analysis of scandals essay

Scandal: The Causes, the Problems and the Outcomes

• First Online: 22 January 2022

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• Robert Busby 2  

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Scandal occupies a prominent place as an issue in politics, serving to shape both an understanding of the political establishment in the United States, and more specific understandings of the legacy and reputation of individual political figures. In this chapter Busby addresses contemporary understanding of scandal politics and what its impact is on American politics. An additional focus is given to understandings of scandal management and damage control and how those involved in scandal seek to deflect and minimize damage to their personal standing. Attention is also given to those who are instrumental to the unfolding of a scandal narrative, including the role of the spouse in shaping understandings of the actions of the alleged wrongdoer.

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Busby, R. (2022). Scandal: The Causes, the Problems and the Outcomes. In: Scandal and American Politics in the 21st Century. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91638-1_2

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Democracy Corrupted: Apex Corruption and the Erosion of Democratic Values

Democratic values are eroding just as citizens perceive increasing corruption, with numerous cases implicating the highest-level politicians. Could perceived increases in apex corruption be weakening democracy? We first present event study analyses of more than 170 high-profile corruption scandals involving some of the most prominent politicians in 17 Latin American countries. We show that in the aftermath of such apex corruption scandals, support for democracy falls by 0.07𝑠𝑑, support for authoritarianism rises by 11% and violent protests rise by 70%. We complement these results with a field experiment in Mexico. Randomized exposure to footage of apex corruption scandals, particularly implicating politicians known for their anticorruption platforms, decreases individuals’ support for democracy by 0.15𝑠𝑑, willingness to trust politicians and neighbors in incentivized games by 18% and 11%, volunteering as election observers by 45%, and actual voter turnout by about 5𝑝𝑝, while raising stealing from local mayors by 4%. The undermining of democratic values produces latent effects that even cumulate four months later. Seeking solutions, priming national identity proved an unsuccessful antidote, but providing exposure to national stock index funds holds some promise.

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The Varsity Blues Scandal

A college admissions prep advisor told wealthy parents that while there were front doors into universities and back doors, he had created a side door that was worth exploring.

Rick Singer was an independent college counselor who held the golden ticket for his clients. He had concocted a “side door” that guaranteed admission to the college of a student’s choice. Students could enter the “front door” of a college by using the normal admissions process, which meant making the necessary grades and test scores and engaging in the appropriate extra-curricular activities to gain a “thumbs up” from the college’s admissions committee. Or, students could enter the “back door” of a college when their parents donated large sums of money – say $20 million or so – to the school, which pretty much guaranteed that the school would not deny their childrens’ applications for admission.

In Singer’s model, the “side door” was a little more complicated. He had learned that many universities’ non-revenue sports programs underpaid their coaches. These coaches had the ability to label applicants as “athletes,” which sent them to the front of the admissions line and made their admission to the school a near certainty. So, if Singer promised donations from parents that would go to these sports’ budgets and/or directly into the pockets of these coaches, he could tell his clients: “If we just pretend that your child is a fencer (or a rower, or a tennis athlete, or a soccer athlete, etc.), and you donate $X to my foundation, I can funnel that money to Coach Y and admission will be guaranteed.”

Another way to use Singer’s “side door” was to improve standardized test scores, which he also rigged. Singer had bribed people who administered standardized tests at a site in Houston and a site in Los Angeles. If parents could get their child certified as needing special accommodations for taking the exam (ideally, extra time over several days), and could also make up an excuse for having their child take the test at one of these locations (instead of their normal site), then Singer could manipulate the child’s test score. He had a “ringer” who would either take the test for the student, or make enough corrections on the student’s test before it was turned in, to acquire the desired score.

Singer pursued clients of children who were rich. As the scheme progressed, he pursued richer and richer parents. He also cultivated relationships with coaches at more and more prestigious universities (Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Georgetown, USC, University of Texas at Austin, etc.). Singer was clever in playing on parents’ insecurities and devotion to their children. He would commonly begin by counseling students in the typical way—what courses to take, what activities to participate in, and so on. He would also advise students regarding their choice of schools, often getting their heart set on a particular school. Then, OMG!! He would tell the parents that their child had no chance of getting into their dream school on their own. But, TA-DA!! He had a “side door” that could do the job.

Singer suggested to parents that they simply take a picture of their child playing water polo (or soccer or tennis, etc.) or Photoshop their child’s face onto the body of someone playing that sport. He then advised parents to be prepared to make a sizeable donation (a little over one million dollars was the largest single donation he acquired) and admission to the school of their child’s choice was guaranteed. Singer would funnel some of the donation to the coach and usually some to the school. The coach would request that the student be put on a preferred admission list for athletes, and admission was sure to follow. The student would show up at school the next year, claiming an injury, and later “retire” from the sport.

It turns out that wealthy people love their kids and want their dreams to come true, just like everyone else. And rich people are just as insecure about being parents as everyone else. While a couple of the parents Singer dealt with were jerks (and at least one was a criminal), most were good people and loving parents. For example, Douglas Hodge was a top executive at one of the world’s biggest bond companies and a tremendous philanthropist. Gordie Caplan was the co-managing partner of a major law firm who constantly preached acting with integrity to his firm’s young lawyers. Felicity Huffman was an actor who also blogged about being a mom, selling “Good Enough Mom” mugs, and advising her readers not to try to be “supermoms” or to raise perfect kids. Writer Jane Buckingham’s mantra was to ‘try to take joy in who my kids ARE not who I want them to be.”

But all these parents, and many more, actively engaged in Singer’s schemes of fraud and bribery in order to get their children into the schools their children desired. Many had deep reservations about the morality of what they were doing. As Huffman drove her daughter to the site of the SAT test that was to be manipulated, she told herself: “Turn around, turn around, turn around.” But she didn’t.

Interestingly, most parents (though not all) went to great lengths to ensure that their children did not know about the cheating. They wanted their kids to believe that they had been admitted to these colleges on their own merit.

College admissions’ processes have had scandals over the years, but the so-called “Varsity Blues” scandal is the biggest one in the history of the college admissions process. When Singer’s schemes were ultimately discovered by the FBI, he went to prison. Many of the parents involved also went to prison, though for shorter periods. And many parents lost their jobs when their wrongs were publicized.

Discussion Questions

• How did this happen? Why did the parents do it? With a couple of exceptions, most of Singer’s clients led honorable lives and seem unlikely to have paid bribes in order to advance their own careers or financial situations. But these parents were willing to do so in order to get their kids into the college of their choice. Is it possible that while playing the role of “loving parent,” these parents thought they had to do these things to protect their kids from disappointment and failure? Could role morality have played a part here? Explain.
• According to Korn and Levitz, while working with Singer, mother Jane Buckingham wanted (more than anything) to help her son. Her main thought was: “If there’s something I can do, I should do it.” Does this sound like a person playing the role of “devoted parent”? Why or why not?
• Psychologist Daniel Houser and colleagues ran an experiment where parents were given the opportunity to cheat under various circumstances. They found that parents were most likely to cheat when (a) it benefited their children rather than themselves, and (b) the children were not present. When children were present, parents cheated less, presumably to model good behavior for their kids. Does this experimental result seem to accord with the facts on the ground in the Varsity Blues scandal? Explain your reasoning.
• Regarding role morality, psychologist Keith Levitt has explained: “When people switch hats, they often switch moral compasses. People like to think they are inherently moral creatures – you either have character or you don’t. But our studies show that the same person may make a completely different decision based on what hat they may be wearing at the time, often without even realizing it.” Does this passage help explain how Gordie Caplan could preach integrity while playing the role of head of a law firm, yet cheat while playing the role of devoted parent? Or how Doulas Hodge could be a great philanthropist while playing the role of “good citizen” while being a cheater while playing the role of devote parent? Discuss.
• Regarding the Varsity Blues scandal, Korn and Levitz wrote:
• “[Jane] Buckingham didn’t let herself think much about it. She knew that this was cheating, even if she wasn’t picturing a federal crime. She told no one. But it also seemed like a straightforward way to solve a problem. Singer was going to help make this better. She knew it was wrong but not that wrong, right? [Her son] Jack would just get into the schools he was supposed to get into if she and Marcus [her husband from whom she was separated] had been better parents.”
• Do you see parallels between Adoboli’s playing the role of “good and loyal employee” and Buckingham playing the role of “devoted parent”? Explain.
• How did both use their roles to give themselves permission to do something they knew was wrong?
• Did the self-serving bias also play a part here? Why or why not?
• Which do you think was the stronger influence – role morality or the self-serving bias? Explain your reasoning.
• Was framing also an issue here? Did the parents’ overwhelming focus on the desired outcome—admission for their children—push moral considerations out of the parents’ frame of reference when they were deciding whether or not to go along with Singer’s schemes? What do you think and why?
• According to Nicole LaPorte: “Singer was ‘good at getting inside these guys’ heads,’ said one source. ‘He’d talk about famous, wealthy kids who went to certain universities and say: You think they got in on their smarts.? He made it sound like everyone got into college through connections and giving money, building libraries.’” If this is accurate, might the conformity bias also have played a role here, making the frauds and bribes seem innocuous to the parents because “everybody does it”? Explain.

Related Videos

Role Morality: Sports Edition

Our moral standards are often determined by the role we see ourselves playing at the time. This can lead us to make decisions and act very differently in the moral realm depending on our role.

Bibliography

Nick Anderson, “From ‘Master Coach’ to a Bribery Probe: A College Consultant Who Went off the Rails,”  Washington Post , March 12, 2019.

Devin Barrett & Matt Zapotosky, “FBI Accuses Wealthy Parents, Including Celebrities, in College-Entrance Bribery Scheme,”  Washington Post  March 12, 2019.

Brian Davis, “Texas Tennis Coach Michael Center Among Coaches Charged in Sweeping College Admissions Scheme,”  Austin American-Statesman , March 12, 2019.

Daniel Golden,  The Price of Admission  (2006).

Mariah Haas & Tyler McCarthy, “Lori Loughlin, Mossimo Giannulli sentenced in college admissions scandal case,”  Fox News , Aug. 21, 2020,

at  https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/lori-loughlin-mossimo-giannulli-sentenced-college-admissions-scandal

Daniel Houser et al., “On the Origins of Dishonesty: From Parents to Children,” NBER Working Paper #20897 (Jan. 2015).

Melissa Korn & Jennifer Levitz, Unacceptable: Privilege, Deceit & the Making of the College Admissions Scandal (2020).

Nicole LaPorte, Guilty Admissions: The Bribes, Favors, and Phonies Behind the College Cheating Scandal (2021).

Jennifer Medina et al., “College Admissions Scandal: Actresses, Business Leaders and Other Wealthy Parents Charged,”  New York Times , March 12, 2019.

Anita Raghavan, “A Rogue Trader Blames the System, but Not All Are Persuaded,” New York Times , March 24, 2017.

John Wertheim, “He Got Punished. The System Got Off,”  Sports Illustrated , Feb. 2022.

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A Summary and Analysis of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

‘A Scandal in Bohemia’ was the short story that transformed the fortunes of Sherlock Holmes, or at least those of his creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Although the great sleuth had previously appeared in two short novels, A Study in Scarlet (1887; it was originally published by Mrs Beeton’s husband, in Beeton’s Christmas Annual ) and The Sign of the Four (1890), it would be the short stories, published in The Strand magazine from 1891, that would transform Sherlock Holmes into one of the most recognisable fictional characters in all fiction.

And it all began with ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’, closer analysis of which reveals the debt Conan Doyle owed to Edgar Allan Poe.

Before we get to the analysis of this story – arguably one of the most important in the annals of detective fiction – it might be useful to offer a brief summary of the story’s plot. Dr Watson, the narrator of most (though not quite all ) of the Sherlock Holmes stories, tells us about Holmes’s admiration (though not love) for Irene Adler, whom Holmes always refers to as ‘ the woman’.

Watson then launches into his recollections of the events surrounding Irene Adler. He called upon Holmes to see his friend, and found Holmes working on a new case. Holmes deduces that Watson has put on some weight and that he is practising medicine (and also, using his trademark analytical deductions – though technically we mustn’t call them ‘deductions’ – that Watson’s servant girl is clumsy).

Then Holmes presents Watson with the note in which a new client announces that he will call on Holmes that evening. Holmes has already deduced that the notepaper is from Bohemia (in the modern-day Czech Republic) and that the author of the note is German.

When the visitor arrives, a tall, well-built man wearing a mask to conceal his identity, Holmes quickly sees through the man’s false identity and realises he is in the presence of the King of Bohemia. The King tears the mask from his face and admits it, before explaining his situation to Holmes and Watson: that when he was a younger man and Crown Prince of Bohemia, he had become romantically entangled with an adventuress named Irene Adler.

He foolishly allowed a photograph of both him and Adler to be taken, as well as exchanging compromising personal correspondence with her. Adler, he explains, now keeps the picture of her and the King, to use for blackmail purposes – when the King’s marriage betrothal is announced, Adler plans to ‘go public’ with the picture, and thus bring an end to the royal marriage, because if she can’t have the King, she doesn’t want anyone to marry him. (Holmes says that the letters could be explained away as forgeries, but the photograph of the two of them together is damning, and must be recovered.)

Adler will not consent to sell the incriminating picture, though the King has tried to buy it from her; he’s also tried several times to steal it back.

In the next part of ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’, Holmes shares the initial stages of his investigation with Watson, the following afternoon. Disguised as a groom, Holmes had spent time among the cabmen working in the area of London where Irene Adler lives, and had learned a great deal about her and her house.

He had followed Adler and her lawyer-friend, Godfrey Norton, who had been a frequent visitor to her house. The two of them had driven to church, and Holmes had followed them – there they had been married, with Holmes (in disguise) being dragged in as a witness to the marriage. Holmes tells Watson about his plans for that evening, and Watson agrees to help.

That evening, they travel to Irene Adler’s house, with Sherlock Holmes disguised once more – this time as a clergyman. Holmes has deduced that that incriminating photograph must be hidden somewhere in Adler’s home, because it is too big for her to carry around with her. So, having hired some men to act as ruffians outside Irene Adler’s house, Holmes – disguised as a priest – contrives to ‘come to her rescue’ while the ruffians are fighting over her.

He pretends to fall, as if injured in the scuffle, and Adler takes him in to check he is all right. Holmes asks for air, so Adler has the window opened – allowing for Watson, as planned, to throw a firecracker into the room and raise the alarm of fire. Watson then retreats to wait for Holmes at the end of the street.

Later, when they are on their way back to Baker Street, Holmes reveals that his plan was to get Adler to reveal to him where she had concealed the incriminating photograph – and, when she thought her house was on fire, she did so, against her better judgment, by instinctively heading for the place in the room where the photograph was hidden – ‘in a recess behind a sliding panel just above the right bell-pull’.

Armed with this knowledge, Holmes plans to return to Adler’s house with Watson and the King of Bohemia the following day, to retrieve the photograph. When they arrived back at Baker Street, a mysterious youth passes the two of them, and bids Holmes goodnight. Unusually for Sherlock Holmes, he doesn’t know who it is.

The next morning, the three of them go to Irene Adler’s house, but find that she and her husband have left for Europe early that morning, never to return. Going to the secret panel where the incriminating photograph was hidden, Holmes finds a new photograph of Irene Adler, along with a letter for him.

In the letter, Adler confesses that she had been outsmarted by Holmes when she had fallen into his trap and inadvertently revealed the hiding-place of the photograph during the fire alarm. She had resolved that the best plan was to leave for the continent with her newlywed husband, but she reassures Holmes that she has no plans to use the incriminating photograph – which she has taken with her – and merely kept it to safeguard her own reputation.

She explains that as soon as Holmes had left her house the evening before, she had realised she’d been found out – and so followed Holmes to Baker Street, in disguise as a boy; she was the mysterious person who had bid Holmes goodnight.

Although she feels she has been outwitted and discovered by the great detective, Sherlock Holmes is singularly impressed, for his part, by Irene Adler’s ingenuity. In an ambiguous remark, he reveals that he thinks the King did well ever to win the affection of such a clever, resourceful woman. The King is just relieved that his reputation is intact and his marriage can go ahead.

Acknowledging his debt to Holmes, he offers the sleuth one of his expensive rings. Holmes requests to keep the photograph as a memento of Irene Adler – the woman.

‘A Scandal in Bohemia’, like many of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories, carries the strong influence of Edgar Allan Poe’s pioneering detective stories featuring C. Auguste Dupin. In particular, several plot features of ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’ bear a close resemblance to Poe’s story ‘The Purloined Letter’ : in particular, the incriminating item (a letter in Poe’s story, a photograph in Doyle’s), the previous unsuccessful attempts by other parties to recover the item (the police in Poe, the King and his hired burglars in Doyle), and the use of a diversion to allow for the recovery of the item (Dupin’s hired accomplice in Poe, and Holmes’s faithful Watson in Doyle).

In both cases, the personage whose reputation is threatened by the incriminating item is noble or royal (though in Poe’s story the precise status or identity of the personage is unstated).

But as T. S. Eliot observed, sometimes genius is a matter of being ‘original with the minimum of alteration’, and what makes ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’ more than just a pastiche of Poe is the way in which Doyle transforms these plot features and makes them his own. The key catalyst in the transformation is the central character, Sherlock Holmes. Like Poe’s Dupin, he is a master of rational analysis and somebody who can solve cases that leave everyone else scratching their heads.

But Doyle’s breakthrough was to take inspiration from his real-life university lecturer, Dr Joseph Bell (who could diagnose patients as soon as they walked into his surgery, merely by observing them), and make Holmes an analytical ‘machine’, who can make ‘deductions’ about people, and discover their inner secrets, from merely glancing at them. The plot of ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’ may be heavily indebted to Poe, but what makes it a fine story in its own right is that key ingredient which would make Doyle’s stories so popular: Sherlock Holmes himself.

The Sherlock Holmes stories in The Strand would be illustrated by Sidney Paget, the man who, after Conan Doyle, probably did more than anyone else to create our idea of the great detective. Curiously, he only got the job because of a clerical error. The publishers had meant to hire his younger brother, Walter, but they inadvertently addressed the letter to the wrong brother. It turned out to be one of the most serendipitous mistakes in the world of literary illustration.

Continue to explore the world of Sherlock Holmes with our analysis of the classic Holmes story, ‘The Speckled Band’ .

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10 thoughts on “A Summary and Analysis of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’”

Great post. I think the issue of Doyle’s use of Poe’s plot is very intriguing – in A Sherlock Holmes way!

Your quote from Elliot hints at the issue and it plays out weekly in Hollywood, in TV and films. What Doyle did was take it a step beyond ‘real’ I think, while still grounding it in a time and place. Sherlock always seems more imagined than flesh and blood to me, but I still loved the character. Sherlock Holmes became almost a superhero and I think that aspect was never in Poe’s characters. (Though it’s been 20 years since I read them – I may need a body check here.) Doyle got to the ‘blood stuff’ of what was most interesting about Poe’s detective genre. In a sense he understood what it was really about – why it was so intriguing- and Poe feels like he was just writing something that came naturally to him and not examining the genre as closely (probably because of his personal demons). I think J.K Rowling did the same with that Harry Potter kid. She digested fantasy novels, absorbed the middle grade and YA magic themes and created was reads as a beat sheet on what people want from the genre. BTW – I am NOT dissing her so please don’t harangue me! Just saying she create a special sauce and that’s what people were craving, not the burger. But again, historic literary critic I am not. But it’s a great issue to think about.

Thanks for the comment, and I agree! I think Doyle and Rowling both managed to distill the essence of their respective genres and, as you say, give people what they want (and give *lots* of people what they want, at that). I like the description of Poe writing something that came naturally to him: he seems to have been able to help create (or at least develop in their early stages) several key genres (science fiction being another), but it’s not as if he was setting out consciously to do so – it’s as if he stumbled upon the right ‘formula’ by accident, but it was left to others such as Doyle to seize upon it and distill the ‘formula’. (See also the Sherlock Holmes story ‘The Dancing Men’, which seems to owe a debt to ‘The Gold-Bug’ – not a bad place to start when revisiting either writer after a few years) :)

I’ve been thinking about this issue all week. (that tells you all you need to know about my week!) It helped avoid deadline work. Anyway, your note about Poe not realizing he was creating a genre is spot on with both Detective fiction and Sci-fi. And I started to wonder about where else this has happened and not just in books. As artists we don’t always ‘know’ what we are doing! (at least I don’t and many of those I have met and talked with through the years too). We are trying to make sense of it of course, looking for meaning in our own ways, but that doesn’t mean we sit down and say, “I’ll create a new genre for middle grade readers.” I suspect, I need to do some research, but I bet could see this play out in fast time in films. Of course film genres took their directions from literary genres but quickly realized that the visual aspect enhanced the experience allowing a great many more genres. The pulp magazines gave way to the pulp and B movies in the late 1930’s and 40’s. Anyway, I’m running off the tracks now, but another example is of course how the religious and mythological texts gave birth to Lord of the Rings which is completely free of religious metaphor (or at least Tolkien would tell us). Good post. I better get back to work now…

Fascinating analysis and comments. Thank you!

Thank you, Audrey – glad you found our analysis interesting! :)

Always enjoyed the original Sherlock Holmes stories (I read Study In Scarlet first and it opened a whole new world up for me) which would later include Poe – so dizzying I never put Dupin and Holmes into chronology (it seemed so unimportant!). … indeed I am sure I didn’t read the Holmes stories in the order in which they were published, but always loved the asides (” … after the case of the Prime Minister’s Speech*). * Ok OK I made that one up.

Reblogged this on Sharon E. Cathcart and commented: For “Weekend Reads,” I give you this excellent analysis of one of my favorite stories, “A Scandal in Bohemia.” Enjoy!

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The School for Scandal

Richard sheridan, ask litcharts ai: the answer to your questions.

The School for Scandal begins in the dressing room of Lady Sneerwell , a wealthy widow with a penchant for plotting and spreading rumors. Lady Sneerwell has hired Snake to forge letters for her and place false stories in the gossip columns. They discuss her plot to stop Charles Surface , whom she loves, from becoming engaged to the heiress Maria . Lady Sneerwell is conspiring with Charles’s older brother Joseph , who has a reputation for goodness, but is really a selfish hypocrite and liar, and who wants to marry Maria for her money. Snake departs and a group of gossipmongers, including Joseph, Mrs. Candour , Sir Benjamin Backbite , and Mr. Crabtree congregate at Lady Sneerwell’s house. Maria is also there, but she rushes from the room in distress when the others gossip about Charles’s enormous debts and financial misfortunes.

The next scene introduces Sir Peter Teazle and his confidante Mr. Rowley . Sir Peter has lived all his life as a bachelor, but seven months ago married a much younger woman. He and Lady Teazle fight all the time and Sir Peter is sure his wife is always to blame. He complains of the bad influence that Lady Sneerwell has on his wife. He is also upset because Maria, who is his ward, does not want to marry Joseph. Sir Peter, who served for some time as a guardian to the Surface brothers, is convinced that Joseph is an exemplary young man with strong morals, and he believes that Charles is not only badly behaved, but also bad deep down. Rowley disagrees: he thinks Charles is wild, but will grow up into a good man. Rowley delivers the news that Sir Peter’s old friend Sir Oliver Surface has arrived back in England after sixteen years in the East Indies.

The second act begins with a quarrel between the Teazles in their home. Lady Teazle wants large sums of money to buy luxury goods. Sir Peter reminds her that she grew up simply and lived with none of the things she now says she needs. Lady Teazle says she remembers that boring life well. After his wife leaves, Sir Peter marvels at how attractive she is when she argues with him.

At Lady Sneerwell’s the gossipmongers (now including the Teazles) are laughing at their acquaintances’ appearances and misfortunes. Maria and Sir Peter find this gossip appalling, while Lady Teazle joins in with the others in making jokes at others’ expenses. Away from the others, Joseph tries to convince Maria to consider him as a potential husband, but she refuses. Although she says she knows from all she has heard that Charles is not fit to marry her, she will not consider marrying his brother. Lady Teazle, who has been considering taking Joseph as a lover, enters the room to find Joseph on his knees in front of Maria. He makes an excuse and, after Lady Teazle sends Maria from the room, begins to try to seduce Lady Teazle, but she is not sure whether to trust his explanation of what she saw.

Rowley brings Sir Oliver to see Sir Peter’s house. They rejoice at being reunited, and Sir Peter gives Sir Oliver his impressions of the Joseph and Charles (who are his nephews and potential heirs). Sir Oliver thinks that the description of Joseph that Sir Peter gives is too good to be true.

Sir Oliver hatches a plot to test his nephews’ characters and choose an heir. When Sir Oliver left the country Charles and Joseph were too young to now remember what he looks like, and Sir Oliver plans to use this fact to test them. He plans to go to Charles disguised as a moneylender named “Mr. Premium,” to see how extravagant Charles really is. To test Joseph’s alleged morality, he plans to visit his older nephew in the guise of a poor relative who needs charity named “Mr. Stanley.”

Rowley introduces Sir Oliver to Moses , a Jewish moneylender who will accompany him to see Charles, and the two men leave to call on Charles. Left alone, Sir Peter immediately gets into an argument with Maria, who says she will not obey his command to marry Joseph. Maria runs from the room and Lady Teazle enters. Sir Peter proposes that they should stop their quarrelling and his wife agrees, but when he tells her that she was always the one to start their fights in the past, they begin to fight again. Sir Peter accuses Lady Teazle of having an affair with Charles Surface, a rumor that Snake and Lady Sneerwell have been spreading. She indignantly denies this and leaves. Sir Peter is infuriated, especially because Lady Teazle never loses her temper when they fight.

Sir Oliver, pretending to be Mr. Premium, arrives with Moses at Charles’s house, where Charles is drinking and playing cards with friends. Charles appeals to Mr. Premium for money, explaining that although he has sold off all his property, he expects to be the heir of the fabulously wealthy Sir Oliver. Charles suggests that Mr. Premium can collect the debt when Sir Oliver dies. Mr. Premium presses Charles for other collateral, and Charles suggests that he can sell him the family portraits . Inwardly, Sir Oliver is shocked at the disrespect this shows to family tradition, but he bids for the portraits in an auction. As the auction nears its end, Sir Oliver asks if Charles will sell him a specific portrait. Charles refuses, saying that it is the portrait of his generous benefactor Sir Oliver. Touched, Sir Oliver inwardly forgives Charles for being so extravagant.

In the next scene, Lady Teazle arrives late for a date with Joseph at his house. She complains about her fights with Sir Peter, but is still unsure whether she wants to commit adultery with Joseph. Sir Peter arrives and, terrified of being discovered, Lady Teazle hides behind a screen in Joseph’s room as Sir Peter makes his way up the stairs. Sir Peter confides in Joseph that he is worried his wife is having an affair with Charles, but that he plans to soon give her financial independence from him, which he hopes will ease their fights. Sir Peter begins to talk to Joseph about his desire to marry Maria, but Joseph tries to stop him, not wanting Lady Teazle to learn that he is courting Maria too. At that moment, Charles arrives. Sir Peter says he will eavesdrop on the brothers to discover the truth about Charles and his wife. Sir Peter tries to hide behind the screen, but Joseph stops him, explaining that he already has a lover hiding there. Sir Peter hides in a closet instead. Charles enters and Joseph asks him about Lady Teazle. Charles denies any involvement with Lady Teazle and begins to say that he believed Joseph and Lady Teazle were the ones having the affair. Joseph stops Charles by telling him Sir Peter is listening. Sir Peter comes out and tells Charles he is very relieved. Joseph leaves the room for a moment and Sir Peter tells Charles that his brother has a woman hidden in the room. As Joseph returns to the room, the screen is pulled down to reveal Lady Teazle. Although Joseph tries to explain Lady Teazle’s presence there, Lady Teazle tells her husband the truth: she was considering having an affair with Joseph, who she now understands is a liar and hypocrite. She says that, even if she had not been discovered, she would have changed her treatment of Sir Peter after hearing how kindly he spoke about her.

Soon after the Teazles leave, Joseph is visited by Sir Oliver, who pretends to be a poor relative named Mr. Stanley. Joseph speaks politely and eloquently about charity, but he tells Mr. Stanley that he has no money to give and that the rumors that his uncle sends him large sums of money are false. Under his breath, Sir Oliver says that Charles will be his heir. After Sir Oliver leaves, Rowley arrives to tell Joseph that his uncle has returned from the Indies and that he will bring him to Joseph’s house soon to see him. Joseph curses the bad timing of his uncle’s arrival.

At Sir Peter’s house, the gossipmongers have gathered to try to find out what really happened between the Teazles. The servant refuses them entry so they stand in an anteroom arguing about what the real story is. Some believe that Sir Peter caught Lady Teazle with Charles, while others allege that it was Joseph. They also report that Sir Peter was wounded in a duel fought with the wife-stealing Surface brother, but there is no consensus about whether swords or pistols were used in the fight. Sir Peter then walks in unharmed and shouts for the ridiculous gossips to leave his house. Rowley and Sir Oliver arrive to tell Sir Peter to come to Joseph’s house for the meeting between the Surface brothers and Sir Oliver. Rowley pleads Lady Teazle’s case, saying that he spoke to her and she feels terrible for the pain and embarrassment she caused him. Upon Rowley’s urging, Sir Peter decides to reconcile with Lady Teazle.

At Joseph’s house, Lady Sneerwell complains that Joseph ruined her chance to disrupt Charles and Maria’s engagement by getting caught pursuing Lady Teazle. Joseph tells Lady Sneerwell she may still have a chance with Charles because Snake has forged letters that suggest Charles has pledged to marry Lady Sneerwell, which should also ruin Charles’s chances with Maria. Sir Oliver and Charles arrive, and Lady Sneerwell hides in the next room. The brothers wish to make a good impression on Sir Oliver and try to force the man they believe to be Mr. Premium or Mr. Stanley from the room, fearing what he will say to their uncle about their behavior.

Sir Peter, Lady Teazle, Rowley, and Maria arrive, and the Teazles reveal to the Surface brothers that the man they are throwing out of the house is their Uncle Oliver. Joseph tries to make excuses for his behavior, but Charles only apologizes for having disrespected the family by selling the portraits. Sir Oliver tells Charles he forgives him everything and Joseph that he sees through his hypocrisy. Lady Teazle suggests that Charles may also be interested in gaining Maria’s forgiveness, but Maria says that she knows he is already engaged to another. Charles is dumbfounded. Lady Sneerwell emerges from hiding to claim that Charles is engaged to her, but Rowley summons Snake, who reveals that he was paid to forge letters for Lady Sneerwell, but paid double to reveal the truth to Rowley. Lady Sneerwell storms from the room in frustration and Joseph follows. The play ends with an engagement between Maria and Charles, who will be his uncle’s sole heir.

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Analysis of The Satyam Corporate Scandal

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The School for Scandal

By richard brinsley sheridan, the school for scandal summary and analysis of act i.

The play starts with two prologues that set up the themes of scandal, rumors, and public appearance.

Act I begins by presenting Lady Sneerwell , a wealthy widow, and her servant, Snake , gossiping as they usually do. Lady Sneerwell gossips because, in her past, someone destroyed her reputation.

Lady Sneerwell reveals to Snake why she is so involved in matters concerning Sir Peter Teazle, his ward Maria , and the young brothers Charles and Joseph Surface : Joseph loves Maria, but Maria loves Charles, whom Lady Sneerwell also loves. Lady Sneerwell and Joseph have been plotting to make Maria and Charles drift apart by putting out a rumor that Charles and Sir Peter’s wife, Teazle, are having an affair. Lady Sneerwell will be sending Snake to execute this plot.

After Lady Sneerwell finishes explaining, Joseph enters. Snake leaves, and Joseph then tells Lady Sneerwell that he suspects Snake of not being entirely faithful to them and their secret plan, because Snake has been in conversation with Rowley, who was his father's steward.

Maria now enters, having tried to escape Sir Benjamin Backbite, another man vying for her love, and his uncle Crabtree. She complains that she did not want to stay with Backbite and his uncle because they were talking badly about others.

Maria is followed by Mrs. Candour , and then by Sir Benjamin Backbite and his uncle Crabtree, who start gossiping that the Surface brothers' rich uncle will soon return to England from the East Indies. Crabtree also lauds Sir Benjamin's poetic sensibilities. They then start gossiping about Charles’ financial situation, so Maria chooses to leave. Mrs. Candour follows her to try to help, and then Crabtree and Benjamin follow as well.

Scene II begins with a soliloquy by Sir Peter about his wife’s spending habits. Rowley arrives and the two talk about Maria, discussing how she rejected Joseph and seems to like Charles. Rowley defends Charles and then tells Sir Peter that Sir Oliver arrived from the East Indies. Sir Peter fears that Sir Oliver will make fun of him for getting married, but he is excited to see a friend whom he last saw sixteen years ago.

Beginning with a prologue was fairly commonplace at the time of Sheridan's writing. These prologues are used to directly address the audience and set up some of the themes or issues of the play. Sometimes, these prologues were not even written by the playwright, much like the forward of a book. In this play, the audience first sees a "portrait" written by the playwright, Richard Brinsley Sheridan , followed by a prologue written by a man named Mr. Garric.

From the beginning of the play proper, characters' names are important for understanding characters' personalities and Sheridan's sense of humor and irony. In the first scene, Lady Sneerwell talks to Snake openly about their plot to spread a nasty, false rumor about Charles Surface and Lady Sneerwell's personal reasons for enjoying creating scandal. Lady Sneerwell's name combines her social status (Lady) with her major character trait of judging others (Sneerwell). Snake's name is slightly more metaphorical, evoking ideas of sneakiness. This sneakiness is why Lady Sneerwell chooses him to do her bidding; ironically, it is also the character trait that allows Snake to reveal Lady Sneerwell's plot in the end.

Lady Sneerwell's forwardness and honesty with Snake might be surprising in a Comedy of Manners. For example, she says directly, "Wounded myself, in the early part of my life, by the envenomed tongue of slander, I confess I have since known no pleasure equal to the reducing others to the level of my own injured reputation" (p.15). However, this honesty and self-awareness in the first scene allows the audience to contrast her manner in private with her behavior in the public sphere, where she constantly throws attention on others rather than drawing it to her own situation.

Act I Scene I introduces many of the important characters and relationships of the play. When Maria is introduced, there is immediate contrast between her own manner and beliefs and those of the rest of the characters. In Maria's second line of the play, she explains why she fled from conversation with Benjamin Backbite, saying, "his conversation is a perpetual libel on all his acquaintance" (p.23), meaning that he, like Lady Sneerwell, is a gossip. Throughout the play, Maria is used as a symbol of innocence and purity. The love Joseph, Charles, and Benjamin all have for her could suggest either that society still sought morality in the midst of all the scandal and gossip that most people partook in, or that women specifically were expected to be seen as moral and pure.

One of the major issue raised in Act I is the relation between mean gossip and wit. Maria suggests that she loses respect for wit when wit is used to hurt or spread gossip about another; in her words, when she "see[s] it in company with malice" (p.23). However, Lady Sneerwell responds that the two concepts (mean gossip and wit) are inextricably linked. Sheridan is perhaps challenging his audience, and especially viewers who are highly educated or writers themselves, to contemplate whether all wit must have a "barb that makes it stick" (p.24). If nothing else, as a writer of satire, Sheridan certainly had to confront the relation between wit and meanness personally.

The School for Scandal Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for The School for Scandal is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

What is Sheridan's message in the play's final scene?

In the play's epilogue, Sheridan urges the audience a final time to see this play not as simple entertainment, but rather as a harsh criticism of any who engage in gossip—both its creation and its transmission.

What is the significance of the auction scene in the play School for Scandal by R. B. Sheridan?

In the auction scene, Sir Oliver becomes aware of Charles' betrayal, something for which he will never forgive him.

What is an example of metaphor in School for Scandal?

"a neat rivulet of text shall meander through a meadow of margin" (p.32) (Metaphor)

In this quote, Benjamin Backbite describes the way his writing will look when published, in an attempt to woo Maria. As a poet, he uses figurative, lyrical...

Study Guide for The School for Scandal

The School for Scandal study guide contains a biography of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About The School for Scandal
• The School for Scandal Summary
• Character List

Essays for The School for Scandal

The School for Scandal essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of The School for Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan.

• Human Nature in Sherdian and Burke
• Satire in The School for Scandal
• The Pride of Wealth: Hypocrisy and Money in The School for Scandal

Wikipedia Entries for The School for Scandal

• Introduction
• Revisions and variant versions
• Film and television adaptations

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