Despite his established reputation, Oliver Goldsmith still relied on publishing to earn money. He developed a taste for luxurious clothes and housing, and his extravagant spending meant he was constantly in debt. He continued successfully publishing, including his first novel, The Vicar of Wakefield, in 1766. In 1768, he produced his first piece for the theater, The Good-Natured Man. He continued producing literature of excellent quality at remarkable speed, publishing his best-known poem, "The Deserted Village", in 1770, and a second successful theatrical work, She Stoops to Conquer, in 1773, the year before his death.3
This comedy's protagonist is a kind but credulous man named Honeywood. He is in love with a wealthy young woman, Miss Richland, and she with him, but he is too afraid to propose to her.
One evening two bailiffs, sent by his uncle to try to teach him a lesson, arrive at his house to imprison him. Worried about what everyone will think, he tries to cover up the situation by passing them off as guests. The two bailiffs are dressed in fine clothes and join in a discussion about French influence on English taste, which Honeywood has to try to interpret for his other guests.
After he is arrested, he is bailed out by Miss Richland. Unaware who paid the bail, he assumes it is his rich and influential friend, Lofty. Feeling indebted to Lofty, he tries to help him marry Miss Richland, who he is interested in for her money and looks alone.
Miss Richland’s guardian, meanwhile, a distant relative named Mrs. Croaker, has every intention of marrying her son, Leontine, to Miss Richland. Her concerns are purely with Miss Richmond’s fortune, and they have no interest in each other. Ultimately, Honeywood learns who bailed him out and marries Miss Richland.
She Stoops to Conquer (1773)
This comedic play is a story of misunderstanding and mistaken identity. A suitor, Marlow, is tricked into believing that the house of his potential lover, Kate Hardcastle, is an inn. He proceeds to treat Kate’s father and mother like innkeepers, rudely ordering food, demanding to see rooms, and telling his servants to drink as much as they can. Marlow is painfully shy around upper-class women, but something of a rake with lower-class ones. After an extremely awkward interview with Kate, she manages to convince him that she’s a barmaid by changing her outfit and voice. His attitude towards her changes entirely, and he tries to forcibly kiss her and carry her off.
In a subplot, Kate’s cousin, Constance, is in love with a man named Hastings. Kate’s mother wants Constance to marry her son from another marriage, Tony, in order to keep her wealth in the family. After an unsuccessful attempt to elope, Tony officially refuses to marry Constance so she and Hastings can be together.
By stooping to the level first of a barmaid and then of a poor relative, Kate manages to elicit professions of love and tenderness from the formerly cold Marlow. In the end, all of the deception is revealed, but everyone forgives each other. Hastings is to marry Constance and Marlow is to marry Kate.
Oliver Goldsmith's Writing Style
Oliver Goldsmith wrote towards the end of the age of Neoclassical or Augustan literature, which was preoccupied with its relation to the classical Greek and Roman literary heritage as well as with the formal rules that should govern writing, down to how vowels and syllables should be arranged.
One example of the high formality of Neoclassical or Augustan literature is the use of the heroic couplet. In a heroic couplet, every line of poetry has ten syllables. The stress pattern of each line is iambic, meaning every other syllable should be stressed unless there is some compelling artistic reason to break the unstressed-stressed pattern. Finally, every pair of lines must have an end-rhyme.
Essentially all of Goldsmith's poetry was written under the demanding formal constraints of the heroic couplet. Take an example from the opening stanza of his most well-known poem, "The Deserted Village." The syllables are divided with a vertical bar, and the stressed syllables are highlighted in red. Note the amazing regularity of the lines:
Sweet | Aub | urn! love | liest | vill | age | of | the | plain,
Where | health | and | plen | ty cheered | the | lab | oring | swain,
Where | smil | ing | spring | its | ear | liest | vis | it | paid,
And | part | ing sum | mer's ling | ering | blooms | de | layed (lines 1-4)
Oliver Goldsmith managed to write within the confines of this style while not sounding pompous or artificial, maintaining a grace and simplicity that belies its difficulty and craftsmanship. Even more remarkable was the volume and pace at which Goldsmith was able to produce this quality of writing. In the words of his close friend and contemporary, Samuel Johnson, he “touched every kind of writing, and touched none that he did not adorn.”3
Oliver Goldsmith Quotes
Oliver Goldsmith produced many memorable turns of phrase in poetry, prose, and conversation.
In the opening stanza of "The Traveler," the poem that made him a literary celebrity, Goldsmith catalogues the difficulties of traveling through remote regions of Europe before remarking that:
Where’er I roam, whatever realms to see,
My heart untraveled fondly turns to thee (lines 7-8)
Ill fares the land, to hast’ning ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates and men decay (lines 51-52)
In the opening act of Goldsmith's most famous play, She Stoops to Conquer, Mr. and Mrs. Hardcastle are having a debate about the relative merits of the country and the city. In favor of the slow pace of country life, Mr. Hardcastle makes the following remark:I love everything that's old: old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wines. (Act 1)
Although Goldsmith was often mocked as an inarticulate conversationalist, there is quite a bit of evidence that what he said was often simply over the heads of his interlocutors. James Boswell, who spent a good deal of time with Goldsmith, records him making the following remark about his religious belief:
As I take my shoes from the shoemaker, and my coat from the tailor, so I take my religion from the priest.3
Oliver Goldsmith - Key takeaways
- Born in 1728 in Ireland, Oliver Goldsmith studied medicine before traveling continental Europe and settling down in London as a writer in 1756.
- Poor but fond of luxuries, Goldsmith earned his living entirely through his writing and so produced a prodigious amount.
- Much of Goldsmith's best writing, such as his only novel, The Vicar of Wakefield, and his best-known poems, "The Traveler" and "The Deserted Village", contain strong autobiographical elements and subtle social criticism.
- Goldsmith's two plays, The Good-Natured Man and She Stoops to Conquer, were both enormously popular comedies.
- Goldsmith's writing is characterized by seeming ease and simplicity under highly demanding formal constraints.
References
1. S. Greenblatt (general editor). The Norton Anthology of English Literature Volume 1. Norton, 2012.
2. J. Merriman. A History of Modern Europe from the Renaissance to the Present. Norton, 2010.
3. N. Clarke. Brothers of the Quill: Oliver Goldsmith in Grub Street. Harvard UP, 2016.
4. W. Irving. Oliver Goldsmith: A Biography. G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1864.
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