Thomas Middleton’s outrageous ‘city comedy’: a brilliantly plotted, farcical satire of lies and lust, translated from Jacobean London to the Soho of the 1950s. A dashingly impecunious bachelor, Dick Follywit, in need of quick cash and a good time has to live on his wits so turns con-man to fool his rich uncle. He variously becomes a Lord, a high-class call girl and a poor actor. Meanwhile, Truly Kidman, a high-class call girl – poor but quick-witted – needs to fool and then marry a rich young man... Sean Foley and Phil Porter’s edited version of Middleton’s play is faithful to the original text but adapts it to fit the seedy world of 1950s Soho, updating character names and including songs of the time to enhance the biting satire of lust and deception in the life of Bohemian London.

Michaelmas term: Cast gender - mixed; number - 19 males, 7 females (total 16); size - large; length - 5 acts, 18 scenes. Elizabethan drama. Property swindling of country landowner by city merchant.

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In this lively work, Beatrice K. Otto takes us on a journey around the world in search of one of the most colorful characters in history—the court jester. Though not always clad in cap and bells, these witty, quirky characters crop up everywhere, from the courts of ancient China and the Mogul emperors of India to those of medieval Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and the Americas. With a wealth of anecdotes, jokes, quotations, epigraphs, and illustrations (including flip art), Otto brings to light little-known jesters, highlighting their humanizing influence on people with power and position and placing otherwise remote historical figures in a more idiosyncratic, intimate light. Most of the work on the court jester has concentrated on Europe; Otto draws on previously untranslated classical Chinese writings and other sources to correct this bias and also looks at jesters in literature, mythology, and drama. Written with wit and humor, Fools Are Everywhere is the most comprehensive look at these roguish characters who risked their necks not only to mock and entertain but also to fulfill a deep and widespread human and social need.

Thomas Middleton (1580-1627) was one of the most prolific and fascinating playwrights of the Jacobean era, producing nearly fifty theatrical pieces in a quarter of a century. This collection comprises five of his most powerful plays, from the comedies satirizing city life, A Trick to Catch the Old One, and A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, to his later tragedies Women Beware Women and The Changeling, in which Middleton reveals a world dominated by the corrupting power of lust and subject to the futility of human pretensions. Also included is The Revenger's Tragedy, originally ascribed to Cyril Tourneur, a Revenge Play infused with sardonic wit and biting irony.

This unique edition brings together four plays concerned with 'domestic' themes: Arden of Faversham, Heywood's A Woman Killed with Kindness and The English Traveller, and Dekker, Rowley and Ford's The Witch of Edmonton. Texts are in modern spelling, accompanied by a critical introduction, wide-ranging annotation and bibliography.

Thomas Middleton (1580-1627), a bricklayer's son, rose to become one of the most eminent playwrights of the Jacobean period. Along with Ben Johnson he helped shape the dynamic course of drama in Renaissance England. His range is broad, as his work successfully covers comedy, tragedy, and history. Praised during his life as well as today, Middleton remains relevant and influential. "A Trick to Catch the Old One" (1608) is a delightful comedy following a young Thomas Witgood who has managed to squander his fortune and is now in debt to his uncle Pecunius Lucre. In order to manage and pay off his debts, an elaborate scheme to court a wealthy mistresses is devised. What ensues is a comedy of intrigue filled with wit and bawdy. In this play greed and seduction intertwine to create a smart comedy with latent social commentary.