SOURCE: Butler, Martin. “City Comedies: Courtiers and Gentlemen.” In Theatre and Crisis, 1632-1642, pp. 141-80. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984.

In the following excerpt, Butler examines the relationship between class and politics in Shirley's comedies, particularly as illustrated through the world of manners, drawing a close connection between the courtship behavior of Shirley's lovers and tensions in the Caroline court.

Town and Country

In his intelligent and complex play [The Weeding of Covent Garden], Brome finds in Covent Garden, the symbol of the new permanent gentry presence (and crossness) in London, an occasion for defending the gentry's developing political character and for making a general critique of the personal rule. In turning to Shirley's town plays we find a society more confident in its own autonomy, and one of Shirley's main aims, consequently, is simply the elucidation of the new codes of manners as they act as internal standards...