Ned Ward [ Commerce / Art and Literature ]
… 1731. Image frontispiece, after Hogarth, of Edward Ward, A Compleat and humorous account of all the remarkable clubs and societies in the cities of London and Westminster, Compil'd from the original papers of a gent., 1745 Abstract Edward … 7 By the 1720s, one-time-spy turned travel writer, John Macky, described London as having ‘an infinity of clubs or societies for the improvement of learning and keeping up with good humour and mirth’. 8 Ward’s satire skewers this … a Promiscuous Encouragement of Vice, Faction, and Folly’. 9 He thus sets about a lively account of each. Some are real societies, such as the Kit-Kat and Beef-Steak clubs, and a lesser-known gathering – the ‘Small Coal-Man’s Music Club’ – …
Clubs | Humour | Impoliteness | Politics | Satire | Sex | Taverns
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