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Act 1, Scene 1
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Beggar’s Opera, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Moral Corruption and Hypocrisy
Gender, Love, and Marriage
Class, Capitalism, and Inequality
Opera, High Art, and Performance
Summary
Analysis
The servant Filch arrives and updates Peachum on his band of thieves. Black Moll is on trial, but Peachum agrees to help her get off. Tom Gagg is sentenced to execution; Peachum curses Tom and adds £40 to his account book—his reward for turning Tom in.
Filch and Peachum’s conversation shows the audience that Peachum makes money by both trading with thieves and turning them in to the law. Eighteenth-century audiences would have quickly recognized Peachum as a fictionalized version of the notorious criminal Jonathan Wild, who famously controlled London’s whole legal system by combining the same two businesses.
Themes
Literary Devices
Betty Sly is Peachum’s top thief, so he’ll do anything to save her from transportation (punishment by deportation to the colonies). He loves helping women escape, since there’s no bounty for turning them in. Filch praises Betty, who trained him in thievery. He sings about how women seduce men to get money, and men use money and lies to manipulate women into sex (Air 2). Peachum sends Filch to visit the detained thieves at Newgate prison, and Filch replies that he loves being the bearer of good news.
Peachum’s second song introduces the play’s other main preoccupation besides crime and immorality: sex and gender relations. In Peachum’s view, relationships between men and women are actually just business transactions—and this is very much the case in the criminal underworld where he lives and works. Finally, Peachum’s reference to transportation should remind modern audiences that this play takes place against the backdrop of England’s growing colonial empire. While it’s unclear whether Gay intended The Beggar’s Opera as a critique of empire, his sequel Polly certainly is, and his characterization of England’s ruling class can help modern audiences understand the greed and corruption at the heart of England’s colonial exploits.
Themes
Literary Devices
