Financial Power and Social Anxiety in Philip Massinger’s A New Way to Pay Old Debts and The City Madam.

Abstract

Philip Massinger (1583-1640) has remained a relatively underexplored author in literary studies compared to his contemporaries. Nevertheless, his plays —both in collaboration and in his own right—, deserve closer examination for their artistic and thematic contributions to early modern drama. This article explores how two of Massinger’s plays engage with the economic transformations of early modern England, particularly the financial speculation and the fluidity of social status. Through close readings of A New Way to Pay Old Debts (1633) and The City Madam (1658), the study examines how Massinger constructs characters —such as merchants, usurers and social climbers— who embody both the opportunities and dangers of a capitalist market-driven society. The plays portray contemporary anxieties about debt, bankruptcy and aristocratic ideals, ultimately suggesting that drama functioned as a medium through which the moral crises generated by emerging capitalism in England could be examined.