Where Evadne Has a Point. And Stabs the King With It.

The Maid's Tragedy by Francis Beaumont
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Set in a Medieval version of Rhodes that seems more like England or Western Europe, this is the story of disappointed lovers and a king taking advantage of his power. I liked it and I didn't, but I'm going with 4 stars after a lot of internal debate. :)

To cover for secretly taking beautiful young Evadne as his mistress, the king makes her marry a young man, Amintor, who the king supposes (somewhat accurately) he can push around. The couple are married just ahead of the action of the play. Amintor was in love with Aspatia and she was in love with him, but he went along with the marriage to Evadne because the king wanted it. He didn't hate Evadne, though, so he was sorta okay with it. This act of unfaithfulness creates tension between the families of the two women, breaking Aspatia's heart and nearly leading to fighting, but the real tension is between the newlyweds when Evadne makes it clear on their wedding night that theirs is a sham marriage and she will never sleep with her new husband.

Ouch.

Amintor is furious and embarrassed and ashamed, but vows to tell no one and do nothing, because again, it's what the king wants, besides the fact that he doesn't want his shame to be broadcast to the world. Eventually, though, his brother-in-law (and old friend) sees he's not as happy as he's pretending and forces the truth out of him. This leads to a series of actions that are pretty predictable if you know this is a tragedy and not a comedy. Lots of stabbing.

That's the part I don't care for. I really enjoyed reading the play, and found it much more readable than most drama out of that era--just overlapping with Shakespeare--but I pretty much hate tragedy. I hate a sad ending. I understand bad things happen in real life, but I don't understand wanting to see a play that shows it to you. I don't want to dwell on misery and sadness and misfortune. It just doesn't work for my brain. (So why do I read such things? Kind of a curiosity or literary FOMO, I guess.) Anyway, I wish it had ended with bad guys down and good guys up, but that's not the story. I still liked it, mostly. A surprising amount.

Just not the end.

I'm still giving it a 4. Well written, interesting, entertaining, and fun--right until it wasn't. And since I'm reading it out of this a very cool little edition from (probably) 1887, a beautiful book with cool old-fashioned wingdings between scenes and acts, I enjoyed the reading experience way more than if I'd read it online.

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