Week 05, E. Bulwer-Lytton and Dion Boucicault

Notes on Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s Money

Act 1, Scene 1

Sir John Vesey expects that his daughter Georgina will be the main heir of the extremely wealthy Mr. Mordaunt (who made his money in India), her maternal uncle. Vesey is himself an admitted “humbug” who has parlayed a clever habit of seeming to be what he is not into a successful life. The opposite of Othello’s rule holds here—the noble Moor of Venice had said that people should be what they seem. But since Vesey’s life is a selfish one and he has nothing to leave behind, his daughter Georgina must marry well or inherit, as she now seems likely to do. Sir Frederick Blount, a dandy with a comic lisp, was the chosen object once, but now he seems too middling. Vesey is the sort of character Oscar Wilde would later describe with so much aplomb: the man who is always conscious that he lives “in an age of surfaces,” that it’s only appearances that count because after all, there are only appearances. Of course, Sir John lacks the genuine charm of, say, Mr. Ernest Worthing or Algernon Moncrieff from The Importance of Being Earnest since the venality of Bulwer-Lytton’s character is apparent, whereas Wilde’s rascals and frivolitarians remain almost innocent even when at their most calculating in pursuit of love, good birth, and the appearance of moral propriety.

Alfred Evelyn, Georgina’s impoverished but Cambridge-educated cousin, is employed by Sir John as a private secretary. As for Clara, another cousin, Sir John didn’t want the expense of caring for her as guardian, so he palmed her off on his half-sister Lady Franklin, who is able to sum up the character of others admirably, as she does Blount’s.

Evelyn soon gives Sir John an opportunity to show some charity, which of course he fails to do. Georgina promises to take care of Evelyn’s nurse’s rent, but we’re told that Clara, too, has peeked at the nurse’s address, and she and Lady Franklin conspire to pay the debt.

Evelyn, who is a bit of a moralist, laments his straitened circumstances, against which his talent and learning can avail nothing, and denounces the insolence of others in their contempt for virtue. When he proposes to Clara in his high-flown way, she rejects him with the excuse that neither of them have enough to make their way in the world. Obviously, he feels that she is rejecting him as unworthy of her simply because he is poor.

Stout the fervent political economist enters and is treated to a sardonic recitation of his own heartless principles by Evelyn. Stout, of course, doesn’t get the joke, and Glossmore’s alleged charitable feelings amount to nothing more than forcing the poor on the parish. Stout’s grinch-like brand of opinion is a fine example of the laissez-faire worship that authors such as Thomas Carlyle (not to mention England’s radical leftist or egalitarian groups) denounced as abstractionist “enchantment” that would posit so-called universal laws (competition, supply and demand, etc.) and then insist that humanity conform itself to them or else.

Graves, supposedly a melancholy worshiper of his dearly departed wife, “the sainted Maria,” enters to read Mr. Mordaunt’s will. Mordaunt has left a pittance to Stout, 500£ to Blount, a butterfly collection to Glossmore along with a pedigree list, and to Sir John Vesey, nothing but the empty bottles that used to contain the restorative Cheltenham waters Vesey sent him every year. To Graves he leaves 5,000£ in government stocks, and to Georgina, 10,000£ in India stock. Most of the old man’s wealth is left to Alfred Evelyn, our poor Cambridge scholar, whom of course everyone now befriends. Evelyn bemoans the gulf between himself and Clara, from whom he’s now separated by his wealth rather than his poverty. The reading of the will is often said to be the best part of the play since it stages for us the frustration of expectations—and consequent incivility—on the part of so many silly and unworthy characters.

What is set before us in this first act is that common Victorian theme: transformation (sometimes sudden) from poverty to wealth, status, and independence. This theme can be dealt with in a satirical manner, a sentimental manner, or with traces of both attitudes. That is, those who don’t deserve any of these things may get them anyway, with absurd results, or those who do deserve them may get them but only after much adversity and testing. Think of Dickens’ 1861 novel Great Expectations, in which young Pip, who at first appears to be a penniless urchin, turns out always to have been a gentleman-in-the-making, thanks to the watchfulness of his disreputable but kind benefactor Abel Magwich.

Evelyn attains his fortune, which is satisfying to us, but of course the comic plot is just getting under way, and comic plots turn upon the setting-up and overcoming of obstacles. The obstacle in this case is Evelyn’s own scruples about true love: he can’t bring himself to consider that he and Clara might just get married, and is “stuck on stupid,” we might say, wallowing in his own tragic sense of loss and stiff pride. The problem of this comedy is not altogether unlike the one we can find handled with more subtlety in Jane Austen’s Regency novel Persuasion (1816). In that work, Anne Elliot and captain Frederick Wentworth must overcome their mutual hesitation after Wentworth’s previous unsuccessful suit to her. (He had proposed before making his mark as an officer in the British Navy during the Napoleonic Wars, and Anne allowed herself to be dissuaded from accepting him.) But since this is a semi-satirical comedy, we should expect the breakthrough to come not through deep introspection and sensitive dialog but rather through clever contrivance and happy accident.

Act 2, Scene 1

Artisans of various kinds surround Evelyn like polite vultures, and he lets them have their way as adorners of his new status just to get rid of them. Glossmore and Stout, still having their aristocrat versus capitalist upstart argument, urge their respective candidates for parliament upon Evelyn, who has just bought a property named Groginhole, the honorable MP of which (Hopkins) is about to pass away. Stout is passionate for Popkins, while Glossmore favors the aptly named Cipher to support aristocratic interests.

Evelyn converses with his lawyer, Sharp, and with Graves, expatiating to the former about the evils of the mammon-worshiping world and explaining the situation with Clara to Graves. It seems that Evelyn has bribed Sharp to say a codicil in Mordaunt’s will had left 20,000£ to Clara. But in truth, Mordaunt had mentioned Clara in another respect, asking Evelyn to choose either her or Georgina as his wife. At this point, Evelyn’s one hope is that Clara is the one who paid his nurse’s rent, but he’s much more inclined to believe it was Georgina, and says that a marriage with such a woman might not be such a bad thing after all. He and Graves exit bantering over who is more “through” with romance.

Act 2, Scene 2

Lady Franklin explains Mr. Graves’ curious character traits to Clara, and wants to inform Evelyn that it was Clara who paid the nurse’s rent, not Georgina, but Clara makes her promise not to. Meanwhile, it’s clear that a romance is brewing between Lady Franklin and Mr. Graves. Next, Mr. Dudley Smooth enters the scene, a mortal danger to the financial health of moneyed young men. On the occasion of looking over some drawings Georgina has made, Evelyn pays court to Georgina to spite Clara, while Clara puts up with Blount to spite Evelyn. Sir John Vesey tries, apparently with success, to trick Evelyn into an assurance that it was indeed Georgina who acted charitably towards the poor nurse. Within earshot of Clara, Evelyn proposes to Georgina. Clara passes out, but awakens with Evelyn’s happiness on her lips. Essentially, this scene shows the wall of misunderstanding between Evelyn and Clara growing thicker, though of course the final moment in it shows that they are quite passionate about each other. The flirtation—if we can call it that—between Lady Franklin and Mr. Graves is hopeful since it underscores the inconstancy of men’s resolutions in matters of love. Mr. Graves wears his mourning like a fashion, and his pose, we can see, will easily give way.

Act 3, Scene 1

Sir John contrives to get Clara out of the house and away from Evelyn so she won’t spoil the match with Georgina. Sir John tells Clara that he had “innocently” tried to spare her the embarrassment of Evelyn’s finding out about her payment of the nurse’s rent, and she declares that she doesn’t want it known anyway. Evelyn and Clara engage in a conversation over their respective positions about the recent past. Evelyn is convinced that she spurned him for the worst reason, while she offers friendship at a distance since she plans to leave the country. Evelyn at least momentarily doubts his resolve, but the obstacle they face is perhaps at its greatest. Evelyn soon learns from Graves, however, that Sir John is after his money and that Georgina is paying court to the fop Sir Frederick Blount. Evelyn is determined to deceive these deceivers, and gets his opportunity when Graves tells him that Sir John is upset at reports of his gambling with Dudley Smooth, and worried that he may have put money in a failing bank. (Banks could and did sometimes fail disastrously in Victorian times—there was nothing like the FDIC protection to guarantee the solvency of banks in America since Franklin Roosevelt’s time.) Evelyn plots to increase Sir John’s alarm tenfold. Graves and Lady Franklin continue their odd courtship, she making what would pass for an advance in Victorian times and he still dissembling his interest in her with references to the sainted Maria. But the colorful scarf he wears gives his true intentions away.

Act 3, Scene 2

Lady Franklin dances Graves into a trap, and Sir John and others catch them dancing, much to Graves’ discomfiture. It seems that Lady Franklin, based on her prior acquaintance with Graves and his wife, is able to inhabit the memory of the “Sainted Maria,” and succeeds in getting the widower to enjoy himself by imitating moments from their past marital happiness.

Act 3, Scene 3

Evelyn conspires with Dudley Smooth to stage a disastrous gambling session, taking in Sir John altogether and alarming him at the prospect of a future son-in-law blowing his fortune without thinking twice. Sir John’s alarm probably isn’t unrealistic since it was fairly common, I believe, for young men to gamble or otherwise fritter their inherited wealth and estates away: it has been the ruin of many a well-to-do house, and a popular subject in art. Hogarth the eighteenth-century visual artist made it a study in his famous engravings entitled “A Rake’s Progress.”

Act 4, Scene 1

Smooth hoodwinks the tradesmen in whose credit Evelyn stands, while Evelyn plays Glossmore and Blount against each other—they realize that he has deviously borrowed from them both.

Act 4, Scene 2

Evelyn drives home his plot by making it plain to Georgina and Sir John just how hard up for ready cash he is, and all for gambling debts. He wants Georgina to “lend” him her 10,000£ settlement to pay off those debts, and speaks of retrenchment or resettling in the countryside so they can live more cheaply. Glossmore and Stout are still arguing over Popkins and Cipher for parliament at Groginhole, but now they learn that Evelyn is supposedly trying to get himself elected there. Smooth talks of taking possession of Evelyn’s estate, and Evelyn floats the possibility that his money is invested with an unsound bank. Graves, surprisingly, volunteers to pay a tradesman’s bill that threatens to land Evelyn in prison, and thereby wins Lady Franklin’s affections all the more. After all have gone, Evelyn and Smooth have a good laugh together.

Act 5, Scene 1

Stout finally informs Sir John that Evelyn is shamming them all, and Sir John abruptly drops his friendliness with Sir Frederick Blount, whom he had begun to think might make a good match with Georgina. Blount is insulted and schemes to get even—he still has designs on Georgina. Apparently, Evelyn has also managed to get himself elected to parliament for Groginhole, dashing the hopes of Popkins and Cipher.

Act 5, Scene 2

Graves makes it plain to Clara that it was Evelyn who had actually given her the money she thought was from the will. Clara is determined to help Evelyn, whom she still believes to be in financial distress, and she and Lady Franklin set off to find him.

Act 5, Scene 3

Evelyn and Graves cement their friendship still more, and at this point it appears from a letter that Georgina has been willing to cast her lot with Evelyn, who would be honor-bound to marry her. Clara enters with Lady Franklin and lets Evelyn know she’s aware that he is the one who awarded her the money from the will. They have an anguished discussion about the recent past, with Clara fully explaining her rationale for rejecting his suit: she would have been unable to assist him in the struggle to survive, and all the responsibility would fall on his shoulders, leading to humiliating failure. But these revelations seem to come too late since the match with Georgina is imminent.

Sir John enters and tries to gull Evelyn into thinking he doesn’t know the young man is still as rich as the day he inherited his money. But when Georgina makes her entrance and fails to catch on, the match is off. Evelyn learns that she isn’t willing to help him and that she wasn’t even responsible for the gift to help the impoverished nurse, either—that was Clara’s doing, as was the more recent 10,000£ credited to his account from Drummond’s Bank. Georgina and Blount are just the ticket for each other, and Evelyn good-naturedly steps in to double the promise to Blount of 10,000£ since Sir John is horrified at actually having to turn over that kind of money, his word notwithstanding. Graves proposes to Lady Franklin and is accepted, Evelyn learns that he has been elected to parliament, and he and Clara are free to marry. The play ends with everybody satisfied (except perhaps Glossmore and Stout, who are worried about Evelyn’s studiously non-partisan political affiliations), and a final pronouncement on the vital importance of having—”plenty of Money!”