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‘The Changing Theatrical Economy: Charles Dibdin the Younger at Sadler’s Wells, 1814–19’

Valladares, Susan

‘The Changing Theatrical Economy: Charles Dibdin the Younger at Sadler’s Wells, 1814–19’ Thumbnail


Authors



Contributors

Oskar Cox Jensen
Editor

David Kennerley
Editor

Ian Newman
Editor

Abstract

This chapter brings Charles Dibdin the Younger centre stage, facilitating an assessment of longer-term changes in the late Georgian cultural economy. The focus is the decline of Dibdin’s management of Sadler’s Wells in the years after 1814. The theatre’s wartime success rested on its spectacular, patriotic, aquatic pantomimes, yet a combination of the tense postwar political climate, the changing social constituency of the area in which the theatre was situated, and an increasing disinclination towards the mixed performances the theatre offered all played a part in the losses the theatre sustained in the late 1810s. The author draws a parallel between the decline of Sadler’s Wells and Dibdin’s poetic romance Young Arthur (1819), which, while enthusiastically received by some, was too much of a ‘medley’ to satisfy others. In both the literary and theatrical fields, tastes were changing, leaving practitioners uncertain of their place in this new theatrical economy.

Citation

Valladares, S. (2018). ‘The Changing Theatrical Economy: Charles Dibdin the Younger at Sadler’s Wells, 1814–19’. In O. Cox Jensen, D. Kennerley, & I. Newman (Eds.), Charles Dibdin and Late Georgian Culture (171-188). Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198812425.003.0012

Online Publication Date Jan 25, 2018
Publication Date 2018-01
Deposit Date Oct 19, 2018
Publicly Available Date Aug 12, 2021
Publisher Oxford University Press
Pages 171-188
Book Title Charles Dibdin and Late Georgian Culture
Chapter Number 9
DOI https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198812425.003.0012

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