Thomas Godfrey’s Prince of Parthia has a complicated legacy. It is credited as being the first theatrical play written and performed by Americans. Yet, this is a complicated claim, as Godfrey—who died in 1763—wrote the work more than a decade before the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783). Godfrey never saw his play performed; The Prince of Parthia only received a professional theatrical debut in 1767, four years after the author’s death. Those actors, too, performed the play before the American Revolution. Debates about Britishness and Americanness aside, Thomas Godfrey’s play was widely attacked by critics, and it was publicly performed only one single time in a theatre during the 18th century. Its poor critical reception largely derived from the work’s obvious imitation of various famous playwrights, such as Shakespeare, Otway, Addison and Rowe, resulting in a largely copied structure and style, and a plot that blazed no new trails. For his overuse of homages, allusions, and references to other plays, Thomas Godfrey was accused of various degrees of plagiarism. But his play did have some redeeming qualities. Namely, the play’s setting of ancient Parthia was a fresh world for a literary tale.
To better appreciate The Prince of Parthia, one must get to know its author and the time in which he lived. Thomas Godfrey was born in 1736, and like many aspiring authors, he held a number of odd jobs before he made his literary debut. A Philadelphia native, he was known to have written poetry while he worked as a watchmaker’s apprentice, and these verses earned him an invitation to study literature at the University of Pennsylvania sometime after 1749. There, in addition to studying poetry, he also became thoroughly familiar with the works of William Shakespeare (c. 1564 [?] – 1616), Thomas Otway (c. 1652-1685), Joseph Addison (1672-1719), and Nicholas Rowe (1674-1718). In particular, the story of Godfrey’s Prince of Parthia largely imitates Shakespearean plot structure, and the Parthian setting was likely inspired by Rowe’s play, Tamerlane. Whatever the case, his studies and literary pursuits were interrupted by the outbreak of the French and Indian War (c. 1754–1763), in which Godfrey served as part of the Pennsylvania militia. After the militia was disbanded, he worked in the merchant business. Despite the distractions of life and war, Godfrey managed to complete his Prince of Parthia play and wrote enough poetry to fill a volume before he suddenly sickened and unexpectedly died in the year 1763. He was only twenty-six years old.
Following his death, Godfrey’s previously unpublished poetic works were released under the title of Juvenile Poems on Various Subjects, and his play, The Prince of Parthia, was performed in 1767 by the aptly named American Company theatre group in Pennsylvania. Godfrey’s poetry was met with praise, which is not surprising as several of his poems were published in magazines during his lifetime. His play, however, had a rockier reception.
The Prince of Parthia is a curious Shakespearean-styled play featuring historical ancient Parthian names in a non-historical plot. Godfrey’s main characters included King Artabanus and his wife Thermusa, as well as Artabanus’ sons: the heroic Arsaces, the loyal Gotarzes, and the villainous Vardanes. Thermusa was the stepmother of the three princes. This fictitious family was thrown into turmoil by the introduction of beautiful Evanthe to the plot, described as a beautiful Arabian noblewoman who, along with her father Bethas, was captured by the Parthians. Evanthe was a popular woman, with Artabanus, Arsaces, and Vardanes all fancying her. Evanthe, however, only had eyes for Arsaces. In the drama of love, lust, and jealousy that ensued, Vardanes killed his father, Artabanus, and then war erupted between Artabanus’ sons, with Arsaces and Gotarzes waging war against Vardanes. As the war played out, Evanthe awaited news of the victor, setting up a Shakespearean tragedy of misunderstanding. In the fog of war, Evanthe came to believe that her beloved Arsaces had died, prompting her to drink poison. Vardanes, however, was the one who actually lost the war, and still-living Arsaces, after discovering Evanthe’s fate, decided to join her in death. Following that Romeo and Juliet styled ending, Godfrey’s play closes with Gotarzes, as the last brother standing, becoming the next king of Parthia.
After its one and only performance at the American Company theatre in 1767, The Prince of Parthia was criticized as being uninspired and derivative. Contemporaneous critics also took issue with the play’s lack of a poignant moral to the story, as well as its silence on the political and philosophical issues being debated on the tense eve of the American Revolution. Other critics were unhappy that Godfrey’s Parthian-inspired characters differed so greatly from actual Parthian history. The historical figures referenced in the play were not all related and the storyline did not follow a historical narrative. The closest parallel from Parthian history was the machinations of the Parthian Arsacid Dynasty ruler, Gotarzes II (r. 38–51), who executed a brother named Artabanus and assassinated another brother named Vardanes. Godfrey’s loyal and selfless rendition of Gotarzes is a stark contrast to his ruthless, fratricidal counterpart from history. Nevertheless, the play’s main source of uniqueness is its Parthian atmosphere, differing from the usual Greek and Roman settings of the Neoclassical movement. And it is also notable that Godfrey’s play was remarkably secular. In contrast to the Christianity-infused American literature of his era, Godfrey’s Prince of Parthia avoided references to God and Christian themes. Thomas Godfrey’s The Prince of Parthia, criticisms and imperfections aside, serves as an interesting study piece for investigating the literary influences, writing styles, and shifting thematic interests of the eighteenth century. Interestingly, The Prince of Parthia’s reputation has improved, or at least been better recontextualized, in recent years. Godfrey’s play was known to have been performed by several theatre companies in the 20th century.
Written by C. Keith Hansley
Picture Attribution: (left: Life-size Arsacid nobleman head, center: Braddock’s Retreat, right: Arsaces XII illustration, all [Public Domain] via Europeana, NYPL and LOC.)
Sources:
- Godfrey, Thomas. The Prince of Parthia, a Tragedy. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1917.
- Shuffelton, Frank. Early American Literature. Vol 13. No 1. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1978.
- Wilmeth, Don B. and Christopher Bigsby, eds. The Cambridge History of American Theatre, Vol 1. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
- https://kids.britannica.com/students/article/Thomas-Godfrey/324757
- https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/godfrey-thomas-jr
- https://www.bartleby.com/lit-hub/specimens-of-american-poetry/thomas-godfrey-17361763/
- https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/thomas-godfrey
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Thomas-Otway
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Joseph-Addison
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nicholas-Rowe
