No abstract

No abstract

This article situates Carlo Goldoni's stage adaptation of Samuel Richardson's Pamela in the context of other stage versions in France and in Italy, focusing on the ideological difficulties presented by the interclass marriage that brings the novel to a happy conclusion. It then turns to the relationship between novel and play and discusses two aspects of Richardson's novel that show a particular affinity with the stage: its epistolarity and the representation of the emotions. on his part to seduce her and, although there is little here to distinguish between seduction and rape, on each occasion she escapes with her honour intact. The story of his pursuit and her resistance is narrated in the letters she sends home to her parents which also reveal to the extra-diegetic reader that Pamela has fallen in love with her master. All is brought to a happy conclusion when Mr B learns to accept that Pamela's inner virtue has far more value than her social standing, and he marries her. Pamela: changing countriesThe popularity of the novel can be measured not only by the number of editions, imitations, travesties and translations that it gave rise to, but also by its success on the European stage. 2 More people probably knew the story of Pamela from the many theatrical productions that the novel engendered than from the novel itself and it is a curious fact that Goldoni's play was translated into more languages than Richardson's novel. This article begins by situating Goldoni's stage adaptation of Richardson's Pamela in the context of other stage versions that appeared in France and Italy. My focus will be on plot and in particular the ideological problems presented by the novel's happy ending.Two plays with Pamela's name in the title were published in 1741 followed by further adaptations where her name was changed, and two ballad operas neither of which appear to have been performed on stage. 3 The problems posed by the text became apparent when Pamela moved to the French stage in 1743 with no fewer than three adaptations produced in Paris that year. It is clear in the first two that the playwrights, working in Louis XV's France, struggled to find a way of avoiding the unpalatable suggestion that a servant girl might marry an aristocrat. Pierre-Claude Nivelle de la Chaussée's vacuous five-act verse dramatization, has milord B spend most of the play literally dying of love for Pamela until, to the relief of all, she brings the play to a close (and saves his life) by agreeing to marry him. It had a one-night run in 1743 and was published in 1762. By contrast, in Louis de Boissy's three-act Paméla en France, ou la vertu mieux éprouvée (first performed in 1743, published in 1745) [Pamela in France, or Virtue Tested ], Pamela is rescued from captivity in Lincolnshire by a French countess who takes her to France where she reveals herself to be a cross-dressing marquis. Here the threat to social order from an interclass marriage is avoided by transforming the two central characters into allegorical figures. It was followed by Volt...

No abstract

No abstract