In the context of the play, however, La Nuche’s decision is understandable. Learn how the author incorporated them and why. Even though he becomes increasingly involved in plans to orchestrate a forbidden relationship with Florinda, it is Florinda, not Belvile, who takes the initiative to alter their destiny; she both designs (and largely executes) the plan that leads them to marriage. Willmore remains a witty and tenacious hero. Angelica, too, is obsessed with money, and must crucially decide whether she will give her heart to Willmore for free, or hold out for the highest bidder. Ariadne at first resists the loveless marriage that has been arranged for her. Even Angelica, the prostitute who controls men through her beauty, becomes a victim.

More important, Behn avoids her contemporaries’ practice of reducing women either to virginal commodities or to corrupt whores. "My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." The line between the two is a blurry one, but an incredibly vital question within the play. They're like having in-class notes for every discussion!”, “This is absolutely THE best teacher resource I have ever purchased.

resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel. However attractive he may be, he willingly participates in a culture that demeans and endangers women. Although dangerous and potentially dishonorable, there is something undeniably attractive about Willmore’s free, roaming spirit—a sort of libertine approach to life and love that captures the imagination of and ignites desire in his love interests. Florinda has set her sights on Belvile, and Hellena is determined to escape what she considers a loathsome life as a nun. The Rover Servants, other Masqueraders, Men and Women. 1675). The Rover Themes. The Church of England positioned this obligation as a religious duty, while pervading seventeenth century economic as well as legal ideology supported the notion that matrimonial arrangements should be dictated by transmission and increase of family property rather than love (Staves, 13). Neither sister is prepared to accept the role that she has been assigned by their father, and both express multiple times their determination to disobey paternal (and fraternal) commands. Out themes are Fully Responsive Designs built on bootstrap, with Great Support. They... Why do many critics believe that Hellena is the Rover rather than Wilmore? Teachers and parents!

The Question and Answer section for The Rover is a great © 2020 eNotes.com, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Willmore in particular presents as a character who values very little the institution of marriage; he enters the play a “rover” not only in the traditional sense, but also in the terms of his sexual promiscuity—what Hellena likes to refer to as an “inconstancy” in his nature. Similar to other Restoration gallants, Willmore is an attractive, witty, free-spirited protagonist, who falls in love capriciously and desires sex without marriage. To further distinguish her female characters, Behn writes regularly witty and bawdy lines for some of her “chaste” female characters—particularly Hellena (Burke, 122). Or at least till I’m so old, I’m fit for nothing else. disobeying her father’s wishes that she become a nun), is so intent on marrying Willmore. In fact, Hellena admits to being in love with what she refers to as the Englishman’s “unconstant humor” (Behn, 85). Isn’t it enough for the two lovers to be united simply by love, rather than formally under the law?

Exhausted and bewildered, she accepts Beaumond in an effort to avoid the crushing masculine forces that humiliate Angelica and marginalize Hellena. SCENE Naples, in Carnival-time.

The female characters are intelligent and bawdy, feeling there is nothing wrong with their sexual behavior. The cavaliers constantly bemoan the fact that they do not have sufficient funds, while Don Pedro picks a husband for his sister based almost solely upon fortune. "The Rover" serves as an example of such a story; initially condemned to marry an old but financially secure Don Vincentio, Florinda eventually averts her preordained “destiny” with the help of her lover, Belvile, and several friends. Learn and understand all of the themes found in The Rover, such as Disguise. Love, courtship, and marriage. Once they are disguised, Florinda can actively seek Belvile, and Hellena can search for the romance she desires. Her characters are predominantly self-serving, and her plays never melt into the kind of sentimentality that distinguishes the drama of the later eighteenth century. From the creators of SparkNotes, something better. In the end, Hellena wins the Rover, but the audience must question his commitment to their marriage, a suspicion borne out in Part II, when Willmore nonchalantly mentions Hellena’s death as he seeks new romance in Madrid. Interestingly, however, his promiscuity and unfaithfulness does not entirely deter his female love interests. Consider, for example, Florinda and Belvile’s mutual efforts to be together, Hellena’s persistent pursuit of Willmore, or Don Pedro’s exhausting—and ultimately futile—efforts to set Florinda up with Don Antonio. Not only does Hellena actively disobey her bother’s orders in this scene, but she also effectively manages to convince her sister to join her in rebelling against restrictive patriarchal/fraternal commands. Consider Belvile, for example, who spends his time at the beginning of the play passively lamenting his predicament.

Blunt, for instance, is instantly a figure of fun as soon as the audience hears his dull, plodding speech; he becomes even more so when he…, Instant downloads of all 1360 LitChart PDFs Restoration comedy was especially known for being sexually explicit and... What is the character analysis of Willmore from Aphra Behn's The Rover? The fickle Willmore is likely to abandon her as quickly as he did Angelica. What are the roles fixed for Hellena and Florinda by their father and brother? In many ways, the characters of The Rover conform to the traditional gender roles found in comedies of the Restoration period: the dishonorable men, like Willmore, seek pleasure; the honorable men, like Belvile, seek to protect women; the honorable women, like Florinda, seek matrimony; and the dishonorable women, like Angelica and Lucetta, seek to ensnare men. -Graham S. “Would not have made it through AP Literature without the printable PDFs. The Rover undoubtedly contains some powerful female characters in sisters Florinda and Hellena. In their dialogue, Willmore and La Nuche savage the values of their society by equating marriage for money with prostitution. Both The Rover and The Man of Mode are perfect examples of English Restoration comedy, also called comedy of manners. Men bear swords and seek out violence; women are peaceful and are threatened by violence.

Willmore will continue to rove, and La Nuche may once again face the imperatives that drove her to prostitution.

The Rover study guide contains a biography of Aphra Behn, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis of the play. Flor. The Rover takes place at Carnival time, and brims with masks and disguises, from the gypsy costumes that Hellena, Florinda, and Valeria wear to Don Antonio’s and Don Pedro’s comedy of mistaken identities to Lucetta’s robbery of Blunt. Throughout "The Rover," each character pursues his or her respective ideal of romance and partnership, and it is through these efforts that we may come to better understand the ways in which the union between a man and woman—either in the informal sense of love, or the formal bond of matrimony—was conceived of in the seventeenth century, when Aphra Behn penned her most successful play. If so, how is it portrayed? And where does courtship play into the equation?

Hellena: And dost thou think that ever I’ll be a Nun? In Part II, Behn develops her feminist themes more strongly. Our, LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in. Consider Lucetta, for example, who designs and executes a clever albeit cruel plan to cheat Blunt out of his possessions. Major Themes in Aphra Behn's The Rover. Hellena is perhaps the most independent and outspoken of all female characters in "The Rover," but the theme of female agency can also be seen in other female characters.