An Irishman’s Diary

• Published date: 26 May 2023

But he and they were enormously popular once, rivalling Shakespeare on the London stage. And although John Dryden is said to have been "confounded" by the amounts Southerne's work could command, their success benefitted other writers too, including him

Hence Alexander Pope, in a poem to celebrate Southerne's 81st birthday, writing affectionately of "Tom, whom Heaven sent down to raise/The price of prologues and of praise."

Southerne is historically interesting for another reason. His sister Elizabeth was (it seems) the mother of philosopher George Berkeley, recently demoted by the students of Trinity College over his ownership of slaves.

This adds piquancy to a point for which Southerne remains interesting to scholars, at least.

Although a generation older than Berkeley, he had more enlightened views on slavery, as dramatised in one of his biggest stage hits, Oroonoco, premiered in 1695 and popular for a century afterwards.

According to one latter-day commentator, the play raised the question of how "noble savages" should be treated: "Since they shared a universal human nature, was not civilization their entitlement?"

A 19th-century critic, while unenthusiastic about the play's quality, was impressed by its morals suggesting that "Southern (sic) deserves the praise of having first of any English (sic) writer, denounced the traffic in slaves and the cruelty of their West Indian bondage".

Despite his surname, Southerne was a northside Dubliner, born in 1660 in the village of Oxmantown, near modern-day Stoneybatter. The son of a brewer, he studied at Trinity College and then at the Middle Temple in London, seemingly bound for a career in law until distracted by drama and war.

For his first play in 1682, he bought a prologue and epilogue from Dryden, who had a lucrative sideline turning out such pieces, which were expected by theatre audiences of the time.

Dryden normally charged £4 but demanded £6 from Southerne, protesting that he had been selling himself cheaply until then and that it was nothing personal (this was part of the joke in Pope's poetic reference to Southerne's price-raising role).

Soon after his second play (1684), however, the Dubliner embarked on a short-lived military career. That was a turbulent decade, as the reign of Charles II neared an end and that of his brother, the Catholic James, loomed.

Politically aware and ambitious, Southerne romanticised James in his 1684 drama, and was...