> Skip to content
  • Published: 28 August 1986
  • ISBN: 9780140432206
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 128
  • RRP: $26.00
Categories:

The Beggar's Opera



Penguin Classics relaunch.

The tale of Peachum, thief-taker and informer, conspiring to send the dashing and promiscuous highwayman Macheath to the gallows, became the theatrical sensation of the eighteenth century.

In THE BEGGAR'S OPERA, John Gay turned conventions of Italian opera riotously upside-down, instead using traditional popular ballads and street tunes, while also indulging in political satire at the expense of the Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole. Gay's highly original depiction of the thieves, informers, prostitutes and highwaymen thronging the slums and prisons of the corrupt London underworld proved brilliantly successful in exposing the dark side of a corrupt and jaded society.

  • Published: 28 August 1986
  • ISBN: 9780140432206
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 128
  • RRP: $26.00
Categories:

Other books in the series

Maldoror and Poems
On Sparta
Love
Annals
Military Dispatches

Also by John Gay

See all