Beau's Duel, or A Soldier for the Ladies

Before there was Wollstonecraft or Burney, there was Susanna Centlivre - a woman who dared to write comedy for the London stage in an era when such audacity was almost unthinkable. Beau's Duel, her second play from 1702, announces its audaciousness in the very prologue: a woman wrote this, and she's not about to apologize for it. Centlivre turns that defiance into theatrical fireworks. The setup is delectable chaos. Two women - the lovely Clarinda and her wealthy heiress cousin - have attracted a swarm of suitors. Returning soldiers flush with conquest, a pompous fop favored by Clarinda's father, a cynical bachelor who despises marriage, and a scheming fortune-hunter all collide in a whirl of crossed signals, threatened duels, and romantic misadventure. The title promises duels, and the play delivers: not just with swords, but with wits, with repartee, with the battle of the sexes played for laughs. This is Restoration comedy at its most energetic - vulgar, sharp, and gleefully uninterested in propriety. Centlivre sees through the games people play around love and money, and she解剖s them with a comic blade that still cuts. If you want to understand how early modern women saw the world - and how they laughed at the men who thought they ruled it - start here.