A Habit of Hubris

A Habit of Hubris

Introduction

John Gay wrote poetry and plays in the early 1700s. His play ‘The Beggar’s Opera’ was incredibly popular. Gay and Shakespheare were not contemporaries, but they both shared London’s theaters and theater goers. Over the test of time, why is one of them still part of almost all English curriculums, but the other is niche? What causes, sustains, or tarnishes literary greatness?

Literary greatness, or the perception of such, has real world implications. Bruce McComiskey edited a book of essays that discussed the nature of community in academic English. In that book, many relevant concepts were put forward. Such as competition for resources between different academic domains, even between subdomains within English (McComiskey). As universities set their entrance exams, they took control of what was taught in high schools and thereby set the standard for what would be considered literary greatness. Hence, Shakespeare kept the stage, while Gay fell into the wings. While John Gay is not talked about as often as some more popular writers, it is still important to see what people do say about him. Once a writer has stopped producing work themselves, their impact on the world is created by what other people say about them.

Contemplation

Like the struggle between academic domains for support and resources, writers struggle for renounce, influence, and attention. To be forgotten is an effective damnatio memoriae, even if it’s not official. After all, the Roman senate hasn’t handed down that curse for a very long time, but being forgotten still stings. Dr. Calhoun Winton, professor emeritus of the University of Maryland writes about Gay with an engaging and comfortable voice (Winton). Dr. Winton writes about the influence of Chaucer on not only Gay, but on Gay’s literary circle in the early 1700s (Winton 28-29). That circle would include Alexander Pope, John Dryden, Jonathan Swift,and Matthew Prior among others. Perhaps literary greatness is a shared bonfire, or perhaps mostly reflected like such as light from Chaucer to Gay.

In 2024, it could easily be argued that literary greatness is decided by popular response to written or performed works. That response might be measurable by the author’s net worth or the number of followers on one or more social media accounts. In 1724, it would be a long time before the exploits of X or the 120 million that is Stephanie Meyer’s net worth (Scott et al.). For John Gay the merit of his work was measured by his patrons and how much they were willing or unwilling to support his work. Gay needed to seek preferment in order to support his lifestyle and basic living needs (Winton, 74).

We know a great deal more about John Gay’s life than say the life of Chaucer. While that might seem as if it could speak to one or the other of them having greater literary merit or skills, it really represents more the change in technology and society rather than perceived merit of either writer. Jan Marten Ivo Klaver a professor of literature at università degli Studi di Urbino, a prestigious Italian university, devotes a paper to discussing Gay’s poem ‘Trivia’ (Klaver 19-33). Klaver argues that Gay’s ‘Trivia’ was influenced by Virgil’s ‘Georgics’, which was a very popular poem at the time, which is a suggestion that greatness is not so much originality, but in being able to skillfully reflect the light of previous greatness. Professor Klaver spends a lot of his words comparing and contrasting Gay’s ‘Trivia’ with other works, discussing points where Gay and other writers he knew influenced each other. Professor Klaver’s paper also highlights references to the Bible with the understanding that readers of ‘Trivia’ would have been familiar with them which shows a shared culture around broad literature traditions, not just with Virgil, but also with Biblical passages. This might suggest that great literary merit isn’t individualistic so much as a communal endeavor.

Communal endeavors aren’t much without ethics. Getty L. Lustila is a teaching assistant at Northwestern University, teaching philosophy and ethics classes (Lustila). They have their PhD out of Boston University. Their paper that brings them into this paper is called, “John Gay and the Birth of Utilitarianism.” The way Lustila describes Gay and what is know of his life is a little bit of a shock. Lustila describes Gay as a clergy man about whom little is known and who published only one essay (Lustila 1). While much more is known about Gay’s life and he certainly published many other pieces, the disconnect could be across domains. Klaver is a professor of literature and Lustila of history and ethics. Perhaps the merit of one’s work is confined within the pool in which one swims.

From a distant perspective, judging the merits of a writer’s work though perhaps it would make sense to judge the breadth of the work, the different pools that a writer could swim in, not just the popularity of their work in one domain, but to look at them more holistically. Lustila argues that Gay is the first philosopher to propose “universal happiness as the criterion of virtue” (Lustila 1). Like Klaver, Lustila also illuminates Gay by comparing and contrasting with others within the domain. In this case with John Locke. This again suggests that glory is reflected off those we stand next to. Shockingly, Lustila suggests that David Hume may have gotten ideas from Gay’s ‘Preliminary Dissertation’ and used them in ‘A Treatise’ (Lustila). In the scope of Western culture, there might not be much more glory than having inspired David Hume.

Dr. Jochen Petzold of the University of Regensburg brings the pool of ethics and literature together in his essay about morality questions in John Gay’s play ‘Polly’. Dr. Petzold is neither a professor of ethics nor of literature, but of British Studies (Petzold). In the essay, Petzhold cites a letter written from Gay to Jonathan Swift, where he talks about moral opposition to his play ‘The Beggar’s Opera’ was adding to his fame (Petzold). So as we consider what measures literary greatness, Gay himself was open to the metric of fame. Fame in 1728, just as much as today, does tend to bring resources and power to a person who holds it.

Perhaps greatness is found in taking on powerful, important subjects. With the criticism of Walpole in ‘The Beggar’s Opera’, Gay found the sequel, ‘Polly’ to be censored. ‘Polly’ would not see the stage within Gay’s lifetime, but he was able to sell print copies of the play. Dr. Petzold argues that while on the surface the play is meant to balance the seemingly immoral first play, in reality, the sequel has just as many moments where the main character lacks virtue. ‘Polly’ has never been a particularly popular play, but the courage it takes to write something daring and authentic is its own kind of greatness.

Greatness would also require durability, longevity. No matter how fantastic a work of art is, if it is popular or has any kind of impact for only a very short period of time. It can’t be said to be great. Dr.Tiffany Yecke Brooks no longer holds affiliation with a university, but instead has aligned herself with the commercial writing world (Brooks). She published an essay that compares Lin Manuel-Mirada and John Gay, suggesting that the recently very popular ‘Hamilton’ was inspired by ‘The Beggar’s Opera’ and ‘Polly’ (Brooks 199). Dr. Brooks immediately makes the comparison of popular, non-high class music between the two productions. Certainly some element of greatness must be the ability to speak to people and not just the people that have the ability to provide preferment, but the much more populous common people. Brook’s website is crisp and commercial, the work of someone who has left the organized power structures of academia for the glittering possibilities of being a commercial creator. This makes her voice about commercial works such as ‘The Beggar’s Opera’ and ‘Hamilton’ all the more authentic.

She writes, “This sort of extreme fluidity of significance is more likely to occur among the cultural output of non-hegemonic groups for the simple reason that the hegemony is, by its very nature, quite conservative in terms of self-preservation Staging a revolution of its own myths and cultural boundaries.” (Brooks 200-201). Non-hegemonic groups is a powerful term. Brooks also suggests that generating cultural dialog is something that give a play or other creative work standing or value (Brooks 202).

Conclusion

Many writers discuss the works of John Gay. He is compared to many other writers both within literature and without. Greatness can’t be something adjudicated only by one person other wise we’d all have to think that like the Unabomber was great (“Unabomber — FBI”). While Theodore John Kaczynski probably thought he was great, greatness has to be more than that. Just as Gay’s take on ethics was that virtue was about happiness for everyone, greatness also must be something decided by the larger community. At the end of his life, John Gay was buried in Westminster Abbey (“John Gay”). To be interred there was and is a durable sign of profound respect from the community that he lived in, honor from the people who knew him.

When an individual creator sets out to define greatness, that is probably a more difficult task than defining virtue was for Gay, Locke, or Hume. After all, every culture has its religions that will step up and claim authority on virtue, but no one has had a Roman style triumph in a very long time.

Greatness could be the courage to create from a non-hegemonic voice, the ability to create works that are both popular and durable that reach across domains. Greatness probably can’t be had within one’s own lifetime, but will need centuries of sustained durability to verify. If there is any hope for greatness, a person must actually create something, then share that something with the wider world, knowing that greatness, not even goodness nor popularity are in any way guaranteed. Greatness is a habit of hubris and a willingness to have both good and bad fame.

Works Cited

Brooks, Tiffany Yecke. “Staging a Revolution: The Cultural Tipping Points of John Gay and Lin-Manuel Miranda.” Studies in Musical Theatre, vol. 12, no. 2, 2018, pp. 199–212, https://doi.org/10.1386/smt.12.2.199_1.

Brooks, Tiffany Y. Tiffany Yecke Brooks, PhD, 2024, https://tiffanyyeckebrooks.com/. Accessed 30 March 2024.“

John Gay.” Westminster Abbey, 2024, https://www.westminster-abbey.org/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/john-gay. Accessed 30 March 2024.

Lustila, Getty L. “Halito.” Getty L. Lustila – Educator and Philosopher, https://gettylustila.com/. Accessed 30 March 2024.

Lustila, Getty L. "John Gay and the Birth of Utilitarianism." Utilitas, vol. 30, no. 1, 2018, pp. 86-106. ProQuest, https://go.openathens.net/redirector/nu.edu?url=https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/john-gay-birth-utilitarianism/docview/2315574237/se-2, doi:https://doi.org/10.1017/S0953820817000115.

Klaver, Jan Marten Ivo. “Loss of Identity in the Urban Soundscape of John Gay’s Trivia.” Linguae & (Milano), vol. 19, no. 1, 2020, pp. 19–33, https://doi.org/10.7358/ling-2020-001-klav.

McComiskey, Bruce, editor. English Studies: An Introduction to the Discipline(s). National Council of Teachers of English, 2006.

Petzold, Jochen. “Model of Virtue’? Questions of Morality in John Gay’s Polly.” Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies, vol. 35, no. 3, 2012, pp. 343-357, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1754-0208.2011.00419.x.

Petzold, Jochen. “Prof. Dr. Jochen Petzold.” Universität Regensburg, 02 05 2024, https://www.uni-regensburg.de/sprache-literatur-kultur/anglistik/staff/petzold/index.html. Accessed 30 March 2024.

“Unabomber — FBI.” FBI, https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/unabomber. Accessed 30 March 2024.

Winton, Calhoun. John Gay and the London Theatre. The University Press of Kentucky, 1993.