Nicholas Rowe (writer) said to have suggested to Samuel Richardson the character of Clarissa Harlowe, as Lothario suggested Lovelace. Samuel Johnson noted of "The Fair Penitent" that, "The story is domestic, and therefore easily received by the imagination, and assimilated to common life; the diction is exquisitely harmonious, and soft or spritely as occasion requires." In 1704, Rowe tried his hand at comedy, producing "The Biter" at Lincoln's Inn Fields, which was unsuccessful, and Rowe returned to tragedy in "Ulysses" (1706). According to Johnson, this play was to share the fate of many such plays based on mythological heroes, as, "We have been
Gravity the Seducer always be judged against". "Spin" magazine's Barry Walters remarked that the album "lacks the infectious, dark-disco rumble" of Ladytron's earlier work, noting that it "withhold[s] the hooks that previously put the sweet in their bitter". John Calvert of "Drowned in Sound" characterised the album as "slightly bland" and "nondescript in its understated sophistication", concluding that ""Gravity the Seducer" never manages to get under your skin the way the band intended". In the band's home country, the United Kingdom, "Gravity the Seducer" peaked at number 72 on the UK Albums Chart, spending one week on the chart. It became the band's