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A country comedy about the absurdly corrupt purchases of military titles. Captain Underwit has succeeded in becoming a “paper” Captain by bribing the Lieutenant with favors and a below-value land-purchase. Underwit then sends his servant Thomas to purchase books to prepare him to actually carry out military duties, but Thomas instead purchases the “Shakespeare” Folio, and other impractical or irrelevant books in a manner that echoes Don Quixote’s belief he could imitate the actions of knights in romance novels. Meanwhile, Underwit withdraws from London into his father-in-law Sir Richard’s country estate. Underwit hires Captain Sackburie to build his military acumen, but Sackburie only has him perform a few military dances before they escape to drink at a tavern. The plot then digresses from these heavy subjects to romantic entanglements as Sir Richard’s wife (Lady) attempts to have an affair with Sir Francis, and Sister flirts with Mr. Courtwell, and Lady’s maid, Mistress Dorothy, devises a fraudulent scheme to make suitors falsely believe she comes from an aristocratic family to secure a husband. There are gems under this visage of simplicity, as Engine is attempting to bribe his way into a monopoly on periwigs, and Device the poet recites elegant songs to Sister that he is not sure if he has plagiarized. The introductory materials explain that the plagiarism of the “Catch” dice-game-song that repeats in the “James Shirley”-bylined Poems &c. (1646) re-affirms Percy’s ghostwriting of most “Shirley”-bylined plays as well as Captain, instead of proving “Shirley’s” authorship of this group of texts, as critics have previously claimed. “A classic English country comedy from the British Renaissance era, and now ably translated by Anna Faktorovich into Modern English for an appreciative readership with an interest in the literature and stage dramas of the time. Captain Underwit is an eloquent, unique, and highly recommended contribution to academic library collections… It should be noted for the personal reading lists of students, academia, and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the subject…” —Midwest Book Review, James Cox, The Literary Fiction Shelf Exordium Plot and Staging “Introduction to Captain Underwit” (1883) by A. H. Bullen Text Terms, References, Questions, Exercises
