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Act 3, Scene 7
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Beggar’s Opera, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Moral Corruption and Hypocrisy
Gender, Love, and Marriage
Class, Capitalism, and Inequality
Opera, High Art, and Performance
Summary
Analysis
Polly meets Lucy at Newgate. Lucy apologizes for her anger the last time they met. She sings that women sometimes lose their tempers and need a drink to calm down (Air 48). Polly apologizes for her misbehavior, too. Lucy offers Polly a cordial as a token of friendship, but Polly refuses because alcohol gives her headaches. Lucy insists that the cordial is top-quality and will help Polly feel better, but Polly again says no. She argues that Lucy should pity her for the way Macheath treated her. But Lucy views herself as Macheath’s “unhappy Wife” and Polly as just his mistress. Polly quips that Macheath neglects and ignores her because “A Man is always afraid of a Woman who loves him too well.”
Lucy’s apology is just a dishonest attempt at getting Polly to let her guard down and drink the poison. But it’s not yet clear whether Polly realizes this. Regardless, Polly’s reluctance to drink also symbolizes her moral purity: everyone else in the play is corrupt and drinks almost all the time, but she is the only one who isn’t interested. Still, she and Lucy continue to fight over who is Macheath’s true wife. However, the fact that they are both waiting for news of him after his escape means that he clearly doesn’t want to be with either of them.
Themes
Polly and Lucy agree that they have “have [both] been too fond” of Macheath. They sing about how men prefer chasing unavailable women to loving the women who are in love with and dedicated to them (Air 49). Polly says she envies Lucy, whom Macheath treated tenderly when he left her. Polly sings that some men flirt with everyone just because they are self-absorbed and want validation (Air 50). She tells Lucy that “our Husband is one of those.” Lucy once again offers Polly a drink, and then she sings about how it will make her worries and sorrows go away (Air 51).
Lucy and Polly finally admit that Macheath isn’t exactly husband material, but even this realization isn’t enough for them to give up on him. Rather, they act as though they have no choice but to keep pursuing him—even though they know that it’s pointless. Of course, by mocking Lucy and Polly’s foolish dedication to Macheath, Gay plays up sexist tropes about irrational, fickle women. At the same time, Polly’s comment that Macheath seeks novelty and validation through romance shows that she may be the wisest character in the whole play when it comes to love. She understands Macheath’s motives even better than he does; in fact, she’s the only one who does at all.
Themes
Literary Devices
