Love and Honour (play)

Sir William Davenant, author of Love and Honour

Love and Honour is a Restoration tragicomedy by English Renaissance theatre playwright Sir William Davenant which was produced at his playhouse Lisle's Tennis Court in Lincoln's Inn Fields in London for a 12-day run in October 1661 and which featured Thomas Betterton as Prince Alvaro and Hester Davenport as Evandra.

The work had previously been performed in 1633 as The Courage of Love (licensed 20 November 1634) by the King's Men at Blackfriars Theatre[1] and had been renamed The Nonpareilles, or The Matchless Maids (printed 1649)[2][3][4] by Sir Henry Herbert, Master of the Revels, at Davenant's request, who was unhappy with the original title. Popular in its day, The Nonpareilles was revived by order of Queen Henrietta Maria, consort of Charles I, in a performance at Hampton Court during the plague of 1636-37 when the theatres were closed.[5]

The play, in which one woman is willing to sacrifice herself to save a close female friend, was described as resembling the works of Shakespeare and, while set in Savoy, had no historical basis. The work concerned the fictional Duke of Savoy and his son Prince Alvaro (the latter played by Thomas Betterton), who in the role was resplendent in the suit worn by Charles II at his Coronation earlier that year. Henry Harris played Prince Prospero and wore the Coronation suit of the James, Duke of York, while Joseph Price, who played Leonell, son of the Duke of Parma, wore a suit provided by the Earl of Oxford.[5][6][7]

Samuel Pepys in his famous Diary recorded seeing Love and Honour three times in four days in October 1661, observing on the latter visit "and a very good play it is".[8][9][10][11] The diarist John Evelyn also attended a performance.[12]

  1. ^ William Davenant - Playwrights and their Stage Works
  2. ^ Sir William Davenant (1606-1668)- Theatre Database
  3. ^ Love and Honour written by W. Davenant, Knight. London: Printed for Humphrey Robinson at the Three Pidgeons, and Humphrey Moseley at the Princes Armes in St. Pauls Church-yard (1649)
  4. ^ Love and Honour (The Courage of Love) (The Nonpareilles, or The Matchless Maids) - A Digital Anthology of Early Modern English Drama - Folger Shakespeare Library
  5. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Collins was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Sir William Davenant, Dramatists of the Restoration: Sir William D'Avenant, Volume 3, William Paterson, Edinburgh and H. Sotheran & Co., London. (1873) - Google Books
  7. ^ Performance of Love and Honour - The Diary of Samuel Pepys: Daily entries from the 17th century London diary
  8. ^ William Davenant - Dictionary of National Biography (DNB) pg. 103
  9. ^ The Diary of Samuel Pepys: Daily entries from the 17th century London diary - 21 October 1661
  10. ^ The Diary of Samuel Pepys: Daily entries from the 17th century London diary - 23 October 1661
  11. ^ The Diary of Samuel Pepys: Daily entries from the 17th century London diary - 25 October 1661
  12. ^ Wiltshire Stanton Austin & John Ralph, The Lives of the Poets-Laureate: Sir William Davenant, Richard Bentley, New Burlington Street, London - Publisher in Ordinary to Her Majesty (1853)