She Stoops to Conquer Summary

Act I begins at the Hardcastles’ home in the countryside. Mrs. Hardcastle complains to her husband that they never leave their rural home to see the new things happening in the city. Hardcastle says he loves everything old, including his old wife. Mrs. Hardcastle says she was a young woman when she had her first husband’s son, Tony, and he is not yet twenty-one. Hardcastle complains about Tony’s immaturity and love of pranks. Tony enters on his way to a pub, and his mother follows him offstage, begging him to stay and spend time with them.

Hardcastle’s daughter Kate enters. He remarks on her fashionable clothing, which he dislikes. Kate reminds him of their deal: she wears what she likes in the morning and dresses in the old-fashioned style he prefers at night. Hardcastle reveals big news: his friend Sir Charles’s son, Marlow, is coming to visit, and Hardcastle hopes Kate and Marlow will marry. Hardcastle says Marlow has a reputation for being handsome, intelligent and very modest. Kate likes all but the last part of this description and resolves to try to make a good impression on Marlow.

Hardcastle exits, leaving Kate to think over her visitor. She is joined by her cousin Constance, whom she tells about Marlow’s impending visit. Constance tells her that she knows Marlow: he is the best friend of her suitor, Hastings. The odd thing about Marlow is that he is terribly shy around upper-class women, and therefore often seduces lower-class women instead. Mrs. Hardcastle wants Constance to marry her cousin, Tony, so that Constance’s inherited jewels stay in the family. Constance tells Kate that she pretends to be willing to marry Tony so that Mrs. Hardcastle won’t suspect she loves Hastings. Lucky for Constance, Tony doesn’t want to marry Constance any more than she wants to marry him.

The scene changes to a bar, where Tony is drinking with a group of lower-class men. The bar’s owner says that two fashionable-looking men have arrived who say they are looking for Mr. Hardcastle’s house. Tony realizes that this must be Marlow and decides to trick Marlow into believing Hardcastle’s house is an inn.

Act II begins with Hardcastle trying to teach his servants how to behave in front of his guests. Soon after, Marlow and Hastings arrive at what they believe to be an inn. Hardcastle enters and tries to engage his guests in conversation, but the two young men ignore what he says, believing him to be a lowly innkeeper. Hardcastle is shocked by their rude, presumptuous treatment of him.

Marlow insists on being shown his room, so Hardcastle accompanies him. When Hastings is left alone, Constance enters. Upon hearing that Hastings believes he is in an inn, she guesses it is a trick of Tony’s. Hastings says that they should keep Marlow’s mistake from him, because he will be embarrassed and leave immediately if he learns the truth. Hastings urges Constance to elope with him, but she is reluctant to lose her fortune: the jewels, which she will only inherit if she marries with her aunt’s permission. She promises to run away with him once she has the jewels.

Marlow returns, complaining that Hardcastle will not leave him alone. Hastings tells Marlow that by coincidence, Constance and her cousin Kate are both at this inn. Marlow freezes in anxiety. Kate enters and tries to engage Marlow in conversation, but once Hastings and Constance leave Kate and Marlow alone, Marlow is too nervous to complete his sentences or even look at Kate’s face. He ends the conversation abruptly and rushes off. Before exiting the stage, Kate reflects to herself that, if he weren’t so shy, she would be interested in him.

Tony and Constance enter, followed by Hastings and Mrs. Hardcastle. Constance makes a show of flirting with Tony for Mrs. Hardcastle, while he tries to repel her advances. Hastings chats with Mrs. Hardcastle, points out Constance and Tony, saying that they are betrothed. Tony objects to this loudly. Hastings tells Mrs. Hardcastle that he will try to talk some sense into Tony, and Constance and Mrs. Hardcastle exit. Hastings reveals to Tony that he loves Constance and wants to elope with her. Tony is thrilled and promises to help the couple any way he can.

Act III begins with Hardcastle and Kate comparing their very different impressions of Marlow. He expresses shock at Marlow’s boldness, while she finds him incredibly shy. Kate convinces her father that they should give Marlow another chance to see what his true character is.

Tony presents Hastings with a box containing Constance’s jewels, which he stole from his mother’s drawers. Constance and Mrs. Hardcastle enter, and Hastings exits. Constance tries to convince her aunt to let her try on her jewels, but Mrs. Hardcastle will not relent. Tony suggests that Mrs. Hardcastle tell Constance the jewels are missing, which she does, upsetting Constance deeply. Tony reassures Constance privately, telling her that he gave her jewels to Hastings, who is preparing for their elopement. Meanwhile, Mrs. Hardcastle has discovered the jewels are missing. Tony teases his distressed mother, and the two of them exit.

Kate enters accompanied by her maid Pimple and wearing the old-fashioned dress her father prefers. She has learned about Tony’s prank and laughs at Marlow’s belief that he is in an inn. Pimple says that Marlow mistook Kate for the inn’s barmaid. Kate says she will take advantage of the mistake, which will enable him to talk to her without such shyness. Pimple exits, and Marlow enters. Kate, pretending to be a maid, speaks to Marlow in the accent of a lower-class woman. Marlow finds her beautiful and immediately begins to flirt with her. He tries to kiss her, but Hardcastle walks into the room and sees them. Marlow flees the room, and Hardcastle tells Kate he is determined to throw Marlow out of his house. Kate persuades her father to give her time to prove to him that Marlow is not what he seems.

Act IV begins with Constance and Hastings planning their elopement. Constance tells Hastings that she has heard Sir Charles will soon be arriving, and Hastings tells Constance that he has entrusted her box of jewels to Marlow to keep them safe. They both exit.

Marlow enters, congratulating himself on thinking to give the box of jewels to the landlady (i.e., Mrs. Hardcastle) to keep it safe. Hastings enters, and Marlow tells him he stashed the jewels securely with the landlady. Hastings conceals his disappointment that Mrs. Hardcastle has the jewels back and leaves.

Hardcastle enters and begins to argue with Marlow, whose servants have gotten drunk. Storming away, Hardcastle says he would never have predicted such rudeness from Sir Charles’s son. Marlow is confused by this remark, but at that moment, Kate enters. Marlow, beginning to understand something is amiss, asks Kate where they are, and she tells him that they are at Mr. Hardcastle’s house. Marlow is horrified at his error. Kate does not yet reveal her true identity, pretending instead to be a poor relation of the family. Marlow announces his departure, and Kate weeps at the news. He is touched to see how much she cares about him.

Tony and Constance discuss her plan to elope with Hastings, even without the jewels. Mrs. Hardcastle enters and the two cousins pretend to flirt so she won’t suspect the planned elopement. A letter comes from Hastings addressed to Tony, but because Tony cannot read, his mother reads it to him. The letter reveals the plan for the elopement. Mrs. Hardcastle is furious and tells Constance she is sending her far away to Aunt Pedigree’s house. Hastings enters and yells at Tony for giving away the secret. Marlow enters and yells at both Tony and Hastings for deceiving him about where he is. Constance is utterly distraught and begs Hastings to stay faithful to her even if they have to wait several years to marry. After Constance leaves, Tony tells Hastings to meet him in the garden in two hours, promising to make it all up to him.

In Act V, Hardcastle and the newly arrived Sir Charles laugh over Marlow’s having mistaken the home for an inn. Hardcastle says that he saw Marlow take Kate’s hand and he thinks they will marry. Marlow enters and formally apologizes to Hardcastle. Hardcastle says it doesn’t matter, since Marlow and Kate will soon marry, but Marlow denies having feelings for Kate. When Hardcastle refuses to believe him, Marlow storms out. Kate enters and assures the two fathers that Marlow likes her. She tells the two fathers to hide behind a screen in half an hour to see proof of Marlow’s feelings.

Out in the garden, Tony arrives and tells Hastings that he has driven his mother and Constance in a circle instead of taking them to Aunt Pedigree’s house. Mrs. Hardcastle is terrified, thinking they are lost in dangerous territory. Hastings rushes off to find Constance. Elsewhere in the garden, Hastings tries to convince Constance to elope with him. She says she is too exhausted from the stress of the night to run off. Instead she wants to explain their situation to Hardcastle and hope that he can influence his wife to allow their marriage.

Inside the house, Hardcastle and Sir Charles hide behind a screen and watch Marlow and Kate talk. Kate no longer pretends to be a barmaid, but speaks in her normal voice. Marlow says he wishes he could stay with her, but he does not want to disappoint his family by marrying someone of lower birth. Kate tells him she has the same background as the woman he came to see. Marlow kneels before her, and the two fathers burst out from behind the screen, asking why he lied to them about his feelings for Kate. Marlow learns Kate’s true identity and is embarrassed again at having been so deceived.

Mrs. Hardcastle and Tony enter (Mrs. Hardcastle having realized where she is). Mrs. Hardcastle says that Constance and Hastings have run off together, but she is consoled by the fact that she will get to keep Constance’s jewels. At that moment, however, Hastings and Constance enter. Sir Charles recognizes Hastings and tells Hardcastle that he is a good man. Hardcastle asks Tony if he is really sure that he doesn’t want to marry his cousin. Tony says he is sure, but that it doesn’t matter, since he cannot formally refuse to marry Constance until he is twenty-one. Hardcastle then reveals that Mrs. Hardcastle has been hiding the fact that Tony is in fact already twenty-one. At this, Tony says he will not marry Constance, freeing her to marry Hastings and keep her fortune. Everyone except Mrs. Hardcastle is thrilled that the two young couples – Hastings and Constance, and Marlow and Kate – will marry.

Themes

Mistakes and Deceptions

An improbable series of deceptions and misunderstandings about characters’ identities propels the plot of She Stoops to Conquer, and at the center of these deceptions is the protagonist Marlow’s mistaken belief that the Hardcastle family—an elite family he hopes to impress—are lowly innkeepers. As a comedy of manners, the play uses its deceptions to bring its most pretentious and uppity characters down to earth by stripping them of their pompous self-assurance. More than simply humiliating these characters, however, the play’s deceptions prompt them to realize that they have misjudged themselves and their surroundings. Most notably, Marlow’s rude and condescending treatment of the Hardcastles provides all the play’s upper-class characters an opportunity to become less vain and affected. Thus, deception somewhat paradoxically enables them to see themselves and others for who they truly are.

Throughout the play, seemingly harmless tricks and trivial mistakes accumulate into a tangled mess of misunderstandings. For example, for the greater part of the play, Marlow mistakenly thinks Hardcastle is an innkeeper and treats him as an inferior. Hardcastle, who thinks that Marlow has come to his home to woo his daughter, is understandably shocked and confused by his guest’s rude and inappropriate behavior. This misunderstanding is played for comedic effect, particularly as Hardcastle (who views himself as wise, venerable, and dignified) struggles to make sense of Marlow’s insults. Toward the end of the play, Tony tricks his mother into believing that they are forty miles away in a dangerous neighborhood (when in fact they are in their backyard), which pokes fun at Mrs. Hardcastle’s naïveté and privilege, as the prank reveals that she is unable to recognize her own backyard.

Not every act of deception in the play is lighthearted, but even tricks that are meant to manipulate others are always revealed before serious harm is done. Mrs. Hardcastle pretends that Constance’s inherited jewelry has been lost because she wants to manipulate Constance into marrying Tony, thereby keeping the jewelry in her family. Tony, however, saves Constance from ruin by pulling her aside to reassure her of the jewelry’s whereabouts. Mrs. Hardcastle also deceives Tony about his own age so that she can keep him under her control and continue to pressure him to marry Constance, but when Hardcastle recognizes the unfair way his wife is manipulating her son, he instantly tells Tony the truth. That none of the play’s many tricks ever gets out of hand ensures that the play’s tone remains lighthearted (it is a comedy, after all), and allows the moral lessons that the characters learn to resonate more, since they’re not too hurt in the process of learning.

The connection between deception, mistakes, and moral lessons is made clearest through Marlow, whose social and romantic life is crippled due by his shyness and his vain fear of embarrassment. Through being tricked into believing that Sir Hardcastle’s home is an inn and subsequently mistaking Kate for a barmaid, Marlow humiliates himself publicly, which paradoxically cures him of his worst flaws. Although publicly humiliating Marlow in this way is somewhat cruel (particularly since this is a deep fear of his), the play never casts judgement on those who deceive him, as their actions are lighthearted and not meant to be cruel. For example, when Tony tricks Marlow and Hastings into believing that Sir Hardcastle’s home is an inn, he simply means to get the better of the men (whom he sees as uppity fops from the city) and to pull a funny prank on his stepfather in the process, not to hurt either of them. Though Hastings quickly learns of the deception, he decides to allow Marlow to persist in the misunderstanding because he fears Marlow will be too embarrassed if he learns the truth, and Marlow is unable to cope with embarrassment. This is an ambiguous moral choice, however, since Hastings—who is Marlow’s closest friend—knows that Marlow has come on this visit for the sole purpose of impressing the Hardcastles and will make a fool of himself if he goes on believing they are innkeepers. Hastings’ choice is ultimately vindicated, though, because allowing Marlow to behave in an embarrassing way for so long enables him to finally overcome his own shyness and vanity. Similarly, Kate fooling Marlow into believing that she is a barmaid could be seen as a cruel and humiliating prank, but Kate’s intentions are good. As Kate wants to woo Marlow, but Marlow’s fear of embarrassment leaves him too intimidated by upper-class women to get to know them, she realizes that she can only get his attention by deceiving him about her class background. Unlike Tony, who deceived Marlow as a prank, Kate allows him to continue in his misconception because she believes (correctly) that this it will ultimately lead to his learning something important about himself—namely, that he has feelings for her and wants to marry her.

Ultimately, the sustained ordeal of Marlow’s public embarrassment—which is itself the result of a whole host of mistakes and deceptions—makes him a better person, as he is finally able to laugh at himself and stop living in terror of embarrassment. Although he has behaved rudely to both Kate and her father, they are both willing to look past these mistakes and focus on his positive qualities, which are newly and abundantly self-evident. The family’s certainty that Marlow is worthy of Kate suggests that Marlow’s experiences of deception and embarrassment have benefited him by teaching him to open up to a woman he respects and enabling her to help him become a better version of himself.

Class and Geography

She Stoops to Conquer takes place in England in the 18th century, a time when British society was still rigidly divided along traditional class lines, but was in the midst of a geographic shift that complicated class distinctions, as both poor and rich were leaving rural areas in droves and moving to the cities. Although the upper class in the city was not technically superior to the upper class living in the countryside, urban aristocrats were seen as more sophisticated, refined, and fashionable than country-dwelling gentry. The gentry (like Hardcastle and his family) were seen as more rustic, and therefore closer in outlook to the lower classes, who had little education. She Stoops to Conquer is an extended interaction between city and country folks as well as between masters and servants, and through this extended interaction the play suggests that those who believe that greater wealth and status make them better or wiser than others are kidding themselves.

Throughout the play, members of the upper class attempt to assert their high status by treating those with a lower social status rudely, or even abusively. This behavior was not considered unusual or inappropriate in 18th century England, but in this play such behavior often backfires, making a fool of the person who acted highhandedly rather than the lower-class person being berated. Marlow in particular treats those he believes to be beneath him with contempt. He treats Hardcastle highhandedly when he believes him to be an innkeeper, interrupting his stories, ordering him around, and generally making himself at home in his house without asking permission to do so. Marlow’s eventual realization that he has been tricked by the rowdy country bumpkin Tony into thinking Hardcastle’s home is an inn is a victory for the countryside over the city—for, even though he is poorly educated and boorish, Tony has gotten one over on the well-educated, cosmopolitan Marlow, which shows that living in the city does not necessarily make someone more intelligent, clever, or sophisticated.

Feeling anxious that his home and family will fail to impress Marlow, Hardcastle sets out to make his high status clear by teaching his servants to be more servile before Marlow arrives. In a haughty and domineering lesson, which he peppers with insults, Hardcastle instructs his servants on how not to act like his equal in front of his guests. However, it’s clear that the relations between him and his servants are typically much more equal and collegial. When Diggory says that Hardcastle must be sure not to tell a certain particularly funny story if he wants the servants to keep from laughing, master and servants immediately share a nostalgic laugh, reflecting the warm relationship that they actually share. In this way, the play lightly mocks both Marlow and Hardcastle by showing how little a person gains by treating others as beneath them.

The play doesn’t simply poke fun at people who are pompous and disrespectful—it also models more egalitarian behavior. Kate in particular (an upper-class woman who pretends to be poor) embodies an unpretentious attitude that mixes the attributes of both country and city, while treating servants with respect. Kate shows an ability to flexibly move between the high and the low when she changes from the fashionable dress of rich, young, city-dwelling women into a more modest and practical dress. She also clearly feels no need to assert her superiority by abusing her servants, as evidenced by her congenial relationship with her handmaid, Pimple, through whom Kate learns that Marlow has mistaken her for a barmaid. Kate speaks confidingly to Pimple about her plan to deceive Marlow, showing her respect for Pimple. Kate also shows a remarkable flexibility in being able to convincingly act out the roles of women with three different social statuses. First, Kate pretends to be a very proper and upright woman, then she pretends to be a poor, uneducated barmaid, and finally she pretends to be a poor relative of the family who works as a housekeeper, but is just as well-born and well-educated as Kate. In each of these roles, Kate also manages to show her wit, her modesty, her sensitivity, and her capacity to love. By shapeshifting across class lines without any loss of her own personality or dignity, Kate shows that class is more of a performance than an innate reflection of a person’s worth.

She Stoops to Conquer is not advocating for a change in British class structure—if it were, Marlow would likely have had to face some retributive justice for his poor treatment of the lower class. Instead, this behavior is considered forgivable, but misguided. Therefore, rather than presenting a full-throated critique of the British class system, the play shows that outward expressions of superiority often make a fool of a person, and that class distinctions, while they shouldn’t necessarily be abolished, shouldn’t be taken too seriously, either.

Courtship and Love

She Stoops to Conquer, like most comedies of its time, is a story about courtship and the obstacles couples overcome on their way to marriage. Unlike other plays, however, this play satirizes the exaggeratedly complex obstacles often faced by lovers in other dramas of the time, and emphasizes instead how an individual’s psychology can create impediments to developing a romantic relationship. Through the character of Marlow, who is unable to interact with women of his own class because he is so afraid of embarrassing himself, the play explores the battle that goes on inside someone who is anxious about courtship and marriage. In the end, the play provides solid dating advice: don’t be scared to be yourself, give new people a chance, and when trouble arises be sure to forgive and forget.

Many of the romantic comedies of the period were sentimental comedies: they often chronicled star-crossed lovers who were separated by tyrannical parents, class difference, and other dramatic obstacles. Goldsmith found these works overblown and a bit ridiculous, and made a point of deciding to write about three relatively normal couples in this play. Constance and Hastings love each other. They are of same class and were even given Constance’s father’s blessing before his death. However, Constance’s guardian Mrs. Hardcastle seeks to impede their marriage because she wants Constance to marry her son Tony, thereby keeping Constance’s inheritance in her family. In most melodramatic plays of this type, Constance would be likely to elope with Hastings, saying she would rather live in poverty with him than be rich without him. Constance undermines this convention, arguing quite practically that they will regret it later if they give up her fortune now. Even more unusual for the dramatic conventions of Goldsmith’s day, the two other couples have few real obstacles to marriage. Kate and Marlow both have parents who promise not to force them to marry anyone they do not like, and they are both from the same class. Marlow has plenty of money and his family doesn’t care that Kate doesn’t have as much. Their path to matrimony is almost comically clear. Similarly, Tony thinks that he is unable to marry the girl of his choice, Bet Bouncer, because he is not old enough to marry without his mother’s permission. When his stepfather informs him that he is actually older than he thought, all obstacles are removed.

The true obstacle to the central couple’s happy union is Marlow’s shyness. Marlow is afraid to court a woman he might actually like and respect because he fears rejection and humiliation. Rather than face the nerve-wracking process of pursuing a serious relationship, he turns to one-night stands with women he doesn’t care about. The women Marlow chooses for his one-night stands are lower-class women, whom he hits on aggressively and often pays to sleep with him. The sexual aggression of young, wealthy men towards poor women was common in 18th century England, and while such behavior would now certainly be seen as sexual harassment, assault, or prostitution, at the time people thought that “boys will be boys” and believed that the bad behavior would end once a man was happily married. This is certainly the expectation for Marlow, who says that what he really wants is a relationship with a respectable woman, but he is too nervous and self-conscious to pursue one. In his initial conversation with Kate, Marlow is so uncomfortable that he loses his normal eloquence and can hardly speak. Although he never looks at Kate for long enough to even see her face clearly, he comforts himself that she was not attractive and there was no opportunity wasted. By presenting herself first as a lowly barmaid, then as a housekeeper, and finally as a well-bred woman, Kate gradually draws Marlow out of his shell and learns about his personality and values in the process. She likes what she sees. Once Marlow learns that Kate is not likely to sleep with him on a whim, he speaks eloquently and shows that he has values which she shares. He expresses respect for her, and then love. Once Kate reveals her true identity to Marlow, she teases him for the two very different ways he treated her when he thought she was two different women. But this is the affectionate teasing of someone who likes a person and finds their faults endearing, not the mocking rejection he always feared.

In the end, the play drives home that the obstacles to intimacy within an individual can be just as challenging to overcome as the dramatic, external obstacles the world puts in love’s way. It shows that a courtship is often not a process of two fully formed and self-assured people finding each other and then fighting to be together. Instead, the play shows a character for whom the hardest part of falling in love is allowing someone he respects grow close enough to see who he really is.

Parents and Children

She Stoops to Conquer shows the effect of parenting on a child’s character, even once that child becomes an adult. The play suggests that parents who smother their children, as well as parents who do not participate much in their children’s upbringing, tend to raise children who are not fully prepared for adulthood, or who reject their parents’ values. By allowing a child some freedom, but also remaining involved in the child’s life, a parent gives a child confidence while also earning their child’s gratitude and respect.

The dangers of smothering a child are on display in the relationship between Mrs. Hardcastle and her son Tony. Even though Tony is perfectly healthy, his mother has always treated him like a sick child in need of her constant care and nursing. As a result, she has kept Tony from receiving the education that would have been standard for most men of his class and he is functionally illiterate. Even though he is an intelligent person, this lack of education sharply limits Tony’s opportunities, making it unlikely that he will ever be able to do anything but live on his inheritance. In addition to crippling his potential, Mrs. Hardcastle’s controlling behavior leads her son to rebel against her. He often escapes to the nearby inn, avoiding his mother and spending time instead with people of a lower social status. He also wants to marry a woman who, based on his description, sounds like she is probably from a lower class background. All of Mrs. Hardcastle’s efforts to control her son have made him attracted to places and people she does not approve of. In the end, once Tony becomes an adult, he is determined to entirely reject his mother’s influence. Her overbearing parenting has caused her to lose her son’s respect and, therefore, she has lost her ability to influence or control him.

The dangers of being a distant parent are given less attention than the dangers of coddling, but Marlow’s upbringing hints at the drawbacks of hands-off parenting. Marlow has been educated at a boarding school and he spent the years of his early adulthood travelling abroad. He seems to have never had the social experiences that most young people in the upper class of the era had while living in their parents’ homes: visiting neighbors, attending balls, and participating in other social activities during which young men and women got to know one another. This lack of experience is part of the reason why he feels so shy around any woman who could potentially become his wife. Having received little input from his parents, Marlow still feels that they expect him to have learned how to be a gentleman and he fears that his actual aptitudes will let them down. He follows his father Sir Charles’s command to visit the Hardcastles because he feels it is his duty, but he lacks the confidence to court Kate. By ceding too much independence to their child at too young an age, Marlow’s parents left him without many of the experiences that would have properly socialized him, and he has not become a confident or socially capable adult.

The relationship between Hardcastle and Kate shows how a parent can strike the right balance of influencing and allowing a child freedom.  Kate and Hardcastle’s relationship is distinguished by mutual respect and trust. Teenagers and parents fight bitterly over teenagers’ clothes to this day, but instead of fighting, Kate and her father are able to strike a compromise: she dresses as she wants to in the morning, and as he would like her to in the evening. Kate’s trust in her father is demonstrated when Hardcastle tells Kate he has found a man for her to marry. Kate does not take this as a threat to force her into a life she does not want; even before her father tells her he would not force her to marry anyone she didn’t like, Kate knows and trusts her father enough to know that he would never do this. Hardcastle also shows his trust in Kate. When he sees Marlow (who believes at the time that Kate is a barmaid) grab Kate and try to kiss her, Hardcastle is tempted to throw Marlow out of his house. But Kate ultimately convinces her father to trust her that Marlow is not as bad as he seems to be. Worried, he asks her to promise that she will be open with him, and Kate replies, “I hope, sir, you have ever found that I considered your commands as my pride; for your kindness is such, that my duty as yet has been inclination.” This statement epitomizes the healthy relationship between this father and daughter; Kate never wants to disobey her father, because the kindness he shows her has always made her want to do what he says. The final proof of Hardcastle’s successful parenting of Kate is her maturity, self-confidence, and good character. Kate wants to marry exactly the man her father would have chosen for her, because she respects and shares his values. He has succeeded in imparting them to her while also showing trust in her own discretion and intellect.

The play shows what a delicate balance parents must strike to raise independent children who have confidence in themselves and trust in their parents, and who share the values their parents wanted to pass on. However, the play does not suggest that only a perfect person can be a good person. Hardcastle is eccentric: he only cares for old-fashioned things and hardly leaves his home in the country. He can also be brash and, in moments of anxiety, he can forget to show Kate that he trusts in her judgment. However, since he has shown Kate concern, love, and attention mixed with a deep trust in her growing capacity to make her own decisions, Hardcastle has succeeded in raising a daughter who listens to him with respect, but is capable of confidently making choices for herself as an adult.

Fashions and Tastes

As is typical of a comedy of manners, She Stoops to Conquer satirizes its characters’ rigid adherence to contemporary fashions by showing characters who exaggeratedly embody a number of different cultural trends. In the same way that people poke fun at the hipster subculture today, Goldsmith takes aim at the hipster of the 1770s through the character of Marlow the “macaroni”—a fashion-obsessed, travel-obsessed, manneristic type of young man often caricatured at the time. The play also skewers Tony Lumpkin (the country bumpkin), Hardcastle (the old-fashioned and long-winded veteran), and the status-obsessed Mrs. Hardcastle. The various characters’ obsessions with trends ultimately doesn’t serve them well at all, and in several instances creates hardship. Through its most well-adjusted characters (Kate and Hastings), the play suggests that individuals should intelligently weigh the fashions and tastes of the day and flexibly adopt only those parts of the culture that truly fit their situations.

Whether a character is fixated on old-fashioned ways or newfangled styles, the play demonstrates that fixation on any kind of fashion makes people too self-obsessed to pay adequate attention to their surroundings. The play’s two fashion-forward characters, Mrs. Hardcastle and Marlow, often fail to understand what is going on right in front of them. While Mrs. Hardcastle doesn’t visit the cities, she tries to keep up with the fashions described in magazines and asks the advice of her better-travelled friends. A desire to travel to fashionable places outside of the countryside becomes a fixation that keeps her from taking in her surroundings, so when Mrs. Hardcastle’s son Tony drives her in circles around her own house, he is able to trick her into believing she is forty miles away from home in a dangerous area. Marlow, however, has travelled far and wide and he tries to dress to impress by copying the latest fashions. But when he is actually face to face with Kate (the woman his exquisite garments are meant to impress), he is too self-conscious to even look at her face and gauge if he likes her.

However, the play’s characters who adhere to old-fashioned dress and manners are equally silly and unable to handle the world as those who are obsessed with newfangled styles, which shows that any rigid focus on style can make a person seem ridiculous. Hardcastle hasn’t renovated his house and he wears an old-fashioned wig. The old-fashioned style of his house is partially why Hastings and Marlow mistake the home for an inn, and the old-fashioned style of his wig allows him to be the butt of his stepson Tony’s practical jokes. Mr. Hardcastle’s immersion in old ways of doing things doesn’t just make him mockable—it also makes him insensitive to the world around him. He is withdrawn from the political concerns that most men of his class take an interest in, and he refuses to leave his home to travel, instead burying himself in memories of the good old days when he fought in the War of Spanish Succession. He insists on telling the same stories about his experience during the war, even though his listeners are bored with them. Mr. Hardcastle’s old-fashioned attitudes are eccentric for a man who could play a powerful role in the world of his day, so it is no stretch for Marlow to take him for an innkeeper suffering from delusions of grandeur.

While characters who are fixated on new and old styles are shown to be unaware of the world around them, characters who have no interest in matters of style at all are slightly more aware, but also socially dysfunctional. The rustic Tony Lumpkin is barely literate and he offends his step-father with his boorish, rude behavior, but he is able to get the best of characters like his mother and Marlow, because he has innate intelligence and is not distracted from reality by the vain concerns of the fashionable. However, the play is not advocating that everyone become ill-mannered and uneducated. Tony’s provincialism and lack of awareness lead him to be kept under his mother’s thumb, because he doesn’t know that he has already come of age and can collect his inheritance.

Being able to balance an interest in the trends of the present day with an appreciation for the old-fashioned is the hallmark of characters who are good judges of their surroundings, which suggests that people are best-served by maintaining a more moderate relationship to the ever-changing fashions of the day. Mr. Hastings is well-dressed, but he does not take himself or his personal style so seriously that he cannot pay attention to more important things, like wooing the woman he loves. He makes light jokes about the fashion-obsessed people around him, but does not take their concerns to heart. Kate represents the play’s ideal for how an individual should relate to the tastes of her time. She blends an interest in the current fashions with an awareness of the value of tradition, wearing the clothes popular among people of her own age in the morning and the clothes her father prefers at night. When she discovers that her old-fashioned clothing has led Marlow to take her for a barmaid, she turns the situation to her advantage, and, in each of their next encounters, she gradually shifts the persona she is playing until she has won Marlow’s heart.

In poking fun at the ways people do or don’t adhere to fashions, the play emphasizes the importance of individual judgment. It suggests that individuals should follow trends that interest them, and ignore the ones that hold no appeal. Regardless of whether people draw the image of their ideal selves from fashion magazines, they should remember that relationships are more important than being fashionable or maintaining traditions. An awareness of other people and a responsiveness to situations as they unfold should never be sacrificed in the name of trying to play a role.

Character

Charles Marlow

An aristocratic, well-educated, and handsome young man, Marlow has spent little time in polite society, instead spending much of his upbringing at school and in international travel. As a result, he lacks self-confidence in social settings and freezes up around women of his own class, who make him incredibly nervous. He often opts instead for seducing lower-class women, with whom he finds it easier to converse, as they do not intimidate him. Marlow arrives at Hardcastle’s home with his best friend, Hastings, having agreed to meet Kate Hardcastle and assess the prospect of marriage. However, he arrives at the Hardcastle’s home thinking that it is an inn, having been misdirected by Tony, and the process of untangling the complex mess of misunderstandings that ensues makes up the bulk of the play’s plot. Marlow falls in love with Kate over several meetings during which he feels comfortable around her because he thinks her to be of lower class, and by the end of the play they are engaged to marry. In this way, Marlow finds love with a woman of his own class despite his crippling shyness, thereby proving Tony’s initial, playful deception of Marlow to have been a fateful and fortunate twist.

Kate Hardcastle

An intelligent, good-humored, sensible, and beautiful young woman, Kate is confident in her own merits and appreciative of the good in those around her. She loves and respects her father, Hardcastle, and humors him by dressing in the old-fashioned manner he prefers half the time. Although she is interested in the fashions of her day, she does not define herself by how she dresses, but takes a flexible attitude towards self-presentation. Kate is at the age when most women of her time look for a husband, and she is interested in finding someone handsome and intelligent and settling down, so she is excited when her father tells her that Marlow, the son of his oldest friend, will pay them a visit to make her acquaintance. Kate is perceptive and able to think on her feet, so when she learns that Marlow is shy around women of his own class but bold around lower-class women—and, what’s more, has mistaken her in her old-fashioned dress for a servant—she quickly turns the situation to her advantage and begins impersonating a member of the lower class. Kate’s decision to pretend to be a member of the lower class to win Marlow’s heart is the “stooping” referred to in the play’s title. This stratagem succeeds in helping Kate and Marlow to get to know one another and learn that they like each other, and enables Kate to “conquer” by winning Marlow’s heart and his hand in marriage.

Constance Neville

A young woman of marriageable age, Constance is kind, affectionate, and practical. Since the death of her father, her aunt—Mrs. Hardcastle, who wants Constance to marry her son Tony—has served as her guardian. Constance is in love with Hastings but does not want to marry without her aunt’s permission because this would mean forgoing the jewels she is supposed to inherit. She tries to deceive her aunt in various ways that she hopes will help her to escape her guardian’s control, but to no avail. Constance is a cultured and cultivated woman and therefore unlikely to be a good match for the rascally Tony. Her name suggests an association with the city, not the countryside, because (in French) “né” means “born” and “ville” means “town.” Thus, in the play’s dramatized opposition between the provincial and the cosmopolitan, Constance’s character is aligned with the cosmopolitan. Although Constance doesn’t want to marry Tony, she appreciates his good qualities. By the end of the play, she has secured her inheritance and is engaged to marry Hastings, just as she had hoped.

George Hastings

Fashionable, well-educated, and good-natured, Hastings is Marlow’s best friend and Constance’s suitor. Unlike Marlow, he is unconstrained in social situations and doesn’t take fashion too seriously. Hastings hopes to encourage Marlow to gain confidence so that he can build a real relationship with a woman he respects. Hastings is a romantic, willing to give up Constance’s fortune to marry her immediately. Desperate to elope with Constance while he has the chance, he enlists Tony’s help in deceiving Mrs. Hardcastle. Hastings name is suggestive of his character in that he wants to marry Constance with haste; he refuses to wait, even if it means that Constance forfeits her fortune.

Hardcastle

An old-fashioned gentleman who owns an old house in the countryside, Hardcastle is stuck in his ways and despises modern trends. He fought in the War of Spanish Succession and likes to tell stories of his time during the war. He is protective of his daughter, Kate, indulgent to his wife, Mrs. Hardcastle, and disapproves of his unpolished and rowdy stepson, Tony. Even though he dislikes modern society and leads a relatively isolated life, he does not wish to be thought of as an irrelevant old fogey. Hardcastle expects to be treated with respect by everyone he meets, so he is appalled by the ill-treament he receives from his friend SirCharles’s son, Marlow. Hardcastle may be eccentric, but he is fair-minded. Therefore, when he sees that his wife’s lies are preventing Tony, Constance, and Hastings from finding happiness, he reveals the truth they need to know to be freed to make their own ways in the world without her interference.

Mrs. Hardcastle

A vain, greedy, sentimental, and manipulative woman, Mrs. Hardcastle has lived all her life in the countryside but is obsessed with what is fashionable in the city. She has spoiled her son Tony and hopes to control him for as long as possible, even going so far as to lie to him about his age in order to keep him under her thumb. She is the guardian to her niece, Constance, whose father and mother are dead, and hopes to force her to marry Tony to keep Constance’s fortune in the family.

Tony Lumpkin, Esquire

Clever but uneducated and rustic, Tony Lumpkin is sick of his mother Mrs. Hardcastle’s domineering personality and eager for the time when he will inherit a substantial fortune and be able to act more independently. Tony was never sent to school as a child, because his mother considered him too sickly, although it seems that this may have only been in her imagination. He passes his time by drinking with lower-class men from the area, making up humorous songs, and playing pranks on his family members, especially his stepfather Hardcastle, who disapproves of Tony’s behavior. Tony wants to marry a rustic woman from the area, Bet Bouncer, but his mother hopes to convince him to marry his cousin, Constance—which would keep Constance’s fortune in the family. Even though Tony is less cultivated than the other characters, he has great stores of natural intelligence. Although his jokes are sometimes crude, he also uses pranks as an equalizer, to prove those who think they are better than him wrong.

Aunt Pedigree

Constance’s aunt who lives a two-hour drive from the Hardcastles. Mrs. Hardcastle intends to send Constance to Aunt Pedigree when she learns that Constance hopes to elope with Hastings, but Tony drives Constance and Mrs. Hardcastle in circles and they never arrive, so Aunt Pedigree never appears onstage. Aunt Pedigree’s name is suggestive of her role: she is meant to protect the family pedigree from marriages that do not get family approval.

Symbol

Clothing

Clothing is a marker of class status and sophistication, but not an absolutely accurate one. Looks can be deceiving, and characters in the play who read too much into clothing can be deceived by those who see what is going on underneath the surface. Mrs. Hardcastle and Marlow are both too fixated on their clothing and the clothing of others to be able to see the truth about the characters around them. At the same time, Mr. Hardcastle’s stubborn insistence on dressing himself and his family in an old-fashioned style leads Marlow to easily mistake him for an innkeeper and his daughter for barmaid. The way the characters dress signal something about them, but far from everything. Thus, clothing comes to symbolize the often-superficial nature of first impressions and appearances.

Inns

Throughout She Stoops to Conquer, the inn is a place in which the expectation of upper-class etiquette and civility is suspended. Hardcastle’s house resembles an inn because he has not redecorated it (often, large houses like his were turned into inns if their owners went bankrupt and had to sell them). So the Hardcastles’ house seems—to Marlow at least—like a place where social conventions were once observed, but have since faded away with the sale of the house to members of a lower class. Thus, Marlow and Hastings feel entitled to do whatever they want in Hardcastle’s home, as long as they pay “the innkeeper” (i.e., Hardcastle himself). Marlow sits in the best chair, demands alcohol, and takes his boots off in the living room to demand that they be shined. He also grabs Kate in an aggressive attempt at seducing her because he believes she is a barmaid—another thing to which he can help himself as long as he pays. Because Marlow has spent so much time in inns, breaking the rules of polite society by drinking and seducing maids, he is uncomfortable in polite society. A normal social situation like meeting the Hardcastles makes him so nervous that he tries too hard and ends up seeming shy and formal. Thus, the inn becomes a symbol not only for indecorous behavior, but for the falseness of the veneer of upper-class refinement and civility.