The Theater Symbol Analysis

The theater represents fashionable 18th-century society and the different class structures which operate within it. Like the theater, which is split up into different levels and where people from different classes sit separately, 18th-century society is divided into stratified classes (lower, middle, and upper) who do not mingle together. Evelina’s various trips to the theater symbolize the idea that social mobility is impossible in 18th-century Britain. People appear out of place and draw unflattering attention to themselves if they enter try to enter the wrong part of society, just as they will if they sit in the wrong part of the theater. For instance, the middle-class Branghtons are out of place when they try to enter the theater pit—where wealthy theatergoers sit—just as Evelina, who is noble by birth, is out of place when she sits in the gallery with lower-class people.

The theater further symbolizes the artificiality of 18th-century society, such as people’s preference for showy and pretentious etiquette and people’s obsessions with status. Plays are artificial performances, and the theater is associated with characters who perform—likewise, the audience is full of people like Mr. Lovel who put on false personas and show off to gain social notoriety. Captain Mirvan explicitly draws attention to this connection between 18th-century Britain and the theater when he says that plays are the only things that tell the truth in fashionable society. This implies that plays are truthful because they are openly artificial, whereas fashionable society is false and corrupt because it hides its artificiality and social snobbishness behind a veneer of politeness.