The London Merchant (or The History Of George Barnwell) is playwright George Lillo's most famous work. A tragedy that follows the downfall of a young apprentice due to his association with a prostitute, it is remarkable for its use of middle and working class characters. First performed at the Drury Lane Theatre on 21 June 1731, The London Merchant became one of the most popular plays of the century.
Sources George Lillo was born in London on 4 February 1693. By 1730, he began writing plays such as The London Merchant, Fatal Curiosity, Silvia, and The Country Burial.
Lillo based The London Merchant on a seventeenth-century ballad about a murder in Shropshire. The ballad follows the adventures of George Barnwell, who engages in an affair with the prostitute Sarah Millwood. After stealing money from his employer to fund his relationship, Barnwell robs and murders his uncle. Both Barnwell and Millwood are arrested and executed for their crimes. Lillo's plays usually resembled drames, or mixed toned Bourgeois Tragedies revolving around the middle-class.Gainor, p. ?
According to Lillo's preface to the play, he was drawn to the subject matter for its moral instruction. Lillo states, "If tragic poetry be. . .the most excellent and most useful kind of writing, the more excellent that piece must be of its kind." He validates his use of middle class characters in "that tragedy is so far from losing its dignity by being accommodated to the circumstances of the generality of mankind that it is more truly August in proportion to the extent of its influence and the numbers that are properly affected by it, as it is more truly great to be the instrument of good to many who stand in need of our assistance than to a very small part of that number."The London Merchant in Gainor, pp. ?–?
Lillo may have taken his title The London Merchant as a twist to make real the fictional play featured in Francis Beaumont's play The Knight of the Burning Pestle. The reuse of the name acknowledges that both plays elevate common citizens as subjects worthy of a play.
Characters Thorowgood, a London merchant George Barnwell, apprentice to Thorowgood Trueman, apprentice to Thorowgood Blunt, servant of Millwood Barnwell, uncle of George Barnwell Maria, daughter of Thorowgood Sarah Millwood, a lady of pleasure Lucy, servant of Millwood Officers with their attendants, keeper of the prison, executioner and footmen
Plot Act I Sarah Millwood, a London prostitute, schemes to find some innocent young man "who, having never injured women, [would] apprehend no injury from them" (I.iii) to seduce and exploit for money. She observes young George Barnwell in town, and she invites him to her house for supper. She realizes that he works for the wealthy merchant Thorowgood (who is known throughout London for his wealth and success). She decides to seduce George Barnwell at supper with irresistible flattery, and he succumbs to her wiles in a way that will give her access to Thorowgood's money, and she manipulates Barnwell to steal from his boss.
Act II Upon returning home the next morning, George feels he has betrayed Thorowgood by disobeying his curfew. The guilt he feels from disobeying the rules of the house, as well as the guilt he feels from his fornication with Millwood, leaves George tormented. His guilt is compounded by the loyalty of his friend Trueman. Soon, Millwood visits George at his place of work. When she discovers he no longer wants anything to do with her, she begins to sense her money-making scheme has come to an end. She quickly thinks of a lie to tell George to keep her plan going. She tells George that the man who provides her with housing somehow found out about their tryst and is now evicting her because of it. This evokes new feelings of guilt from George, and he is prompted to steal a large sum of money from his employer's funds to give to her to amend the situation.
Act III
After giving her the money, George feels unworthy of his kind master, Thorowgood, so he runs away and leaves a note for Trueman confessing his crime. Having no place to go, he turns to Millwood for help. At first she refuses him since his employer's money is no longer at his disposal, but she quickly remembers that he has previously mentioned a rich uncle. She again manipulates George into believing that she truly loves him, and concocts a scheme for him to rob his uncle. George objects, saying that his uncle will recognize him as his nephew; Millwood answers that the only way, then, will be to also murder his uncle. In a fit of passion, George runs off to commit the robbery and murder. He finds his Uncle Barnwell alone, and as he approaches, George veils his face and attacks his uncle with a knife. As he lies dying, Uncle Barnwell prays both for his nephew and his murderer, not knowing that they are the same. Overcome with sorrow, George reveals himself to his uncle, and before he dies, Uncle Barnwell forgives his murderous nephew.
Act IV In the meantime, Lucy came to Thorowgood and revealed the truth behind what Barnwell had done. Because of this Thorowgood rushes to exit and tells Lucy she must keep watch on Millwood's house. Later, George returns to Millwood's home upset, trembling, and with bloody hands. Upon realizing that he did not take any money or property, Millwood sends for the police and has George arrested for murder. Two of Millwood's servants, Lucy and Blunt, who were aware of the plan from the beginning, have her arrested as well. Both George and Millwood are sentenced to death. In the last scene of Act 4 Millwood expresses to Thorowgood that she is not remorseful in the least bit saying, "I hate you all! I know you, and expect no mercy -- nay, I ask for none. I have done nothing that I am sorry for. I followed my inclinations, and that the best of you does every day. All actions are alike natural and indifferent to man and beast who devour or are devoured as they meet with others weaker or stronger than themselves."
Act V Millwood blamed society and men for what she has become. She is not remorseful at all and with passion accepts her fate. Despite all that has transpired, George is visited by Thorowgood and Trueman in his prison cell. They console and forgive him. Thorowgood provides for his spiritual needs by arranging a visit from a clergyman. In the end, George is truly repentant for his sins and is at peace with himself, his friends, and God. Trueman ends the show with a small monologue saying, "In vain with bleeding hearts and weeping eyes we show a human gen'rous sense of others' woe, unless we mark what drew their ruin on, and, by avoiding that, prevent our own" (Act V Sc. X) to show that the play was to learn how to do the right things in our own lives.
Themes Morality and ethics Morality in the theater was an important issue during the Restoration and eighteenth century. The Killigrew and Davenant Patents are similar documents which gave the guidelines for the reopening of theaters in London, granting the rights of one theater to each. The Killigrew Patent describes that "no new play shall be acted … containing any passages offensive to piety and good manners" (Patent). Many felt that plays from earlier periods, including those of Shakespeare, exhibited bold vulgarity. Producers strove to remove these aspects from theater to ensure that the audience did not model themselves after the immoral decisions of characters. The London Merchant follows this general trend and goes further to include a moral message intended to be learned by apprentices watching the play. In the dedication to "The London Merchant", Lillo argues that "Plays founded on moral tales in private life may be of admirable use by carrying conviction to the mind with such irresistible force as to engage all the faculties and powers of the soul in the cause of virtue, by stifling vice in its first principles." Tejumola Olaniyan states that Lillo is effective in ensuring that the audience should learn from the play.Olaniyan, Tejumola. "The Ethics and Poetics of a "Civilizing Mission": Some Notes on Lillo's The London Merchant", English Language Notes, pp. 34–39 He suggests that due to accounts from Thorowgood, Trueman, and Maria, as well as evidence from his actions in the play, Barnwell is at his essence a good character despite his crimes, and the audience should sympathize with and learn from him.
Olaniyan argues that the ethics in the play are "supernatural," meaning that they are timeless. Morals do not exist for people, but people exist for the morals. This is significant because it means that the individual is subservient to the system. As a part of the absolutist system, each member must contribute to these ethics and is allowed no individuality in them. This is important for then-contemporary audiences, who by watching the play would learn their place within society. Within the supernatural ethics of the play, Barnwell has no hope as soon as he smiles at Millwood as he sees her on the street for the first time. He is unable to eradicate this error, and any attempts he makes to fix his situation end up making it worse. He digs himself into a deeper hole until eventually he commits the ultimate crime of murdering his uncle. Millwood is another character who operates within this scheme of ethics. In a system that allows for no deviation, she is the deviation. Because of this, she is not offered the same "redemption" that is granted to Barnwell at the end of the play, as he is accepted by Trueman and dies respected by other characters.
Status of the merchant Lillo emphasizes the central role of the merchant in society, showing that the merchant class has a level of what Peter Hynes calls "cultural legitimacy".Hynes, Peter. "Exchange and Excess in Lillo's London Merchant". University of Toronto Quarterly, 72.3 (2003), pp. 679–97 The upper classes of the eighteenth century struggled to decide where to place merchants in society, and many looked down upon them. At the same time, merchants strove to emphasize their gentility. Daniel Defoe argued that the trade of the merchants and the land of the elites were codependent, supporting and supplying one another with necessities. Olaniyan argues that the play glorifies mercantile ideals such as empire, peace, and patriotism, and also asserts the importance of the merchant in holding society together; the merchant builds the empire and helps ensure the peace. Thorowgood draws attention to these key aspects of the merchant throughout the text with statements such as "honest merchants, as such, may sometimes contribute to the safety of their country as they do at all times to its happiness"(Act I, scene i).
Important to the emphasis on the merchant's role is the genre of the play. The London Merchant is an early example of bourgeois tragedy. Tragedy, which had been a genre reserved for elite and royal subjects, has now been applied to the middle class. Lillo says in the dedication to the play that "tragedy is so far from losing its dignity by being accommodated to the circumstances of the generality of mankind.". What he refers to as "the end of tragedy" functions by "exciting the passions in order to the correcting of them". By bringing tragedy to the level of the middle class, he allows it to have a powerful message that the audience can learn from. This significant shift in tragedy is similar to the change in comedy made by Richard Steele's The Conscious Lovers, a play that refined sensibility in comedy and depicted the middle class as modern gentryFreeman, Lisa A. "Introduction to "Conscious Lovers"", Introduction, The Broadview Anthology of Restoration & Early Eighteenth-Century Drama, Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview (2001), p. 762 The London Merchant asserts the ethics of the merchant, creating Thorowgood as a character who exemplifies all of the desired values that a merchant should have.
Exchange and excess