The Author's Farce
The Author's Farce show parts of Fielding's life and experience with the London theatre community. Some of his other plays were rejected from the Theatre Royal. The Author's Farce was put on at a small theatre. This allowed Fielding to experiment. He could not experiment at larger theatres. The play was the first to have things found in his later plays. However, he did not come up with them all. He got many of his ideas from the Scriblerus Club. Their members were Alexander Pope, Jonathan Swift, John Gay, and John Arbuthnot. One idea is his character Nonsense. She is similar to Pope's character Dulness in the Dunciad. Both characters promote bad writing. Fielding gave Nonsense a sexual aspect. It is funny when she chooses as a lover a man who is sexless. Other parts of the play are similar to Gay's Beggar's Opera.