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The Chances: A Comedy
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116 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1791
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About the author
Francis Beaumont
811 books19 followersborn 1584
English poet Francis Beaumont wrote his major works, plays, including The Maid's Tragedy and The Coxcomb , with John Fletcher in the 1610s.
Francis Beaumont, a dramatist in the Renaissance theater, most famously collaborated.
A justice of the common pleas of Grace Dieu near Thringstone in Leicestershire fathered Beaumont, the son, born born at the family seat. Broadgates hall (now Pembroke College, Oxford) educated him at 13 years of age in 1597. Following the death of his father in 1598, he left university without a degree and entered the Inner Temple in London in 1600 to follow in his footsteps.
Beaumont worked not long as a lawyer, accounts suggest. He studied Ben Jonson; Michael Drayton and other dramatists also acquainted him, who decided on this passion. He apparently first composed Salmacis and Hermaphroditus in 1602. The edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica describes as "not on the whole discreditable to a lad of eighteen, fresh from the popular love-poems of Marlowe and Shakespeare, which it naturally exceeds in long-winded and fantastic diffusion of episodes and conceits."
In 1605, Beaumont commendatory verses to Volpone of Jonson. Collaboration of Beaumont perhaps began early as 1605.
They hit an obstacle early in their dramatic careers with notable failures; The children of the Blackfriars in 1607 first performed The Knight of the Burning Pestle of Beaumont; an audience rejected it, and the epistle of the publisher to the quarto of 1613 claims, failed to note "the privie mark of irony about it;" they took satire of Beaumont as old-fashioned drama. It received a lukewarm reception. In the following year of 1608, Faithful Shepherdess failed on the same stage.
In 1609, however, the two collaborated on Philaster , which the men of the king performed at the globe theater and at Blackfriars. The popular success launched two careers and sparked a new taste for comedy. John Aubrey related a mid-century anecdote; , they lived in the same house on the Bankside in Southwark, "sharing everything in the closest intimacy."
About 1613, Beaumont married Ursula Isley, daughter and co-heiress of Henry Isley of Sundridge in Kent; she bore two daughters, one posthumous. After a stroke between February and October 1613, he ably composed no more than an elegy for Lady Penelope Clifton, who died 26 October 1613.
People buried his body in Westminster abbey. People celebrated Beaumont during his lifetime and remember him today as a dramatist.
English poet Francis Beaumont wrote his major works, plays, including The Maid's Tragedy and The Coxcomb , with John Fletcher in the 1610s.
Francis Beaumont, a dramatist in the Renaissance theater, most famously collaborated.
A justice of the common pleas of Grace Dieu near Thringstone in Leicestershire fathered Beaumont, the son, born born at the family seat. Broadgates hall (now Pembroke College, Oxford) educated him at 13 years of age in 1597. Following the death of his father in 1598, he left university without a degree and entered the Inner Temple in London in 1600 to follow in his footsteps.
Beaumont worked not long as a lawyer, accounts suggest. He studied Ben Jonson; Michael Drayton and other dramatists also acquainted him, who decided on this passion. He apparently first composed Salmacis and Hermaphroditus in 1602. The edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica describes as "not on the whole discreditable to a lad of eighteen, fresh from the popular love-poems of Marlowe and Shakespeare, which it naturally exceeds in long-winded and fantastic diffusion of episodes and conceits."
In 1605, Beaumont commendatory verses to Volpone of Jonson. Collaboration of Beaumont perhaps began early as 1605.
They hit an obstacle early in their dramatic careers with notable failures; The children of the Blackfriars in 1607 first performed The Knight of the Burning Pestle of Beaumont; an audience rejected it, and the epistle of the publisher to the quarto of 1613 claims, failed to note "the privie mark of irony about it;" they took satire of Beaumont as old-fashioned drama. It received a lukewarm reception. In the following year of 1608, Faithful Shepherdess failed on the same stage.
In 1609, however, the two collaborated on Philaster , which the men of the king performed at the globe theater and at Blackfriars. The popular success launched two careers and sparked a new taste for comedy. John Aubrey related a mid-century anecdote; , they lived in the same house on the Bankside in Southwark, "sharing everything in the closest intimacy."
About 1613, Beaumont married Ursula Isley, daughter and co-heiress of Henry Isley of Sundridge in Kent; she bore two daughters, one posthumous. After a stroke between February and October 1613, he ably composed no more than an elegy for Lady Penelope Clifton, who died 26 October 1613.
People buried his body in Westminster abbey. People celebrated Beaumont during his lifetime and remember him today as a dramatist.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 17, 2019
'The Chances, A Comedy' as altered from Beaumont and Fletcher, by his Grace the Duke of Buckingham. Adapted for Theatrical Representation as performed at the Theatres- Royal, Drury Lane and Covent Garden. Regulated from the Prompt-Books by permission of the managers. Printed for the Proprietors, under the Direction of John Bell, British Library, Strand, Bookseller to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. 1791.
November 5, 2023
Gosh: The Chances. A monstrously silly romp. People run round in the dark for (most of) the play, bumping into and fighting the wrong people. Two Spaniards lust over the same woman, while inadvertently protecting her baby, while two noblemen get into the most ludicrous street-fights. The language (particularly of Don John) is extreme (funny, OTT, but outrageously sexist), while the women face issues of people having the same names, looking like someone else, but basically being the good ones.
Men in this play are idiots: I get the impression John Fletcher had a low opinion of most men, and probably deserved.
This play will not change your life in any way, but if you like your renaissance plays fluffy, frothy and ludicrous, look no further. I would love to see this onstage.
Men in this play are idiots: I get the impression John Fletcher had a low opinion of most men, and probably deserved.
This play will not change your life in any way, but if you like your renaissance plays fluffy, frothy and ludicrous, look no further. I would love to see this onstage.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews