The Beggar's Opera

By John Gay

BEGGAR. If Poverty be a Title to Poetry, I am sure no-body can dispute mine. I own myself of the Company of Beggars; and I make one at their Weekly Festivals at St. Giles's. I have a small Yearly Salary for my Catches, and am welcome to a Dinner there whenever I please, which is more than most Poets can say.

PLAYER. As we live by the Muses, it is but Gratitude in us to encourage Poetical Merit wherever we find it. The Muses, contrary to all other Ladies, pay no Distinction to Dress, and never partially mistake the Pertness of Embroidery for Wit, nor the Modesty of Want for Dulness. Be the Author who he will, we push his Play as far as it will go. So (though you are in Want) I wish you success heartily.

BEGGAR. This piece I own was originally writ for the celebrating the Marriage of James Chaunter and Moll Lay, two most excellent Ballad- Singers. I have introduced the Similes that are in all your celebrated Operas: The Swallow, the Moth, the Bee, the Ship, the Flower, &c. Besides, I have a Prison-Scene, which the Ladies always reckon charmingly pathetic. As to the Parts, I have observed such a nice Impartiality to our two Ladies, that it is impossible for either of them to take Offence. I hope I may be forgiven, that I have not made my Opera throughout unnatural, like those in vogue; for I have no Recitative; excepting this, as I have consented to have neither Prologue nor Epilogue, it must be allowed an Opera in all its Forms. The Piece indeed hath been heretofore frequently represented by ourselves in our Great Room at St. Giles's, so that I cannot too often acknowledge your Charity in bringing it now on the Stage.

PLAYER. But I see it is time for us to withdraw; the Actors are preparing to begin. Play away the Overture.

• Language: English
• Publisher: anboco
• Release date: Aug 24, 2016
• ISBN: 9783736410022

John Gay

John Gay was an English playwright and poet who is most famous for his satirical masterpiece The Beggar’s Opera. Originally employed in the government, Gay turned to writing after losing his position following the death of Queen Anne in 1714. From then on, Gay relied on his income from writing, building up a long list of patrons over the course of his career, and making contact with some of the most famous writers of the time, including Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope (and with whom he was a member of the informal society of authors and thinkers known as the Scriblerus Club). After losing the majority of his fortune to a bad investment, Gay eventually found his greatest success in The Beggar’s Opera, a ballad opera that satirized society and government, and which ran for sixty-two nights upon its initial release. Gay died on December 4, 1732, at the age of forty-seven, and is buried in Westminster Abbey.

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