towards his many “women”, but in the end when he practically offers up his life for the baby of this woman that has deceived him, I found myself no longer on her side, and hating the artful treachery that she tricked him into.

As a woman of “class” from the country, she cares much more about reputation than virtue, shown in the beginning of the story when she would rather have sex with him than have her name around town:

“at the worst, have the private vexation of knowing I have lost him; -the intrigue being a secret, my disgrace will be so too.-  I shall hear no whispers as I pass.”

This parallels with many of the stories that we have read thus far, and shows how important this was, especially to women of this time.

To end my elaborate comments on Fantomina, I would like to bring up an interesting and highly ironic quote from the beginning of the story:

“He had no reason to distrust the truth of this story, and was therefore satisfied with it; but did not doubt by the beginning of her conduct, but that in the end she would be in reality the thing she so artfully had counterfeited,” (2570).

Here Beauplaisir talks about how she will most likely have sex with him because she has feigned to be a prostitute- but I think this line speaks multitudes about her fate as an actress.