Bartholomew Fair (Magill Book Reviews)

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At Smithfield, horse dealers and cloth manufacturers hold an annual fair--complete with games, sideshows, and entertainments--on St. Bartholomew’s Day. Jonson uses the fair as a microcosm of society. Here men and women pursue pleasures, connive to get ahead, and try to escape life’s limitations. Hardly any of them find what they expect.

Justice Overdo, disguising himself in order to detect criminals, unwittingly befriends a pickpocket and finds himself accused of stealing. By the day’s end he has been beaten, arrested, and locked in the pillory.

Bartholomew Cokes, a...

[The entire page is 535 words long]

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