Licensing Act 1737 - Banning of Gustavus Vasa

Banning of Gustavus Vasa

Although many plays and playwrights (including Henry Fielding) have been suggested as the cause of the act, debates on the Act mentioned the play A Vision of the Golden Rump, a raucous attack on the current Parliament whose author is unknown.

The first play to be banned by the Licensing Act was Gustavus Vasa by Henry Brooke. Samuel Johnson wrote an attack on the Licensing Act entitled A Complete Vindication of the Licensers of the British Stage that was a parody of the position for censorship. Brooke's Gustavus Vasa was not particularly savage or dark, and it took relatively few liberties. However, his previous The Earl of Essex had been perceived as highly political, and therefore Gustavus Vasa was banned.