It is unnecessary to dwell on the cure, for long before this stage the story has lost all semblance of probability.
The inferiority of the Gaoler’s Daughter to Ophelia is as patent as that of the false to the true Florimel of Spenser’s “Færie Queene.” A little more skill on the part of the author and a great deal more restraint would, no doubt, have effected an enormous improvement, but it is unlikely that Fletcher could ever have made us take the same interest in the Gaoler’s Daughter as we take in Ophelia. She is quite unnecessary to the plot, and would require far greater depth of characterisation before she could appeal with any force to our sympathies. Had this been done, the taint of the comic and the coarseness removed, the ravings lessened and the execrable character of the Doctor changed, we might have had another Ophelia and not an exaggerated and debased imitation.
Whatever the nature of the madness of our last subject, the affliction of Penthea, in Ford’s “Broken Heart” is certainly acute melancholia. She is dealt with here for the sake of contrast with the two preceding characters. “The Broken Heart,” as far as its “mad-scenes” are concerned, has certainly more in common with “Hamlet” than with “The Two Noble Kinsmen.” It is a tragedy of more than usual gloom, and the scenes in question are marked by a subdued restraint quite absent from the “Two Noble Kinsmen.” Penthea talks much more coherently than either Ophelia or her ape; and though there
is a distinct want in her speeches of that colour which so marks the other two plays, she is much nearer Ophelia in spirit and essentials than the girl for whom Ophelia actually stood as a model.
The story, so far as it concerns Penthea, is this: She is in love with Orgilus, son of a counsellor to the King of Laconia, but has been compelled to marry Bassanes, a jealous nobleman whom she detests. Her brother Ithocles’ love for the King’s daughter, Calantha, becomes known to Penthea, who, in spite of her brother’s cruelty to her, tries to bring about their union; when she is dead, however, her lover stabs Ithocles and the Princess dies of a broken heart. Penthea’s situation, when in the second act she has an interview with Orgilus, is this: she is contracted to Bassanes, and though she loathes him and will have no more to do with him than she can help she will not consent to break the bond of marriage. Her loss of reason, which terminates in her death in the fourth act, is one of the main factors of the series of events which leads up to the impressive final situation.
The scenes which portray the melancholy and distraction of Penthea are much superior to the others in which she appears, by reason of the irresistible sympathy which they inspire. We are not greatly enamoured of the unhappy girl in the first scenes; her character is somewhat slightly drawn, and, as one commentator
puts it, there is “a trace of selfishness in her sorrow, which operates against the sympathy excited by her sufferings.”[89:1] This is dispelled in that touching scene (iii., 5), where Penthea pleads with Calantha on behalf of her brother. Her plaintive farewell to life, in the same scene, is not less touching:
“Glories
Of human greatness are but pleasing dreams
And shadows soon decaying; on the stage