Etherege, Sir George (1635?-1692?), was an English playwright. Little is known of his early life, but during the Restoration period (1660-1700), he wrote comedies of manners. These plays were clever satires of upper-class society. Etherege provided comic portraits of London society in The Comical Revenge, or Love in a Tub (1664) and She Would if She Could (1668). But his fame rests on his only other play, The Man of Mode, or Sir Fopling Flutter (1676). The play is full of witty dialogue and sparkling language. Sir Fopling Flutter, a pretentious fool, is one of the most popular characters in English comedy. Etherege also created brilliant comic figures in Dorimant, an attractive young man who wins the affections of all the women in the play, and Loveit, his aging and abandoned mistress. See also Drama (European drama: 1660-1800).
