Response
Jonathan Swift, when witnessing the death of Tom's ghost, was reported in the memoirs of Mrs. Pilkington to have laughed out loud; such a feat was rare for Swift and this was only the second time such an occurrence was said to have happened. J. Paul Hunter argues that the whole play "depends primarily on one joke", which is the diminutive size of the main character. F. Homes Dudden characterizes the play as "a merry burlesque" and points out that the play was "a huge success". Albert Rivero points out that the ignoring of Tom Thumb for its expanded and transformed version, Tragedy of Tragedies, "is a regrettable oversight because Tom Thumb constitutes a vital link in Fielding's dramatic career, its importance lying not so much in its later expansion into Scriblerian complexity as in its debt to, and departure from, the play it followed on stage for thirty-three nights in 1730."
Read more about this topic: Tom Thumb (play)
Famous quotes containing the word response:
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—Don Logan, U.S. businessman, president and chief executive of Time Inc. His response when asked how much his company had spent in the last year to develop Pathfinder, Time Inc.’S site on the World Wide Web. Quoted in New York Times, p. D7 (November 13, 1995)
“[In response to this question from an interviewer: “U. S. News and World Report described you this way: ‘She’s intolerant, preachy, judgmental and overbearing. She’s bright, articulate, passionate and kind.’ Is that an accurate description?”:]
It’s ... pretty good [ellipsis in original].”
—Joycelyn Elders (b. 1933)
“I am accustomed to think very long of going anywhere,—am slow to move. I hope to hear a response of the oracle first.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)