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The Eldest Son, by John Galsworthy.
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This play in its theme is similar to another one, The Silver Box, by Galsworthy, in that there are two young men across caste lines whose crime is same, but result different due to status; the difference in the two plays is the nature of the crime, and every other circumstance and more.
Here it's not about theft, but about marriage, or rather, refusal or inability to marry even when there's a baby coming, and how society looks at such conduct. The latter, while it should be, is far from independent of the social caste of the couple, and that's mostly the point.
Galsworthy has solved it a tad close to convenient but attempting to save some grace, by the angry father of the girl giving her courage through his pride, to refuse the young master's "offer of marriage", which the young boy has made not only firmly but stuck to despite his almost whole family attempting to dissuade him; nevertheless, one has to wonder why the lot weren't amenable to the young boy's scheme of marrying and relocating to Canada, why they thought it was tragic, why they thought the marriage must fail. In the social setup of rigid castes in England or Britain, they could be predicting correctly; but in say, California, it wouldn't have mattered. Or even in the snobbish Southrn society, where the girl would be considered more of a lady than in Britain, while his antecedents would be serving him better than his ability to earn, the latter unproved as long as he lived in Britain.
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June 04, 2021 - June 05, 2021.
Purchased June 14, 2013.
Kindle Edition, 68 pages
Published May 17th 2012
(first published September 1st 1964)
Original Title
The Eldest Son: A Domestic Drama in Three Acts
ASIN:- B0084B3L1C
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