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The Broken Heart: A Tragedy
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84 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1633
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About the author
John Ford
64 books41 followersJohn Ford (baptised 17 April 1586 – c. 1640?) was an English Jacobean and Caroline playwright and poet born in Ilsington in Devon in 1586.
Ford left home to study in London, although more specific details are unclear — a sixteen-year-old John Ford of Devon was admitted to Exeter College, Oxford on 26 March 1601, but this was when the dramatist had not yet reached his sixteenth birthday. He joined an institution that was a prestigious law school but also a centre of literary and dramatic activity — the Middle Temple. A prominent junior member in 1601 was the playwright John Marston. (It is unknown whether Ford ever actually studied law while a resident of the Middle Temple, or whether he was strictly a gentleman boarder, which was a common arrangement at the time.)
It was not until 1606 that Ford wrote his first works for publication. In the spring of that year he was expelled from Middle Temple, due to his financial problems, and Fame's Memorial and Honour Triumphant soon followed. Both works are clear bids for patronage: Fame's Memorial is an elegy of 1169 lines on the recently-deceased Charles Blount, 1st Earl of Devonshire, while Honour Triumphant is a prose pamphlet, a verbal fantasia written in connection with the jousts planned for the summer 1606 visit of King Christian IV of Denmark. It is unknown whether either of these brought any financial remuneration to Ford; yet by June 1608 he had enough money to be readmitted to the Middle Temple.
Prior to the start of his career as a playwright, Ford wrote other non-dramatic literary works—the long religious poem Christ's Bloody Sweat (1613), and two prose essays published as pamphlets, The Golden Mean (1613) and A Line of Life (1620). After 1620 he began active dramatic writing, first as a collaborator with more experienced playwrights — primarily Thomas Dekker, but also John Webster and William Rowley — and by the later 1620s as a solo artist.
Ford is best known for the tragedy 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (1633), a family drama with a plot line of incest. The play's title has often been changed in new productions, sometimes being referred to as simply Giovanni and Annabella — the play's leading, incestuous brother-and-sister characters; in a nineteenth-century work it is coyly called The Brother and Sister. Shocking as the play is, it is still widely regarded as a classic piece of English drama.
He was a major playwright during the reign of Charles I. His plays deal with conflicts between individual passion and conscience and the laws and morals of society at large; Ford had a strong interest in abnormal psychology that is expressed through his dramas. His plays often show the influence of Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy.
Ford left home to study in London, although more specific details are unclear — a sixteen-year-old John Ford of Devon was admitted to Exeter College, Oxford on 26 March 1601, but this was when the dramatist had not yet reached his sixteenth birthday. He joined an institution that was a prestigious law school but also a centre of literary and dramatic activity — the Middle Temple. A prominent junior member in 1601 was the playwright John Marston. (It is unknown whether Ford ever actually studied law while a resident of the Middle Temple, or whether he was strictly a gentleman boarder, which was a common arrangement at the time.)
It was not until 1606 that Ford wrote his first works for publication. In the spring of that year he was expelled from Middle Temple, due to his financial problems, and Fame's Memorial and Honour Triumphant soon followed. Both works are clear bids for patronage: Fame's Memorial is an elegy of 1169 lines on the recently-deceased Charles Blount, 1st Earl of Devonshire, while Honour Triumphant is a prose pamphlet, a verbal fantasia written in connection with the jousts planned for the summer 1606 visit of King Christian IV of Denmark. It is unknown whether either of these brought any financial remuneration to Ford; yet by June 1608 he had enough money to be readmitted to the Middle Temple.
Prior to the start of his career as a playwright, Ford wrote other non-dramatic literary works—the long religious poem Christ's Bloody Sweat (1613), and two prose essays published as pamphlets, The Golden Mean (1613) and A Line of Life (1620). After 1620 he began active dramatic writing, first as a collaborator with more experienced playwrights — primarily Thomas Dekker, but also John Webster and William Rowley — and by the later 1620s as a solo artist.
Ford is best known for the tragedy 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (1633), a family drama with a plot line of incest. The play's title has often been changed in new productions, sometimes being referred to as simply Giovanni and Annabella — the play's leading, incestuous brother-and-sister characters; in a nineteenth-century work it is coyly called The Brother and Sister. Shocking as the play is, it is still widely regarded as a classic piece of English drama.
He was a major playwright during the reign of Charles I. His plays deal with conflicts between individual passion and conscience and the laws and morals of society at large; Ford had a strong interest in abnormal psychology that is expressed through his dramas. His plays often show the influence of Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 13, 2019
This is one of those rare tragedies where you actually don't want anyone to die and like 90% of them die anyway.
October 27, 2013
The Broken Heart is a powerful, intensely dramatic exposition of the issue of betrothal and compulsion in marriage. In the sense that John Ford seems to be espousing the course of the heart’s affection, the man and the lady's choice of partner, he seems to be a standard bearer of the modern belief that marriage and partnership should be principally a matter of personal affection and even love, and not of convenience or class or parental choice, still less external compulsion. This is in opposition to the then current but possibly changing notion of forced marriage of economic alliance. At the same time, the play is typically Jacobean: it is gaudy, excessive, at times grotesque both in language and in action, at times perhaps gratuitously cruel, making a theatre of cruelty (Orgilius's macabre and exhibitionistic death by bleeding), and it is dominated by a parallel between metaphor and the literal transposition of metaphor, which is grotesque and even comic. The echoes of Shakespeare are not as strong as they are in "Tis Pity She's a Whore" and the play gains by that. The influence of John Webster is however, just as strong as in that play. John Ford's originality lies more in the extreme extent to which he is prepared to shock and provoke than in his language, which is very imitative (of Shakespeare and Webster). The character of Penthea strikes me as an admixture of the Duchess of Malfi and Ophelia whilst Orgilus strongly recalls Webster's Bosola from "The Duchess of Malfi". Like Bosola, Orgilus, unhappy Penthea's brother, acts as an agent of some kind of fatlsitic quasi divine justice but he himself the agent of that justice is unwillingly (how unwillingly? this is subject to interrpetation I think) cruel, cruel to be kind and to a greater extent than Bosola concerned to be good. As with all Jacobean tragedies, the Age of Spain dominates the action and the exlosive comportment of the protagonists, obsessed as they are with honour, fidelity, loyalty, revenge and justice. The play contains a number of excellent lines and saws
"Let the gods be moderators still,
No human power can prevent their will."
Incest is not pronounced and proclaimed as it is in Ford's "Tis Pity she's a whore" but it is implied and the allegation is made by the insanely jealous Bassanes. The implication of incest against recalls "The Duchess of Malfi". One could say of this play, that the characters suffocate in the atmosphere of court, mores, tradition and oppression. At the same time, Ford more than his contemporary dramatists or those who had immediately proceeded him, stamps, warns and wails against the consequences of social compulsion and oppression in affairs of the heart. Very much part of the society about which he is writing, he is much aware of the unnaturalness of much of it, or the dangers of adhering too relentlessly to its rituals and coda. The play culminates in a bizarre dance, which is presumably a satire of royal impertuability and the resilience. At the same time Ford's warnings may also be seen as a warning, not so much of what existed but of what was coming, namely a disinclination to be candid and honest. The century just beginning was to be one in which men and women were I think even more afraid to speak their minds than in the century passing and where torments were applied abitrarily and suddenly, not as in the past, merely as punishment or to find out where wealth was hidden, but to extract the kind of "truth" which others wanted to hear. We are at the beginning of the great period of the persecution of witches, a persecution simultanously against women and against nature both perceived as threats and both identitifed often as constituting the same threat. It is interesting that the redeeming charcaters in the plays of both Webster and Ford are for the most part women. Women lose their reason because the world into which they are born, a world dominated by men, the likes of Bassanes, Bosola, Ferdinand, is a world of men who act themselves beyond reason. The men have all dug up mandrakes, so it is hardly a wonder that women and the men who love women for their own sake seek death. Amid all the pomp and circumstance of the baroque architecture of this and other Jacobean plays, there are some very contemporary concerns striving to make themselves heard.
The scene is enacted in Sparta, which provides Ford with the opportunity, which I suspect he welcomed, to omit all possible Christian reference or moralisation. Fate seems to be determined by never present, distant gods and there seems no certainty that death will be followed by a heaven nor hell. Ithocles seems sure of going to heaven but his yearning for peace and death,a wish shared by Penthea and by the wildly jealous Bassanes, strikes me as being much closer to the romantic subjective death wish than to any Christian or for that matter Pagan teleology. That after all, may account for the recurring popularity of this extravagant Jacobean writer and the Jacobean playwrights in general. They seem ultimately more concerned with the bizarre manner in which characters forge their own destiny than with a divine justice which in this play seems as far away as a distant star.
"Let the gods be moderators still,
No human power can prevent their will."
Incest is not pronounced and proclaimed as it is in Ford's "Tis Pity she's a whore" but it is implied and the allegation is made by the insanely jealous Bassanes. The implication of incest against recalls "The Duchess of Malfi". One could say of this play, that the characters suffocate in the atmosphere of court, mores, tradition and oppression. At the same time, Ford more than his contemporary dramatists or those who had immediately proceeded him, stamps, warns and wails against the consequences of social compulsion and oppression in affairs of the heart. Very much part of the society about which he is writing, he is much aware of the unnaturalness of much of it, or the dangers of adhering too relentlessly to its rituals and coda. The play culminates in a bizarre dance, which is presumably a satire of royal impertuability and the resilience. At the same time Ford's warnings may also be seen as a warning, not so much of what existed but of what was coming, namely a disinclination to be candid and honest. The century just beginning was to be one in which men and women were I think even more afraid to speak their minds than in the century passing and where torments were applied abitrarily and suddenly, not as in the past, merely as punishment or to find out where wealth was hidden, but to extract the kind of "truth" which others wanted to hear. We are at the beginning of the great period of the persecution of witches, a persecution simultanously against women and against nature both perceived as threats and both identitifed often as constituting the same threat. It is interesting that the redeeming charcaters in the plays of both Webster and Ford are for the most part women. Women lose their reason because the world into which they are born, a world dominated by men, the likes of Bassanes, Bosola, Ferdinand, is a world of men who act themselves beyond reason. The men have all dug up mandrakes, so it is hardly a wonder that women and the men who love women for their own sake seek death. Amid all the pomp and circumstance of the baroque architecture of this and other Jacobean plays, there are some very contemporary concerns striving to make themselves heard.
The scene is enacted in Sparta, which provides Ford with the opportunity, which I suspect he welcomed, to omit all possible Christian reference or moralisation. Fate seems to be determined by never present, distant gods and there seems no certainty that death will be followed by a heaven nor hell. Ithocles seems sure of going to heaven but his yearning for peace and death,a wish shared by Penthea and by the wildly jealous Bassanes, strikes me as being much closer to the romantic subjective death wish than to any Christian or for that matter Pagan teleology. That after all, may account for the recurring popularity of this extravagant Jacobean writer and the Jacobean playwrights in general. They seem ultimately more concerned with the bizarre manner in which characters forge their own destiny than with a divine justice which in this play seems as far away as a distant star.
October 15, 2015
I cannot understand how come this play has such low ratings. It is the first tragedy of its time that I've read (admittedly, I haven't read that many) that felt almost modern, in the sense that none of the characters were outright villains. They were all complex and all had understandable motivations. It makes it so much more interesting when you're not told who to root for! I read a few of Webster's (Ford's contemporary) works recently, expecting them to be better for some reason; I don't know where I got the notion that John Ford is somehow inferior to Webster. Well, according to this self-taught reader, that couldn't be farther from the truth. I found Ford easier to read and understand, as well as far more compelling in terms of character development. I was almost tempted to give it a five-star rating, but I felt at times that the language was a bit too convuluted to warrant that. And it's not because it's an ancient form of English - Marlowe and Shakespeare wrote even earlier than Ford, and I never felt as confused reading them as I felt in some sections of The Broken Heart. However, I would recommend this play to anyone who's interested in theatre - I'd probably even urge them to read this before picking up the better known Duchess of Malfi. I found The Broken Heart to be far superior, and I'm looking forward to reading more of Ford's work.
January 31, 2024
No other work of Ford's (or any other playwright's) will probably ever rival 'Tis Pity for me, but The Broken Heart is just as worthy of attention. I was only half-heartedly interested in the characters during the first couple of acts, but by the time Penthea narrates her living will to Calantha, I am fully invested in the fate of the characters, happily caught in the tragic trap. The play contains some accessible but fascinating ideas about marriage, not to mention several interesting deaths. If I could time travel, I would absolutely go to see the original staging of this play (and try to catch a staging of Titus Andronicus too -- how does the Early Modern stage handle so much blood?!).
Read
January 21, 2021I read this play from the 1630s as part of a course in seventeenth century drama and now, almost half a century later, remember virtually nothing about it. My paperback edition is heavily underlined and annotated - in pen, no less - so I did read it very closely. It tells a rather macabre story of thwarted love, enforced marriage, despicable marital relations, a desire for revenge, suicide by starvation, a rather insidious murder, and a heartwrenchinge dance by a heroine during which she is informed of the deaths of all those close to her, resulting in her own demise. And people complain that movies today are too violent!
May 20, 2023
Enjoyable, though I prefer 'Tis Pity. An odd sort of tragedy where everyone learns their lesson by act III but they all die anyways; the cast has a uniformly high level of self-awareness, which is well appreciated in a genre so given to cliche.
Also, these are some Romantic-ass Spartans, Lycurgus is rolling in his grave.
Also, these are some Romantic-ass Spartans, Lycurgus is rolling in his grave.
October 17, 2025
John Ford was one of final prominent revenge tragedy dramatists, writing his plays in the post-Jacobean period, and suffering from some of the decadence that a tired sub-genre begins to experience by its end.
The main theme here is forced marriage. Penthea and Orgilus were in love, but the death of Penthea’s father brought an end to their hopes, as her brother Ithocles decides to marry her to another man, Bassanes. This insanely jealous man keeps Penthea locked away until she goes insane, and only then does he repent.
Meanwhile Orgilus is trying to limit his sister’s choice of husband in a similar manner, and brooding over revenge against Ithocles. This revenge is surprisingly slow at coming. We may wonder if the play will end with just a few sad deaths, but the last two acts include several gruesome and protracted murders of the kind that audiences of the time were thought to enjoy.
Themes of thwarted love, infidelity, jealousy, revenge, incest, insanity and murder abound – as they do in all the revenge plays of the time. Ford is more restrained than many, and for once not all the characters are so abominable that their fate seems fully deserved. A few characters even escape a tragic ending. The revenge taken by Orgilus gives him no satisfaction, especially since both Ithocles and Bassanes have begun to repent already by this stage.
Ford also explores the notion of honour so common to revenge plays. The honour of violence and revenge is condemned in favour of the honour of playing like a decent citizen. Unfortunately, the main characters do no understand this until it is too late.
The Broken Heart is an interesting play, but might have benefited from less intrigue and fewer characters. This makes it a slightly difficult read at times, but then the play was meant to be seen on stage where some of the problems in keeping track of the story might have been removed.
As it stands, the play is a minor but poignant late entry in the succession of British revenge tragedies.
The main theme here is forced marriage. Penthea and Orgilus were in love, but the death of Penthea’s father brought an end to their hopes, as her brother Ithocles decides to marry her to another man, Bassanes. This insanely jealous man keeps Penthea locked away until she goes insane, and only then does he repent.
Meanwhile Orgilus is trying to limit his sister’s choice of husband in a similar manner, and brooding over revenge against Ithocles. This revenge is surprisingly slow at coming. We may wonder if the play will end with just a few sad deaths, but the last two acts include several gruesome and protracted murders of the kind that audiences of the time were thought to enjoy.
Themes of thwarted love, infidelity, jealousy, revenge, incest, insanity and murder abound – as they do in all the revenge plays of the time. Ford is more restrained than many, and for once not all the characters are so abominable that their fate seems fully deserved. A few characters even escape a tragic ending. The revenge taken by Orgilus gives him no satisfaction, especially since both Ithocles and Bassanes have begun to repent already by this stage.
Ford also explores the notion of honour so common to revenge plays. The honour of violence and revenge is condemned in favour of the honour of playing like a decent citizen. Unfortunately, the main characters do no understand this until it is too late.
The Broken Heart is an interesting play, but might have benefited from less intrigue and fewer characters. This makes it a slightly difficult read at times, but then the play was meant to be seen on stage where some of the problems in keeping track of the story might have been removed.
As it stands, the play is a minor but poignant late entry in the succession of British revenge tragedies.
September 6, 2023
I really want to see The Broken Heart performed on a stage. It has just about everything in it that you want from an Early Modern play.
The most-used words in the play, used in a multitude of senses, are "Pleasure" and "Time", and, in this play, none of the characters seem to have any of either.
But what this play really has (more than any other Early Modern play) is a depiction of the after-effects of marital rape. The character Penthea is clearly traumatised by being raped by her husband, after a forced marriage away from her lover. It is as if we are seeing Romeo and Juliet, where neither character has died, but Juliet is forced to marry Paris after all, and Romeo turns into Vindice or Hieronimo. More than any other EM play I have read, this play shows the after-effects of trauma, ending in self-destruction, depression, anorexia, and death.
While clearly Ford knows what he is writing about (Penthea is "raped" and "ravished" from her intended), EM writers clearly had limited ways of expressing the concept of marital rape (which, given the number of upper-class arranged marriages, must have been more common than one would now suspect), and he is struggling to express on stage a concept that simply wasn't available. The ending of the play reflects that confusion (which is why this play docked a star for me).
But magnificent.
The most-used words in the play, used in a multitude of senses, are "Pleasure" and "Time", and, in this play, none of the characters seem to have any of either.
But what this play really has (more than any other Early Modern play) is a depiction of the after-effects of marital rape. The character Penthea is clearly traumatised by being raped by her husband, after a forced marriage away from her lover. It is as if we are seeing Romeo and Juliet, where neither character has died, but Juliet is forced to marry Paris after all, and Romeo turns into Vindice or Hieronimo. More than any other EM play I have read, this play shows the after-effects of trauma, ending in self-destruction, depression, anorexia, and death.
While clearly Ford knows what he is writing about (Penthea is "raped" and "ravished" from her intended), EM writers clearly had limited ways of expressing the concept of marital rape (which, given the number of upper-class arranged marriages, must have been more common than one would now suspect), and he is struggling to express on stage a concept that simply wasn't available. The ending of the play reflects that confusion (which is why this play docked a star for me).
But magnificent.
June 4, 2021
Ford really beginning to reach his peak here. A domestic tragedy really, though set at the royal court of Sparta. Suspicion, betrayal, murder, the usual collection. One character bleeds to death, another dies of a broken heart, others are murdered in a variety of ingenious ways. Some very powerful language holds the whole thing together, however.
Read as part of the REP King's Men repertoire online readathon in the still pandemic-blighted late spring of 2021.
Read as part of the REP King's Men repertoire online readathon in the still pandemic-blighted late spring of 2021.
May 21, 2015
I enjoyed watching this at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. I came back home and read it, and I was able to catch a few different things. It isn't my favorite kind of story, but it still was interesting in a "people are always the same" kind of way.
July 18, 2015
Amazing, in my opinion much better than 'Tis Pity.
October 18, 2021
The language makes up for everything. The play itself is a bit complicated, but not more so than Webster's The White Devil.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews