The Beggar’s Opera: A Satirical Version of Robert Walpole

During the Eighteenth Century, highway robbery was nearing the end of its peak. Despite this, the beginning of the century saw an increased fear of this particular type of crime. It had been on the increase since the end of the English Civil War but now highwaymen had become engrained in popular culture. The theatre was a popular way of representing this relatable problem for British Society during this time. The most notable production was John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera (1728), which told the story of the sexually attractive Macheath, a gentleman highwayman.

The Beggar’s Opera was first performed at Lincoln Inn Fields Theatre but didn’t enjoy initial success because it was a ballad opera, a satirical play with operatic songs. This genre was seen as too modern at the time for an audience who liked consistency. Eventually, the play gradually grew in popularity because of its themes of satirising a growing social issue, whilst not condemning the criminal life. Another reason for its increasing popularity was the satirical political undertones that the public began to see in the production. Macheath, the infamous rogue, is an ambiguous character within the play as it was left open to the audience to decide whether they interpreted him as a villain or hero. This was partly because Macheath was based on Robert Walpole to demonstrate how corrupt the government was. The play subtly blamed Walpole for the collapse of the South Sea Bubble, a stocks and shares incentive with trade to the South Seas, which had ruined many wealthy people in Britain and disgraced many politicians. It was meant to show Walpole as “a fraudulent, self-interested manipulator”, who was always insincere and corrupt in his government business.

 Dahl, 

During the early eighteenth century, criminal biographies and sensationalised stories of criminals, especially highwaymen, were a popular form of literature. The Beggar’s Opera is a recycled version of these pre-existing criminal biographies, which shows that content in cheap and topical pamphlets was being recreated in the new form of ballad opera culture, in order to appeal to a wider audience. The play contained many similar themes to the existing pamphlets and cheap books that spread news on the latest celebrity criminals. The main plotline of The Beggar’s Opera tells the story of a highwayman with many female lovers, who escapes from prison only to be convicted on evidence given by members of his gang.

Whilst the satire of the criminal background may be lost to a contemporary audience, the audience of the eighteenth century would have understood both the political and criminal context. The characters featured in The Beggar’s Opera had huge similarities to the largest criminal case of the early eighteenth century: Jack Sheppard and Johnathan Wild. Jack Sheppard’s daring escapes from prison were the talk of the country and his popularity after death continued with a published form of his dying speech. Jonathan Wild, the ‘thief-taker’, who provided evidence against Sheppard, quickly became the most hated man in the country for sending the nation’s hero to the gallows. All of these themes were evident in The Beggar’s Opera‘s eventual success. The little-known sequel, Polly, was officially banned by Robert Walpole due to the similar insinuations that highwaymen had the same morals as politicians. From both of these plays by John Gay, the highwayman became a satirical character in the subversive commentary on politics, allowing crime to directly relate to the moral ambiguity of Walpole and his government.

 Hogarth, 

The play also made the actors who featured in it stars in their own right. Three of them featured in some of the first examples of theatrical biographies. These biographies blamed the theatre and other celebrations of actors and actresses as creating debauched tastes within their audiences. This was because of the sexual, political and cultural issues they were associated with, as they went against the grain of ‘normal’ society.  This links to the eighteenth century idea of the “invention of liberty” which was the fanciful idea of the freedom of the individual, even though ‘free’ actions were still condemned. The hypocrisy of this concept was again a key theme to the satirical, particularly those concerned with the criminal.

The Beggar’s Opera, though largely forgotten in today’s understanding of eighteenth-century theatre and literature, was hugely significant in its day. It successfully linked itself to fears of crime waves and political corruption. It also purposefully joined in on the popular band wagon of criminal biographies by using similar sensationalist themes. Gay’s application of this was so apparent that there became fears that it would eventually debauch the audience who watched it.

McKenzie, A., ‘Martyrs in Low Life? Dying “Game” in Augustan England’, Journal of British Studies, 42.2 (2003), p. 176.

Brewer, J., The Pleasures of the Imagination: English Culture in the Eighteenth Century (London: Routledge, 2013), pp. 342-343.

Brewer, J., The Pleasures of the Imagination, p. 343.

Brewer, J., The Pleasures of the Imagination, p. 285.

White, J., London in the Eighteenth Century: a Great and Monstrous Thing (London: The Bodley Head, 2012), pp. 303-304.

Goring, P., Eighteenth-Century Literature and Culture (London: Continuum, 2008), p. 19.

Brewer, J., The Pleasures of the Imagination, pp. 342 and 345.

Brewer, J., The Pleasures of the Imagination, p. 343.

Brewer, J., The Pleasures of the Imagination, p. 345.

Brewer, J., The Pleasures of the Imagination, p. 347.

James R. Sutherland, ‘Polly Among the Pirates’, Modern Language Review, 37 (1942) cited in Rediker, M., Villains of All Nations: Atlantic Pirates in the Golden Age (London: Verso, 2004), p. 120.

Wanko, C., ‘Three Stories of Celebrity: The Beggar’s Opera “Biographies”’, Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900, 38.3 (1998), p. 482.

Jean Starobinksi, The Invention of Liberty’ translated by Bernard C. Swift cited in Castle, T., ‘The Culture of Travesty: Sexuality and Masquerade in Eighteenth-Century England’, in Demaria, R. (ed) British Literature, 1640-1789 (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd, 1999), p. 270; Castle, T., ‘The Culture of Travesty’, p. 252.

Wanko, C., ‘Three Stories of Celebrity’, pp. 481-482; Arnold, C., Underworld London: Crime and Punishment in the Capital City (London: Simon & Schuster, 2012), p. 91.