A Jovial Crew

A Jovial Crew, or the Merry Beggars, is a comedy about four noble lovers who join the beggar community for a pastoral life of dance and song. Or is it? Whilst maintaining its unremitting good humour, A Jovial Crew shows that the literary depiction of beggar life, and real beggar life, are profoundly different. Daily aspects of life in the beggar world – poverty, dirt, licentiousness – come as a surprise to the well-born, who are ultimately led to question their own values.

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