Love in Several Masques - Sources

Sources

It is possible that the plot of Love in Several Masques is connected to Fielding's own attempt to marry Sarah Andrew in November 1725. Fielding met Andrew when he travelled to Lyme Regis. She was his cousin by marriage, 15 years old, and an heiress of the fortune of her father, Solomon Andrew. Her guardian Andrew Tucker, her uncle, prohibited Fielding from romantically pursuing her; it is possible that Tucker wished Andrew to marry his own son. On 14 November 1725, Andrew Tucker alleged the mayor that Fielding and Fielding's servant, Joseph Lewis, threatened to harm Tucker. According to Andrews's descendants, Fielding attempted to violently take Andrew on 14 November. Regardless, Fielding fled the town after leaving a notice in public view that accused Andrew Tucker and his son of being "Clowns, and Cowards". Thomas Lockwood qualified the connection of this incident and the plot of Love in Several Masques by saying, "I suspect so too, or at any rate suspect that this experience gave a crucial infusion of real feeling to that part of the play: which is however not to say that the writing itself, or the idea, goes back that far."

The style of Love in Several Masques, along with The Temple Beau (1730), exemplified Fielding's understanding of traditional Post-Restoration comedic form. Albert Rivero, a critic specialising in early 18th-century literature, believes that Fielding, in the play, "recognizes that to have his plays acted at Drury Lane, he must have the approval of his famous contemporary . To gain that approval, Fielding must follow Cibber—if not write like him, certainly write plays that he will like." However, Fielding did not respect Cibber's abilities, nor did he believe that the control Cibber took over the plays performed at the Theatre Royal were improved by Cibber's required changes. Instead, Fielding believed that Cibber got in the way of comedy. Regardless, there are similarities between the characters in Love in Several Masques and Cibber and Vanbrugh's The Provok'd Husband. In particular, Fielding's Lady Matchless resembles the character Lady Townly.

The play was traditionally believed by critics to be modelled after the plays of Congreve, with those in the eighteenth century, like Arthur Murphy, to those in the twentieth century, like Wilbur Cross, arguing in support of a connection. Love in Several Masques resembles Congreve's use of plot and dialogue. In particular, Merital and Malvil resemble characters in The Old Batchelor and Rattle resembles the fop in Love for Love. However, parts of Love in Several Masque also resembles Molière's Les Femmes Savantes, Sganarelle and Le Misanthrope. There are also possible connections between the play and Farquhar's The Constant Couple and Etherege's She wou'd if she Cou'd. Of all the influences, theatre historian Robert Hume points out that Fielding's "play is humane comedy, not satire, and his generic affinities are closer to Centlivre and Cibber than to Congreve" and that "His first play is an imitative exercise in a popular form, not an attempt to write a Congrevean throw-back"; Hume offers that Love in Several Masques has connections to Christopher Bullock's Woman is a Riddle (1716), Susanna Centlivre's Busy Body (1709), Cibber's Double Gallant (1707), Farquhar's Constant Couple (1699), Richard Steele's Funeral (1701), John Vanbrugh's The Confederacy (1705) and The Mistake (1705) and Leonard Welsted's The Dissembled Wanton (1726).