David Mallet (writer)

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Portrait, thought to be Mallet, by Hogarth, 1745

David Mallet (or Malloch) (c. 1705–1765) was a Scottish poet and dramatist.

He was educated at the

Henry St John, Viscount Bolingbroke
.

His best-known work was written in the same year: William and Margaret, adapted from a traditional ballad. In 1740, he collaborated with Thomson on a masque, Alfred, which was the vehicle for "Rule, Britannia!". His other plays and poetry (e.g. Amyntor and Theodora), popular at the time, are largely forgotten, but Bolingbroke's writings were edited and published by Mallet in 1754.

Life

Mallet was probably the second son of James Malloch of Dunruchan, a well-to-do tenant farmer on Lord Drummond's

Jacobite Rebellion of 1715. Mallet gave his age as 28 in 1733, and was therefore born about 1705. He seems to have been educated at the parish school of Crieff under John Ker.[1]

In 1717 Mallet was acting as janitor in

Shawford, near Winchester. He lived with the family until 1731, mainly in London and Shawford. In 1726 he received the honorary degree of M.A. from the University of Aberdeen, ostensibly for an English poem in imitation of Ker's Donaides. Early in 1727 he made a continental tour with his pupils. Towards the end of 1731 he left the Montrose family, and went to Gosfield in Essex, to act as tutor to the stepson of John Knight, to whose wife, formerly Mrs. Newsham, he had been recommended by Alexander Pope.[1]

On 2 November 1733 Mallet, with his pupil, matriculated at

St. Mary Hall, Oxford, where he resided fairly regularly till 27 September 1734. On 5 March 1735 he received, at his request, the degree of M.A. from the University of Edinburgh, and on the 15th of that month he graduated B.A., and on 6 April M.A. of the University of Oxford. He was again abroad in 1735.[1]

Mallet came into favour with the opposition, and was appointed, 27 May 1742, under-secretary to the Prince of Wales. In 1745 he made a tour in Holland.[1]

Mallet was rewarded in 1763 by

Lord Bute, to whom he had given fulsome praise, with the post of inspector of exchequer-book in the outports of London, a sinecure which he held till his death. In the autumn of the following year he joined his wife Lucy in Paris, but ill health compelled him to return to London. He died on Sunday, 21 April 1765 and was buried on 27 April in St. George's cemetery, South Audley Street.[1]

Works

Mallet published a Pastoral in the Edinburgh Miscellany in 1720; and during his college days produced a number of short pieces, including an imitation of

Sir Spencer Compton, and some verses for the second edition He had himself written, early in 1725, a poem on the same subject, which was praised by Thomson; and on his return from the continent he prepared for the press The Excursion, in two books, which he had written in 1726.[1]

On 22 February 1731 Mallet produced his tragedy of Eurydice at Drury Lane, with a prologue and epilogue by Aaron Hill. It was acted about thirteen times, and was revived in 1759. Mallet showed his appreciation for Pope with his poem on Verbal Criticism (1733), in which he ridiculed Lewis Theobald.[1]

Mallet made more of a reputation with the tragedy of

Cliefden, before the Prince and Princess of Wales, on Friday, 1 August 1740, with Quin, Christiana Horton, and Kitty Clive in the leading parts.[1]

Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough left in 1744 the sum of £1,000 to Mallet and Richard Glover, to write a life of her husband; and Mallet, on Glover's refusal, undertook the work. He only did some research. He published, in May 1747, 'Amyntor and Theodora, or the Hermit.'[1]

Mallet and Thomson had, through George Lyttelton, 1st Baron Lyttelton, support from the Prince of Wales, but then lost it as Lyttelton fell from favour. Mallet then found the patronage of Bolingbroke, and prepared a new edition of the Patriot King, published in 1749; in it he attacked the memory of Pope for having clandestinely edited and printed the work in 1738. There was a short pamphlet war with Pope's friends. He then edited Bolingbroke's works, 5 vols. in March 1754. Samuel Johnson remarked on this enterprise that Bolingbroke had "spent his life in charging a gun against Christianity", and "left half-a-crown to a hungry Scotchman to draw the trigger after his death".[1]

In 1751, three years after the death of Thomson, Mallet published a new version of the masque of 1740. The adaptation was major, with new scenes and songs added. It was acted at Drury Lane on 23 February 1751, with David Garrick in the title rôle. The masque of Britannia, an appeal to patriotic sentiment on the eve of an outbreak of war with France, followed in 1755. It was produced at Drury Lane on 9 May, when Garrick spoke the prologue as a drunken sailor.[1]

On 19 January 1763 Mallet's

The Bishoprick Garland 1834 by Cuthbert Sharp.[2]

  • Mallet with Captain Lord George Graham, on Graham's ship the Lark, painted by William Hogarth
    Mallet with Captain Lord George Graham, on Graham's ship the Lark, painted by William Hogarth
  • "Edwin and Emma"
    "Edwin and Emma"

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Lee, Sidney, ed. (1893). "Mallet, David" . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 35. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
  2. ^ "The Bishoprick Garland page 40" (PDF).

External links

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