NOTES
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS HOLCROFT
The chief source of information respecting the life of Thomas Holcroft (1745–1809) is theLifehere printed. A brief résumé of dates may not, however, be useless. He was born in London, December 10, 1745 (o.s.). After wandering with his father, who was in turn shoemaker, horse-dealer and pedlar, he was apprenticed at the age of thirteen as a stableboy at Newmarket. He returned to London when he was sixteen, and his next years were spent as shoemaker, school-master and strolling player. He turned dramatist, and his first piece,The Crisis, or Love and Famine, was acted on May 1, 1778, for a single performance. He turned author, and in 1780 his first novel,Alwyn, or the Gentleman Comedian, was published. These were followed by other novels and many plays, the best known of which isThe Road to Ruin(Covent Garden, February 18, 1792). In 1783 he went abroad in the interests of journalism, and busied himself with sundry translations (e.g.Le Mariage de Figaro, by Beaumarchais, which was successful at Covent Garden, December 14, 1784, asThe Follies of a Day). He did not escape the political troubles of his time, and, on October 7, 1794, he was sent to Newgate to await his trial for high-treason: he was discharged, however, without being tried, on December 1. The remaining years of his life were spent in unfortunate business speculations (chiefly picture-buying) and literary adventures in England and abroad: they were years of constant struggle against poverty and adverse fate. He died on March 23, 1809, and lies buried in Marylebone Parish Cemetery. He married four times.
There does not seem much reason for the abbreviation of the names of people mentioned in Holcroft’s ‘Memoirs,’ since they are rarely the subject of scandal. (See, however, with respect to the Diary, a letter from Wm. Godwin to Mrs. Holcroft, given in C. Kegan Paul’s ‘William Godwin,’ vol. ii. pp. 176–77, and Hazlitt’s remarks on p. 169 of the ‘Memoirs.’) Capitals were evidently used for the sake of shortness; in some cases it is easy to identify from the context the persons indicated; in others, less so, and, where possible, the identification is made in the Notes. In some few cases it has not been possible to state definitely the person meant.
In addition to the works mentioned in the text Holcroft seems also to have translated Count Stolberg’s ‘Travels through Germany, Switzerland, Italy and Sicily’ (1796), ‘The Life of Baron Trenck’ (1792), Goethe’s ‘Hermann and Dorothea’ (1801), ‘Sacred Dramas’ by the Countess de Genlis (1786).
In a letter from Mary Lamb to Mrs. Hazlitt (Nov. 30, 1810, ‘Memoirs of Hazlitt,’ vol. i. p. 179), in speaking of Hazlitt’s ‘Memoirs of Holcroft,’ she calls the book the ‘Life Everlasting.’
Abel Drugger.In Ben Jonson’s ‘The Alchemist’ (1610).
Scrub.In ‘The Beaux’ Stratagem’ (1707), by George Farquhar (1678–1707).
Sharp.In David Garrick’s ‘The Lying Valet’ (1741).
‘nonumque prematur in annum.’Hor. De Arte Poet., 388.
‘nonumque prematur in annum.’Hor. De Arte Poet., 388.
‘nonumque prematur in annum.’Hor. De Arte Poet., 388.
‘nonumque prematur in annum.’
Hor. De Arte Poet., 388.