George Farquhar

1677(?)-1707. Irish playwright.

He was born between 1677 and 1678 in Londonderry, Ireland. He started his studies at Trinity College in Dublin, leaving without degree. He started as an actor at the Smock-Alley-Theatre in Dublin. Due to an accident during fencing rehearsals on stage where Farquhar wounded a colleague he left theatre and started a career as writer. It is not clear when he moved to London or whether he wrote his first play Love and a Bottle in Dublin on demand of his close friend Robert Wilks, a famous British actor (Britannica). The play was first performed at Drury Lane, London in 1698. His second play, The Constant Couple, or A Trip to the Jubilee, was performed in 1699 starring Robert Wilks. Due to financial problems Farquhar worked between 1704 and 1705 as a recruiting lieutenant which inspired him to write the play The Recruiting Officer (1706).

Farquhar's plays were marked by humour, cynicism and sexual frankness, although not to the extent of the very explicit comedies by George Etherege and William Wycherley (Drabble). They are often set outside of London and reflect the joys (and problems) of provincial life.

In 1707 he wrote his most famous play The Beaux' Stratagem. It is famous not only because of its wit, but also because the happy ending includes the (at that time not possible) separation of a married couple. A few weeks after the premiere Far­quhar, who had been seriously ill for a long time, died impoverished in London.

Works

Love and a Bottle (1698)

The Adventures of Covent-Garden (1699)

A Constant Couple, or A Trip to the Jubilee (1699)

Love and Business (1701)

Sir Harry Wildair (1701)

The Inconstant, or The Way to Win Him (1702)

The Twin-Rivals (1702)

The Stage-Coach (1704)

The Recruiting Officer (1706)

The Beaux' Stratagem (1707)

Sources

Drabble, Margaret (ed.) The Oxford Companion to English Literature. New Edition. Oxford Univer­sity Press, 1985, Fifth Edition.

Drescher, Horst W. Lexikon der Englischen Literatur. Stuttgart: Kröner, 1979.

Kreutzer, Eberhard; Nünning, Ansgar. Metzler Lexikon Englischsprachiger Autorinnen und Autoren. Stuttgart, Weimar: Verlag J. B. Metzler, 2002.

George Farquhar In: Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, 1911