45 pages • 1 hour read
William CongreveThe Way of the World
Fiction | Play | Adult | Published in 1700A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Act IIChapter Summaries & Analyses
Act II Summary
Mrs. Marwood and Mrs. Fainall discuss their distaste for men, but Mrs. Marwood says she only pretends to hate men to earn Lady Wishfort’s favor. Mrs. Fainall says she even hates her own husband, and Mrs. Marwood confesses she was testing Mrs. Fainall. Mrs. Marwood says she would like to get married to torment her husband, and both women become nervous when they discuss Mirabell. Mirabell and Fainall enter, and Mrs. Fainall chooses to walk with Mirabell, noting that Fainall does not want to walk with his wife. When Mrs. Fainall and Mirabell leave, Fainall reveals his affair with Mrs. Marwood, but he accuses Mrs. Marwood and Mrs. Fainall of loving Mirabell. Mrs. Marwood denies the charge herself, but she admits that Mrs. Fainall may be in love with Mirabell. Fainall explains his plan to marry Mrs. Fainall, who was a widow, to get her money through Lady Wishfort’s death. Millamant stands to inherit half of Lady Wishfort’s fortune, but Lady Wishfort would disown Millamant if she married Mirabell. Fainall promises to inherit Mrs. Fainall’s wealth and run away with Mrs. Marwood. Fainall tells Mrs. Marwood to stop crying when they see Mirabell and Mrs. Fainall returning.
Mrs. Fainall tells Mirabell she hates Fainall, and Mirabell reveals their scheme to betray Fainall, secure a marriage between Mirabell and Millamant, and blackmail Lady Wishfort by tricking her into marrying Mirabell’s servant, Waitwell. They will pretend he is Mirabell’s aristocratic uncle to lure in Lady Wishfort. Witwoud, Millamant, and her servant Mincing approach, and Millamant is frustrated with Witwoud’s jokes. Millamant says she is glad she upset Mirabell the previous night, and he says she should be grateful that he feeds her vanity. Millamant tells Mrs. Fainall to come with her, but Mrs. Fainall takes Witwoud, leaving Mirabell and Millamant alone. Mirabell confesses his love to Millamant, who laughs at him and reveals that she knows Mirabell’s plan before leaving with Mincing. Waitwell and Foible approach, and Foible tells Mirabell that she told Lady Wishfort about Mirabell’s false uncle, Sir Rowland, promising to give Rowland a picture of Lady Wishfort. Mirabell gives Foible money, then he plans to disguise Waitwell as Sir Rowland. Waitwell jokes that he is getting married and knighted in the same day, but he is keeping the same wife.
Act II Analysis
Marwood and Mrs. Fainall’s conversation reveals The Complexities of Gender Dynamics in Personal and Financial Power, showing how the women of the play are often engaged more with the emotional components of relationships, while the men focus on wealth. Marwood and Mrs. Fainall both profess to “hate those vipers, men” (267), but they each secretly love Mirabell, while Marwood also loves Fainall. According to Marwood, though she claims she is being dishonest, publicly hating men is fashionable, and Mrs. Fainall accuses Marwood of “dissembling” her hatred “only in compliance with my mother’s humour” (266). These elements combine to create an image of upper-class women’s lives, in which they must suppress their interests around each other while conspiring with men for any chance at advancement. As Fainall explains, Marwood’s best chance at wealth and freedom is for Fainall to deceive Mrs. Fainall and run away with her money.
Two affairs are revealed in this act, as Fainall and Marwood expose their relationship to the audience, and Mirabell and Mrs. Fainall admit to a prior love affair. However, following The Manipulation of Appearances for Personal Gain, they are all engaged in an extended subterfuge to deceive each other and Lady Wishfort, all hoping to secure some portion of Lady Wishfort’s fortune. Nonetheless, when Mirabell is alone, he still professes his love for Millamant, saying, “There is no point of the compass to which they cannot turn, and by which they are not turned; and by one as well as another, for motion, not method, is their occupation” (276). Mirabell sees love as an inevitable force over which he has no control, though he notes how he still must “play the fool by the force of instinct” (276). In part, Mirabell wants Millamant’s money, but he also loves her genuinely, whereas Fainall does not have any love for Mrs. Fainall and only wants to secure her fortune.
The manipulation Mirabell then engages in focuses on removing Lady Wishfort’s hold over Millamant’s share of her fortune. When Foible and Waitwell enter, now married, Foible reports that she alerted Lady Wishfort of Sir Rowland’s arrival. However, Waitwell explains that he is “[m]arried, knighted, and attended all in one day! ‘Tis enough to make any man forget himself” (277). Waitwell’s joke is that he is truly married, but he is only pretending to be knighted and attended. Waitwell is going to perform the role of Sir Rowland, allowing Mirabell to embarrass Lady Wishfort, convince her to let him marry Millamant, and secure both his love and her money. The ending lines of this act, spoken by Waitwell, read, “Aye, there’s the grief; that’s the sad change of life, / To lose my title, and yet keep my wife” (277). This couplet plays on the stereotype of a man who resents his wife, but it also highlights the key difference between the men and women in the play. The men, like Waitwell, are more concerned with official status and wealth, while the women are more concerned with happiness and social success.
