Burlesque

Burlesque is an absurd or grotesque imitation of what is intended to be dignified or pathetic. The humor of burlesque comes out of a juxtaposition of high and low style or an incongruity of style and subject matter. It is achieved in one of two ways: by treating a serious subject in an overly familiar manner—low burlesque or travesty—or treating a relatively trivial subject in a grandiose way—high burlesque or parody. The term has been used over the centuries interchangeably with parody, travesty, burletta, pantomime, extravaganza, and most recently striptease. This entry traces the evolution of burlesque from being recognized as a literary genre in England during the Restoration (1660) to its present-day association with erotic entertainment.

Burlesque has elements of both parody and satire but is distinct from each. Like parody, burlesque mimics some well-known work of literature, oratory, or drama. However, burlesque does not stick closely to the original text but uses characters and incidents from a story as means to comment on unrelated topics. Like satire, burlesque employs laughter as criticism, but burlesque finds humor primarily in artistic pretentions and moral posturings, not in the faults and foibles of individuals. While satire can be savage and bitter, burlesque delights in human frailties and sentimentality. As such, burlesque has been a tactic of the low, ridiculing pomposity, false dignity, and the moral posturing of high culture.

Humor that is recognizably burlesque goes back to the earliest forms of Western theater. It is the basis of the satyr plays of early Greek theater, which were burlesque treatments of mythological stories. It is found in the medieval Feast of Fools, with its burlesque of the Catholic mass. Both Geoffrey Chaucer and Miguel de Cervantes burlesqued chivalric romances in their greatest works. In the Elizabethan theater, it is evident in “Pyramus and Thisbe,” the play-within-a-play in A Midsummer Night's Dream, and in Francis Beaumont's Knight of the Burning Pestle (1607), which was in fact the first full-length theatrical burlesque.

The term derives from the Italian burla, meaning a joke, ridicule, or mockery. Popular in Italy and France during the 17th century, burlesque was introduced to England by Royalist poets and dramatists who had spent the Commonwealth years abroad (1642–1660). Early burlesques were travesties of literary epics, influenced particularly by French satirist Paul Scarron's Le Virgile Travesti (written between 1648 and 1652), a burlesque of the Aeneid. The most notable burlesque poems in English are Samuel Butler's Hudibras (1663–1678)—a low burlesque about a Puritan knight written in doggerel—and Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock (1712–1717)—a mock tragedy that treats a trivial incident involving cutting a lock of hair in the epic style of the Iliad.

Burlesque found its most enduring home in the theater, ridiculing the literary weaknesses of romantic and heroic drama, as well as the badly executed stage effects and overwrought acting that often marred performances. The first play labeled a burlesque was William Davenant's Play-House to Be Let (1663), which presented several short plays being auditioned at a theater, including a travesty of Antony and Cleopatra. A more important work was The Rehearsal (1671), by Charles Villiers, duke of Buckingham, which used the setting of a rehearsal to ridicule the neoclassical dramas of the time. Thomas Duffett burlesqued productions of Shakespeare in Mock-Tempest (1674) and of opera in Psyche Debauch’d (1675) because they were staged at a competing theater.

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