Edward Moore

Edward Moore (1712-1757). Courtesy Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive.

Edward Moore (22 March 1712 - 1 March 1757) was an English poet and playwright.

Life

Overview

Moore, son of a dissenting minister, was born at Abingdon. After being in business as a linen-draper, in which he was unsuccessful, he took to literature, and wrote a few plays, of which The Gamester (1753) had a great vogue, and was translated into various languages. He is best known by his Fables for the Female Sex (1744), which rank next to those of John Gay.

Youth and education

Moore was born at Abingdon, Berkshire, the 3rd son of Thomas Moore, M.A., dissenting minister, of Abingdon, and Mary, daughter of Thomas Alder of Drayton in the same county. Having lost his father when he was about 10 years old, he was brought up by his uncle, John Moore, a schoolmaster at Bridgwater, Somerset. He also spent some time at a school in East Orchard, Dorset, and was then apprenticed to a linendraper in London, where (after some years spent in Ireland as a factor) he eventually set up in business on his own account, and, not succeeding, turned to literature as a last resource.

Career

Henry Brooke wrote the prologue to Moore's 1st comedy, The Foundling, produced at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, on 13 February 1747-8, and damned with faint praise. At Drury Lane also on 2 February 1751 was produced his second play, Gil Bias, founded on the story of Aurora in Le Sage's romance, which, though ill received, was kept on the boards for 9 nights. His domestic tragedy, The Gamester, produced at the same theater on 7 February 1753, though it set tradition at nought by being written in prose, was on the whole a success. The prologue and some of the most admired passages, including the greater part of the scene between Lewson and Stukely in the fourth act, were written by Garrick, who played the principal part. The piece ran with applause for 11 nights, and has since kept the stage.

Moore found patrons in George, 1st lord Lyttelton of Frankley, and Henry Pelham. His ingenious poem, The Trial of Selim the Persian, published in 1748, is a covert panegyric upon the former. A fine ode on the death of the latter (1754), which in 6 weeks went through 4 editions, has been ascribed to Moore (cf. Brit. Mus. Cat.}, but was written by Garrick. Another ode, in praise of Pelham, which holds the place of honor in the collective edition of Moore's Poems, Fables, and Plays, London, 1756, 4to, is in the same stanza, and probably by the same hand.

On 10 Aug. 1749 Moore married Jenny, daughter of Hamilton (table-decker to the princesses), who survived him. By her he had an only son, Edward, who was educated and pensioned by Lord Chesterfield, entered the naval service, and died at sea in 1773.

Through Lyttelton's influence Moore was appointed in 1753 editor of The World, a weekly periodical started in that year, and devoted to satirising the vices and follies of fashionable society. With the exception of Moore, who under the nom de guerre of Adam FitzAdam wrote 61 out of 210 numbers, the contributors were men of fashion (they included Lords Lyttelton, Bath, and Chesterfield, Soame Jenyns, Horace Walpole, and Edward Lovibond), and Moore was permitted to take the entire profits of the venture. The circulation averaged from 2,000 to 3,000 copies.

After a course of 4 years The World was brought to a close with an announcement of the dangerous illness of the editor; and by a curious coincidence Moore, who was then in good health, barely survived the revision of the collective edition, dying at his house in South Lambeth. He died, as he had lived, in poverty, and was buried in the South Lambeth parish graveyard, near High Street, without even a stone to mark the spot.

Writing

His Fables for the Female Sex (London, 1744, 8vo) have an excellent moral turn, but are somewhat deficient in the sprightliness which is especially demanded in that species of composition. The 3 last and best were contributed by Henry Brooke (1703?–1788).

Besides the collective edition of Moore's Poems, Fables, and Plays mentioned above, a separate edition of his Dramatic Works was published at London in 1788, 8vo, and the latter have since been reprinted from time to time in the principal collections of English dramatic literature. The Foundling has been translated into French, and The Gamester into French, German, and Dutch.

The Fables and Poems are included in the collections of English poetry edited by Anderson, 1793–1807; Park, 1808; Chalmers, 1810; and Davenport, 1822. Separate reprints of the ‘Fables’ appeared at London in 1768, 8vo; 1770, 12mo; 1771, 12mo; 1783, 8vo; 1786, 12mo; 1795, 24mo; 1799, 8vo; 1806, 12mo. A joint edition of Fables by John Gay and Edward Moore appeared at Paris in 1802, 12mo. The Fables have also been translated into German.

The World appeared in collective form at London in 1757, 2 vols. fol. and 6 vols. 12mo, and in 1761 4 vols. 8vo; reprinted in 1772, 8vo, 1793, 8vo, and in 1794, 24mo. It is also included in the series of British Essayists edited by Ferguson and Chalmers in 1823, and by Robert Lynam in 1827.

Recognition

5 of Moore's poems were included in Dodsley's Collection of Poems in Six Volumes; by several hands.

A portrait of Moore by T. Worlidge belonged to Dr. Edward Hamilton. It was engraved by Neagle, and prefixed to the 1788 edition of Moore's Dramatic Works.

Publications

Poetry

• Fables for the Female Sex (with Henry Brooke). London: R. Francklin, 1744, 1749; Dublin: George Faulkner, 1749.
• The Trial of Selim the Persian: For divers high crimes and misdemeanours. London: M. Cooper, 1748.
• An Ode to David Garrick, upon the talk of the town. London: M. Cooper, 1749.
• Poetical Works. Edinburgh: Apollo Press, by the Martins, 1782.
• Poetical Works. London: C. Cooke (Cooke's edition), 1797.

Plays

• Solomon: A serenata. London: John Moore, 1742.
• The Foundling: A comedy, of five acts. London: W. Lowndes & W. Nicoll, 1748.
• Gil Blas: A comedy. London: R. Francklin, 1751.
• The Gamester: A tragedy. London: 1753.
• Dramatic Works. London: W. Lowndes / W. Nicoll / S. Bladon / J. Bew, 1788.
• Plays (edited by J. Paul Hunter). New York: Garland, 1983.

Collected editions

• Poems, Fables, and Plays. London: J. Hughs, for R. and J. Dodsley, 1756.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

Gamester Edward Moore Tragedy Speaking Book English 1 2

See also

• List of British poets
• List of English-language playwrights

References

•  Rigg, James McMullen (1894) "Moore, Edward (1712-1757)" in Lee, Sidney Dictionary of National Biography 38 London: Smith, Elder, pp. 347-348 . Wikisource, Web, Aug. 24, 2016.

External links

Poems

• "The Trial of Selim the Persian, for divers High Crimes and Misdemeanours"
• Edward Moore at the Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive (5 poems)

Books

• Edward Moore at Amazon.com

About

• Moore, Edward in the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica
• Edward Moore (1712-1757) at English Poetry, 1579-1830

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, the Dictionary of National Biography (edited by Leslie Stephen). London: Smith, Elder, 1885-1900. Original article is at: Moore, Edward (1712-1757)