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Literary Devices
Definition of Allusion
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals, historical events, or philosophical ideas... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to... read full definition
Act 1, Scene 2
Explanation and Analysis—Venus:
In the second scene of Act 2, Willmore alludes to the goddess Venus as he tries to convince Hellena to have sex with him:
I find you’ll be better acquainted with it, nor can you take it in a better time; for I am come from sea, child, and Venus not being propitious to me in her own element: I have a world of love in store – would you would be good-natured and take some on’t off my hands.
Through this allusion, Willmore is expressing that it's been a long time since he's had sex because he's been at sea, which he describes as Venus's element. In Roman religion and mythology, Venus is the goddess of love, desire, sex, and fertility. While she is not directly a goddess of the sea or of water, Willmore is correct in claiming that water is her element. Her Greek equivalent being Aphrodite, Venus is associated with the sea because the myth goes that she was born, as a fully formed adult, out of the sea foam.
Willmore's and Hellena's relationship is built on a shared love of double entendres and gift for euphemistic wordplay. This allusion is an example of how they use figurative language to discuss seduction and sex. Willmore's reason for invoking Venus is not primarily that she is associated with the sea, but that she functions in mythology, art, and literature as an embodiment of love and sexuality. Usually depicted nude in paintings, she was believed to provide people with sexual success.
In addition, Venus was sometimes represented as the goddess of prostitutes. Due to Hellena's disguise, Willmore believes she is a gypsy and essentially sees her as a prostitute. By invoking Venus, Willmore is in a way invoking the mythological authority of prostitutes to seduce the young woman.
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Explanation and Analysis—Jeptha's Daughter:
In the second scene of Act 1, Hellena tells Willmore that whoever wants to be with her will have to storm a convent, as she is due to become a nun after Carnival. Willmore responds with delight, alluding to the Book of Judges and creating a paradox in his assertion that this makes him even more convinced that they will have sex:
A nun! Oh how I love thee for’t! There’s no sinner like a young saint – nay now there’s no denying me, the old law had no curse (to a woman) like dying a maid; witness Jephtha’s daughter.
Willmore's statement that there's "no sinner like a young saint" is a paradox. Although it may seem contradictory to claim that young saints are the ultimate sinners, he is arguing that no one is more familiar with the temptation of sin than those who have vowed to forego earthly pleasures early in their life. Willmore's line of reasoning goes as follows: If Hellena is entering a convent and a life of privation, then she will more easily be seduced. This is because nuns have to swear vows of chastity and Willmore claims that, for women, there is no greater curse than dying a virgin.
To back this up, Willmore uses a story from the Book of Judges. As a result of a vow Jephtha made—that he would sacrifice the first thing that comes out of his door—the judge is forced to sacrifice his daughter. Before the sacrifice takes place, she asks for a two-month grace period so she can go into the mountains to weep for her virginity. Reinforcing the idea that women do not and should not want to leave the world as virgins, Willmore uses the story of Jephtha's daughter to convince Hellena to sleep with him. Hellena does not plan to die, but, in Willmore's eyes, entering a convent is more or less the equivalent of death.
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Explanation and Analysis—Cupid:
In the second scene of Act 1, Blunt and Frederick make fun of Belvile for being in love with Florinda—and in particular for letting a woman have so much control over his life and wellbeing. Alluding to the Roman god Cupid, Blunt compares his and Frederick's feelings for women to Belvile's feelings for Florinda:
[...] our Cupids are like the cooks of the camp, they can roast or boil a woman, but they have none of the fine tricks to set ’em off, no hogoes to make the sauce pleasant and the stomach sharp.
In Roman religion and mythology, Cupid is the god of desire and erotic love. He is usually portrayed as a winged boy carrying a bow and arrow, which he uses to fill people with irrational and uncontrollable desire. When Blunt mentions his and Frederick's Cupids, he is using metonymy to invoke their romantic attachments.
In this passage, Blunt uses a simile to compare his and Frederick's Cupids to camp cooks. Rather than creating decadent and delicious meals, camp cooks make simple meals whose main purpose is to fill soldiers up. Blunt says that, by contrast, Belvile's cooks treat him to exciting meals full of garnish and flavor. His Cupids are far less utilitarian and have plenty of "fine tricks" up their sleeves to make his love life passionate and pleasant. Nevertheless, Blunt does not suggest that he wishes his Cupids were like those of Belvile—he is more than content with his noncommittal sexual relationships and thinks Belvile's situation is inferior to his own.
It is telling that Blunt chooses to compare love and sex to eating—and women to a meal. He suggests that Cupid's purpose is to provide men with women to have sex with, just as camp cooks are supposed to feed soldiers. He claims not to know why he and Frederick, in their relationships to women, fail to experience the romance and passion that Belvile does, but it evidently results from their varying views of women and sex.
Blunt again alludes to Cupid in the first scene of Act 2, when he has fallen for Lucetta and her tricks:
What a dog was I to stay in dull England so long – how have I laughed at the colonel when he sighed for love! but now the little archer has revenged him! and by this one dart, I can guess at all his joys, which then I took for fancies, mere dreams and fables.
Blunt refers back to when he made fun of Belvile for pining over Florinda. Now, after Lucetta has convinced him that she's in love with him, he claims to understand how Belvile felt. When Blunt says "the little archer has revenged him," he means that Cupid has shot him with an arrow of love. By "this one dart," Blunt comprehends the authenticity and intensity of the feelings that Belvile holds for Florinda. Ironically, Lucetta is merely subjecting Blunt to a clever scheme and is not in love with him at all. This experience leaves him more jaded—and less interested in fulfilling romantic attachments—than ever.
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Act 2, Scene 1
Explanation and Analysis—Cupid:
In the second scene of Act 1, Blunt and Frederick make fun of Belvile for being in love with Florinda—and in particular for letting a woman have so much control over his life and wellbeing. Alluding to the Roman god Cupid, Blunt compares his and Frederick's feelings for women to Belvile's feelings for Florinda:
[...] our Cupids are like the cooks of the camp, they can roast or boil a woman, but they have none of the fine tricks to set ’em off, no hogoes to make the sauce pleasant and the stomach sharp.
In Roman religion and mythology, Cupid is the god of desire and erotic love. He is usually portrayed as a winged boy carrying a bow and arrow, which he uses to fill people with irrational and uncontrollable desire. When Blunt mentions his and Frederick's Cupids, he is using metonymy to invoke their romantic attachments.
In this passage, Blunt uses a simile to compare his and Frederick's Cupids to camp cooks. Rather than creating decadent and delicious meals, camp cooks make simple meals whose main purpose is to fill soldiers up. Blunt says that, by contrast, Belvile's cooks treat him to exciting meals full of garnish and flavor. His Cupids are far less utilitarian and have plenty of "fine tricks" up their sleeves to make his love life passionate and pleasant. Nevertheless, Blunt does not suggest that he wishes his Cupids were like those of Belvile—he is more than content with his noncommittal sexual relationships and thinks Belvile's situation is inferior to his own.
It is telling that Blunt chooses to compare love and sex to eating—and women to a meal. He suggests that Cupid's purpose is to provide men with women to have sex with, just as camp cooks are supposed to feed soldiers. He claims not to know why he and Frederick, in their relationships to women, fail to experience the romance and passion that Belvile does, but it evidently results from their varying views of women and sex.
Blunt again alludes to Cupid in the first scene of Act 2, when he has fallen for Lucetta and her tricks:
What a dog was I to stay in dull England so long – how have I laughed at the colonel when he sighed for love! but now the little archer has revenged him! and by this one dart, I can guess at all his joys, which then I took for fancies, mere dreams and fables.
Blunt refers back to when he made fun of Belvile for pining over Florinda. Now, after Lucetta has convinced him that she's in love with him, he claims to understand how Belvile felt. When Blunt says "the little archer has revenged him," he means that Cupid has shot him with an arrow of love. By "this one dart," Blunt comprehends the authenticity and intensity of the feelings that Belvile holds for Florinda. Ironically, Lucetta is merely subjecting Blunt to a clever scheme and is not in love with him at all. This experience leaves him more jaded—and less interested in fulfilling romantic attachments—than ever.
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Act 5, Scene 1
Explanation and Analysis—Hymen:
In the first scene of Act 5, it seems like something will finally come of the lengthy, back and forth seduction game that Hellena and Willmore have been engaged in throughout the play. Refusing to have sex with him before they get married, Hellena proposes to Willmore with an allusion to the Greek god Hymen:
’Tis but getting my consent, and the business is soon done; let but old Gaffer Hymen and his priest say amen to’t, and I dare lay my mother’s daughter by as proper a fellow as your father’s son, without fear or blushing.
In Greek religion and mythology, Hymen was the god of weddings and marriage. It was absolutely necessary for him to attend weddings; his absence was an indication that the marriage would not go well. By invoking Hymen, then, Hellena is not only figuratively expressing that she wants to marry Willmore, but also that she hopes their union will be auspicious. The audience can't help but feel that she'll need it: Willmore's main reasons for wanting to marry her are his desire to have sex with her and to access her wealth. Regardless, this moment involves a transgressive reversal of gender roles. At the play's opening, she was an inexperienced, convent-bound young girl. By the end, she has successfully proposed to the play's most infamous womanizer.
At first, Willmore responds that if they're inviting a priest and Hymen, they may as well invite a hangman. He makes it clear that his preferred deities are Aphrodite and Eros (who are gods of sexual desire rather than of matrimony), that the only vow he cares for is love, and the only witness he wants is the lover. He contends that adding formalities and wedding ceremonies to their love will ruin its purity. He goes along with marrying Hellena in the end, but not before he expresses that "marriage is as certain a bane to love as lending money is to friends."
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