The Fair Penitent appears earlier in "Don Quixote" by Cervantes. In this story Lothario is urged by his lifelong friend Anselmo to attempt to seduce his wife in order to test her faithfulness. At first most unwilling he eventually enters into the scheme with skill and success. This earlier Lothario is a successful seducer. Malcolm Goldstein edited "The Fair Penitent" for a modern edition in 1969. Critics, both traditional and modern, have debated whether Calista is actually "penitent" for her infidelity. The Fair Penitent The Fair Penitent is Nicholas Rowe's stage adaptation of the tragedy "The Fatal Dowry," the Philip Massinger and Nathan
The Fatal Dowry play that deal with the fashionable world of Beaumelle and Novall Junior, while Massinger handled the parts involving soldiers, the law court, and the serious moral issues of the drama. The play has been called "unique among the plays of the Massinger canon in being both weak in plot and unusually strong in characterization." The play has been praised by critics; Arthur Symons considered it one of Massinger's "two most distinct and most distinguished tragedies" (the other being "The Duke of Milan"). In 1702, Nicholas Rowe adapted "The Fatal Dowry" into a new version he titled "The Fair Penitent". Aaron