Deception in the comedies and tragicomedies of John Fletcher

John Fletcher was prolific, popular, and highly praised by his comtemporaries, but has received little in-dividual critical attention. Scholars usually focus on the whole of the Beaumont and Fletcher canon, but his thirteen independently written comedies and tragicomedies are also worthy of serious criticism. The present study was undertaken as a step in the reassessment of Fletcher and examines one of the prominent techniques found in all of his unaided plays: deception. Fletcher found deceit so important that in all but two of them it is central. He used well-known devices beloved by his audiences: disguise, deception with words, and tricks like feigned physical or mental illness, fake death, and false documents. He chiefly relied on disguise--the changing of one's identity by altering the outward appearance, or the alteration of one's character but not his identity. His ability to take a stock technique and convention and not only make it fit organically and thematically into his play but also use it in such a way that the actor is given enormous scope is what sets him apart as a dramatist. Although the deceptions are frequently dismissed as no more than showy tricks, Fletcher's skill is such that he also makes them functional, integral to plot and often to theme. He employs deception to serve a range of dra-matic purposes, chiefly to aid in plot construction, but also to comment on human follies and foibles, to reveal character, and to cure humours, among others. The dissertation discusses each play separately, finding the last of the tragicomedies–The Pilgrim,, The Island Princess, and A Wife for a Month--to be the most successful and memorable.