Scare. But pray, sir, at whose expence shall I eat?
Book. At whose? Why, at mine, sir, at mine. I am as great a friend to learning as the Dutch are to trade: no one can want bread with me who will earn it; therefore, sir, if you please to take your seat at my table, here will be everything necessary provided for you: good milk porridge, very often twice a day, which is good wholesome food and proper for students; a translator too is what I want at present, my last being in Newgate for shop-lifting. The rogue had a trick of translating out of the shops as well as the languages.
Scare. But I am afraid I am not qualified for a translator, for I understand no language but my own.
Book. What, and translate Virgil?
Scare. Alas! I translated him out of Dryden.
Book. Lay by your hat, sir — lay by your hat, and take your seat immediately. Not qualified! — thou art as well versed in thy trade as if thou hadst laboured in my garret these ten years. Let me tell you, friend, you will have more occasion for invention than learning here. You will be obliged to translate books out of all languages, especially French, that were never printed in any language whatsoever.
Scare. Your trade abounds in mysteries.
Book. The study of bookselling is as difficult as the law: and there are as many tricks in the one as the other. Sometimes we give a foreign name to our own labours, and sometimes we put our names to the labours of others. Then, as the lawyers have John-a-Nokes and Tom-a-Stiles, so we have Messieurs Moore near St Paul’s and Smith near the Royal Exchange.
SCENE VI. — To them, LUCKLESS.
Luck. Mr Bookweight, your servant. Who can form to himself an idea more amiable than of a man at the head of so many patriots working for the benefit of their country.
Book. Truly, sir, I believe it is an idea more agreeable to you than that of a gentleman in the Crown-office paying thirty or forty guineas for abusing an honest tradesman.
Luck. Pshaw! that was only jocosely done, and a man who lives by wit must not be angry at a jest.
Book. Look ye, sir, if you have a mind to compromise the matter, and have brought me any money —
Luck. Hast thou been in thy trade so long, and talk of money to a modern author? You might as well have talked Latin or Greek to him. I have brought you paper, sir.
Book. That is not bringing me money, I own. Have you brought me an opera?
Luck. You may call it an opera if you will, but I call it a puppet-show.
Book. A puppet-show!
Luck. Ay, a puppet show; and is to be played this night at Drury-lane playhouse.
Book. A puppet-show in a playhouse!
Luck. Ay, why, what have been all the playhouses a long while but puppet-shows?
Book. Why, I don’t know but it may succeed; at least if we can make out a tolerable good title-page: so, if you will walk in, if I can make a bargain with you I will. Gentlemen, you may go to dinner.
SCENE VII. — Enter JACK-PUDDING, Drummer, Mob.
Jack-P. This is to give notice to all gentlemen, ladies, and others, that at the Theatre Royal in Drury-lane, this evening, will be performed the whole puppet-show called the Pleasures of the Town; in which will be shewn the whole court of nonsense, with abundance of singing, dancing, and several other entertainments: also the comical and diverting humours of Some-body and No-body; Punch and his wife Joan to be performed by figures, some of them six foot high. God save the King.
[Drum beats.
SCENE VIII. — WITMORE with a paper, meeting LUCKLESS.
Wit. Oh! Luckless, I am overjoyed to meet you; here, take this paper, and you will be discouraged from writing, I warrant you.
Luck. What is it? — Oh! one of my play-bills.
Wit. One of thy play-bills!
Luck. Even so — I have taken the advice you gave me this morning.
Wit. Explain.
Luck. Why, I had some time since given this performance of mine to be rehearsed, and the actors were all perfect in their parts; but we happened to differ about some particulars, and I had a design to have given it over; ‘till having my play refused by Marplay, I sent for the managers of the other house in a passion, joined issue with them, and this very evening it is to be acted.
Wit. Well, I wish you success.
Luck. Where are you going?
Wit. Anywhere but to hear you damned, which I must, was I to go to your puppet-show.
Luck. Indulge me in this trial; and I assure thee, if it be successless, it shall be the last.
Wit. On that condition I will; but should the torrent run against you, I shall be a fashionable friend and hiss with the rest.
Luck. No, a man who could do so unfashionable and so generous a thing as Mr Witmore did this morning ——
Wit. Then I hope you will return it, by never mentioning it to me more. I will now to the pit.
Luck. And I behind the scenes.
SCENE IX. — LUCKLESS, HARRIOT.
Luck. Dear Harriot!
Har. I was going to the playhouse to look after you — I am frightened out of my wits — I have left my mother at home with the strangest sort of man, who is inquiring after you: he has raised a mob before the door by the oddity of his appearance; his dress is like nothing I ever saw, and he talks of kings, and Bantam, and the strangest stuff.
Luck. What the devil can he be?
Har. One of your old acquaintance, I suppose, in disguise — one of his majesty’s officers with his commission in his pocket, I warrant him.
Luck. Well, but have you your part perfect?
Har. I had, unless this fellow hath frightened it out of my head again; but I am afraid I shall play it wretchedly.
Luck. Why so?
Har. I shall never have assurance enough to go through with it, especially if they should hiss me.
Luck. Oh! your mask will keep you in countenance, and as for hissing, you need not fear it. The audience are generally so favourable to young beginners: but hist, here is your mother and she has seen us. Adieu, my dear, make what haste you can to the playhouse.
[Exit.
SCENE X. — HARRIOT, MONEYWOOD.
Har. I wish I could avoid her, for I suppose we shall have an alarum.
Money. So, so, very fine: always together, always caterwauling. How like a hangdog he stole off; and it’s well for him he did, for I should have rung such a peal in his ears. — There’s a friend of his at my house would be very glad of his company, and I wish it was in my power to bring them together.
Har. You would not surely be so barbarous.
Money. Barbarous! ugh! You whining, puling fool! Hussey, you have not a drop of my blood in you. What, you are in love, I suppose?
Har. If I was, madam, it would be no crime,
Money. Yes, madam, but it would, and a folly too. No woman of sense was ever in love with anything but a man’s pocket. What, I suppose he has filled your head with a pack of romantick stuff of streams and dreams, and charms and arms. I know this is the stuff they all run on with, and so run into our debts, and run away with our daughters. Come, confess; are not you two to live in a wilderness together on love? Ah! thou fool! thou wilt find he will pay thee in love just as he has paid me in money. If thou wert resolved to go a-begging, why did you not follow the camp? There, indeed, you might have carried a knapsack; but here you will have no knapsack to carry. There, indeed, you might have had a chance of burying half a score husbands in a campaign; whereas a poet is a long-lived animal; you have but one chance of burying him, and that is, starving him.
Har. Well, madam, and I would sooner starve with the man I love than ride in a coach and six with him I hate: and, as for his passion, you will not make me suspect that, for he hath given me such proofs on’t.
Money. Proofs! I shall die. Has he given you proofs of love?
Har. All that any modest woman can require.
Money. If he has given you all a modest woman can require, I am afraid he has given you more than a modest woman should take: because he has been so good a lod
ger, I suppose I shall have some more of the family to keep. It is probable I shall live to see half a dozen grandsons of mine in Grub-street.
SCENE XI. — MONEYWOOD, HARRIOT, JACK.
Jack. Oh, madam! the man whom you took for a bailiff is certainly some great man; he has a vast many jewels and other fine things about him; he offered me twenty guineas to shew him my master, and has given away so much money among the chairmen, that some folks believe he intends to stand member of parliament for Westminster.
Money. Nay, then, I am sure he is worth inquiring into. So, d’ye hear, sirrah, make as much haste as you can before me, and desire him to part with no more money till I come.
Har. So, now my mother is in pursuit of money, I may securely go in pursuit of my lover: and I am mistaken, good mamma, if e’en you would not think that the better pursuit of the two.
In generous love transporting raptures lie,
Which age, with all its treasures, cannot buy.
TOM THUMB: A TRAGED Y
OR, TRAGEDY OF TRAGEDIES
This play was first performed at Haymarket on 24 March 1731, with the companion piece The Letter Writers. The drama presents Tom Thumb as small in stature and status, yet is granted the hand of a princess in marriage. Angered by this, the queen and another member of the court subsequently attempt to destroy the marriage. In adapting an earlier version of the work Fielding incorporated significant plot changes in reaction to the view that Tom Thumb was a burlesque. Therefore, Fielding replaced some of the humour in favour of biting satire.
The character of Tom Thumb first appeared in The History of Tom Thumb by Tomas, published in 1621, being one of the first fairy tales printed in English. The tale portrays Tom as no bigger than his father’s thumb and his adventures include being swallowed by a cow, tangling with giants and becoming a favourite of King Arthur. The earliest allusions to Tom Thumb occur in various 16th century works such as Reginald Scot’s Discovery of Witchcraft (1584) where Tom is cited as one of the supernatural folk employed by servant maids to frighten children. Fielding’s play is the first recorded drama to take up the character of Tom Thumb.
The Daily Post stated in April 1731 that there was a high demand to see the play. Notable individuals who attended the play, according to the Daily Post on 3 May, included Princess Amelia and Princess Caroline, stressing the growing popularity of Fielding’s work as a playwright.
The original title page
CONTENTS
PREFACE.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE.
ACT I.
ACT II.
ACT III.
Hogarth’s frontispiece to the play
THE TRAGEDY OF TRAGEDIES; OR, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF TOM THUMB THE GREAT.
WITH THE ANNOTATIONS OF H. SCRIBLERUS SECUNDUS
FIRST ACTED IN 1730, AND ALTERED IN 1731.
H. SCRIBLERUS SECUNDUS
PREFACE.
THE town hath seldom been more divided in its opinion than concerning the merit of the following scenes. While some publickly affirmed that no author could produce so fine a piece but Mr P —— , others have with as much vehemence insisted that no one could write anything so bad but Mr F —— .
Nor can we wonder at this dissension about its merit, when the learned would have not unanimously decided even the very nature of this tragedy. For though most of the universities in Europe have honoured it with the name of “Egregium et maximi pretii opus, tragoediis tam antiquis quam novis longe anteponendum;” nay, Dr B —— hath pronounced, “Citius Maevii Aeneadem quam Scribleri istrus tragoediam hanc crediderium, cujus autorem Senecam ipsum tradidisse haud dubitarim:” and the great professor Burman hath styled Tom Thumb “Heroum omnium tragicorum facile principem:” nay, though it hath, among other languages, been translated into Dutch, and celebrated with great applause at Amsterdam (where burlesque never came) by the title of Mynheer Vander Thumb, the burgomasters receiving it with that reverent and silent attention which becometh an audience at a deep tragedy. Notwithstanding all this, there have not been wanting some who have represented these scenes in a ludicrous light; and Mr D —— hath been heard to say, with some concern, that he wondered a tragical and Christian nation would permit a representation on its theatre so visibly designed to ridicule and extirpate everything that is great and solemn among us.
This learned critick and his followers were led into so great an error by that surreptitious and piratical copy which stole last year into the world; with what injustice and prejudice to our author will be acknowledged, I hope, by every one who shall happily peruse this genuine and original copy. Nor can I help remarking, to the great praise of our author, that, however imperfect the former was, even that faint resemblance of the true Tom Thumb contained sufficient beauties to give it a run of upwards of forty nights to the politest audiences. But, notwithstanding that applause which it received from all the best judges, it was as severely censured by some few bad ones, and, I believe rather maliciously than ignorantly, reported to have been intended a burlesque on the loftiest parts of tragedy, and designed to banish what we generally call fine things from the stage.
Now, if I can set my country right in an affair of this importance, I shall lightly esteem any labour which it may cost. And this I the rather undertake, first, as it is indeed in some measure incumbent on me to vindicate myself from that surreptitious copy before mentioned, published by some ill-meaning people under my name; secondly, as knowing myself more capable of doing justice to our author than any other man, as I have given myself more pains to arrive at a thorough understanding of this little piece, having for ten years together read nothing else; in which time, I think, I may modestly presume, with the help of my English dictionary, to comprehend all the meanings of every word in it.
But should any error of my pen awaken Clariss. Bentleium to enlighten the world with his annotations on our author, I shall not think that the least reward or happiness arising to me from these my endeavours.
I shall waive at present what hath caused such feuds in the learned world, whether this piece was originally written by Shakspeare, though certainly that, were it true, must add a considerable share to its merit, especially with such who are so generous as to buy and commend what they never read, from an implicit faith in the author only: a faith which our age abounds in as much as it can be called deficient in any other.
Let it suffice, that THE TRAGEDY OF TRAGEDIES; or, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF TOM THUMB, was written in the reign of queen Elizabeth. Nor can the objection made by Mr D —— , that the tragedy must then have been antecedent to the history, have any weight, when we consider that, though the HISTORY OF TOM THUMB, printed by and for Edward M —— r, at the Looking-glass on London-bridge, be of a later date, still must we suppose this history to have been transcribed from some other, unless we suppose the writer thereof to be inspired: a gift very faintly contended for by the writers of our age. As to this history’s not bearing the stamp of second, third, or fourth edition, I see but little in that objection; editions being very uncertain lights to judge of books by; and perhaps Mr M —— r may have joined twenty editions in one, as Mr C —— l hath ere now divided one into twenty.
Nor doth the other argument, drawn from the little care our author hath taken to keep up to the letter of this history, carry any greater force. Are there not instances of plays wherein the history is so perverted, that we can know the heroes whom they celebrate by no other marks than their names? nay, do we not find the same character placed by different poets in such different lights, that we can discover not the least sameness, or even likeness, in the features? The Sophonisba of Mairet and of Lee is a tender, passionate, amorous mistress of Massinissa: Corneille and Mr Thomson give her no other passion but the love of her country, and make her as cool in her affection to Massinissa as to Syphax. In the two latter she resembles the character of queen Elizabeth; in the two former she is the picture of Mary queen of Scotland. In short, the one Sophonisba is as different from the other as the Brutus of Voltaire is
from the Marius, jun., of Otway, or as the Minerva is from the Venus of the ancients.
Let us now proceed to a regular examination of the tragedy before us, in which I shall treat separately of the Fable, the Moral, the Characters, the Sentiments, and the Diction. And first of the
Fable; which I take to be the most simple imaginable; and, to use the words of an eminent author, “one, regular, and uniform, not charged with a multiplicity of incidents, and yet affording several revolutions of fortune, by which the passions may be excited, varied, and driven to their full tumult of emotion.” — Nor is the action of this tragedy less great than uniform. The spring of all is the love of Tom Thumb for Huncamunca; which caused the quarrel between their majesties in the first act; the passion of Lord Grizzle in the second; the rebellion, fall of Lord Grizzle and Glumdalca, devouring of Tom Thumb by the cow, and that bloody catastrophe, in the third.
Complete Fictional Works of Henry Fielding Page 251