Editing Miser (section)

==Misers in literature==

===Fables===
There were two famous references to misers in ancient Greek sources. One was [[Aesop's Fables|Aesop's fable]] of "[[The Miser and his Gold]]" which he had buried and came back to view every day. When his treasure was eventually stolen and he was lamenting his loss, he was consoled by a neighbour that he might as well bury a stone (or return to look at the hole) and it would serve the same purpose.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://mythfolklore.net/aesopica/perry/225.htm|title=THE MAN AND HIS GOLD|work=mythfolklore.net}}</ref> The other was a two-line epigram in the [[Greek Anthology]], once ascribed to [[Plato]]. In this a man, intending to hang himself, discovered hidden gold and left the rope behind him; on returning, the man who had hidden the gold hanged himself with the noose he found in its place.<ref>''The Greek Anthology'' III, London 1917, [https://archive.org/stream/greekanthology03newyuoft#page/24/mode/2up pp.25-6]</ref> Both these stories were alluded to or retold in the following centuries, the most famous versions appearing in [[La Fontaine's Fables]] as ''L'avare qui a perdu son trésor'' (IV.20)<ref>''The Complete Fables of Jean de La Fontaine'', translated by Norman Shapiro, University of Illinois 2007, [https://books.google.com/books?id=xWnR0pCxH9UC&dq=the+miser+who+lost+his+treasure++norman+shapiro&pg=PA101 p.101]</ref> and ''Le trésor et les deux hommes'' (IX.15)<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.readbookonline.org/readOnLine/20012 |title=Jean de La Fontaine's Fable Poem: The Treasure And The Two Men |work=readbookonline.org }}</ref> respectively. Yet another of La Fontaine's fables was the late addition, ""The miser and the monkey" (XII.3),<ref>{{cite web|url=http://oaks.nvg.org/fonta12.html#damismonkey|title=Jean de La Fontaine Fables|work=nvg.org}}</ref> used as a cautionary tale for financiers. Here a man keeps his hoard in a sea-encircled tower until a pet monkey amuses itself one day in throwing the coins out of the window.

In Asia, misers were the butt of humorous folklore. One very early cautionary tale is the ''Illisa Jataka'' from the Buddhist scriptures. This includes two stories, in the first of which a rich miser is miraculously converted to generosity by a disciple of the Buddha; following this, the Buddha tells another story of a miser whose wealth is given away when the king of the gods impersonates him, and when he tries to intervene is threatened with what will happen if he does not change his ways.<ref>Tale 78, [http://www.sacred-texts.com/bud/j1/j1081.htm Sacred texts online]</ref> Two 16th century stories concerning misers are included among the witticisms attributed to [[Birbal]] during Mughal times. In one he extracts from a casuistical miser a fee for a poem written in his praise.<ref>Anindya Roy, ''Akbar-Birbal Jokes'', New Delhi 2005 [https://books.google.com/books?id=gc1UP05XUKYC&dq=Miser+poem&pg=PA125 "The Miser's Misery", pp. 125–6]</ref> In the other the miser is forced to reward a merchant who rescued his hoard from a fire with the whole of it.<ref>Clifford Sawhney, ''50 Wittiest Tales Of Birbal'', Bangalore 2005, [https://books.google.com/books?id=HJX694hcntAC "A question of 'like'", pp. 47–9]</ref> Arabs similarly made extensive use of misers in their literature. The most famous being the 600 page collection of anecdotes called ''Kitab Al Bukhala'' or Book of Misers by [[Al-Jahiz|Al-Jāḥiẓ]]. He lived in 800 CE during the [[Abbasid Caliphate]] in [[Basra]], making this the earliest and largest known work on the subject in [[Arabic literature]].

When there was renewed European interest in Aesop during the early [[Renaissance]], the [[Neo-Latin]] poet [[Laurentius Abstemius]] wrote two collections of original fables, among which appeared ''Avarus et poma marcescentia'' (The miser and the rotten apples, fable 179), published in 1499. This was eventually translated into English by [[Roger L'Estrange]] and published in his fable collection of 1692.<ref>''Fable'' 458, [https://books.google.com/books?id=OE5AAQAAMAAJ&dq=%22There+was+a+Stingy%2C+Narrow-hearted%22&pg=PA430 p. 430]</ref> It concerns a miser who cannot bring himself to eat the apples in his orchard until they start to go rotten. His son invites in his playmates to pick the fruit but asks them not to eat the rotten ones since his father prefers those. The 18th century French fabulist [[Claris de Florian]] was to adapt the story in his "L'avare et son fils" (The miser and his son, IV.9). In this version the miserly father hoards his apples and only eats those going rotten. His son, upon being caught raiding them, excuses himself on the grounds that he was confining himself to eating just the sound ones.<ref>''Fables de Florian'', Paris 1846, [https://books.google.com/books?id=yg8tAAAAYAAJ&q=L%27Avare+et+son+fils&pg=PA109 p. 109]</ref>
 
[[File:Blake Miser&Plutus.jpg|thumb|A print of John Gay's "The Miser and Plutus" by [[William Blake]], 1793]]
In 18th century Britain, when there was a vogue for creating original fables in verse, a number featured misers. [[Anne Finch, Countess of Winchilsea|Anne Finch]]'s "Tale of the Miser and the Poet" was included among others in her 1713 Miscellany.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.digital.library.upenn.edu/women/finch/1713/mp-miser.html|title=A Tale of the Miser and the Poet|work=upenn.edu}}</ref> There an unsuccessful poet meets [[Mammon]] in the guise of a miser digging up his buried gold and debates with him whether the life of wit and learning is a better calling than the pursuit of wealth. Eventually the poet is convinced that keeping his talent hidden until it is better regarded is the more prudent course. It was followed by [[John Gay]]'s "The Miser and Plutus", published in his collection of fables in 1737.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://immortalpoetry.com/The_Miser_and_Plutus|title=The Miser and Plutus|work=Immortal Poetry}}</ref> A miser frightened for the security of his hoard denounces gold as the corruptor of virtue and is visited by the angry god of wealth, who asserts that not gold but the attitude towards it is what damages the personality.

While these are more or less original interpretations of the theme, French fabulist [[Antoine Houdar de la Motte]] harks back to the light-hearted approach of the Greek Anthology in "The Miser and Minos", first published in his fables of 1719.<ref>Fable XIX, [https://books.google.com/books?id=a4hdAAAAcAAJ&dq=de+la+motte++%22L%27avare+et+minos%22&pg=PA97 Internet Archive]</ref> Descending to the Classical underworld at his death, the miser is brought before the judge of the dead and is given the extreme punishment of returning to earth to witness how his wealth is now being spent. The Scottish poet [[Allan Ramsay (poet)|Allan Ramsay]] adapted this into dialect two years later,<ref>''Poems'' vol. 2 (1761) [https://archive.org/details/poems01ramsgoog/page/n46  <!-- quote=Miser poem. --> pp. 37–9]</ref> and Charles Denis provided a version in standard English in his ''Select Fables'' (1754), reversing the title to "Minos and the Miser".<ref>Fable XC [https://books.google.com/books?id=JW5bAAAAQAAJ&q=Minos&pg=PR2 p. 326]</ref>

===Poetry===
Misers are frequent figures of fun in the epigrams of the [[Greek Anthology]].<ref>A group of eight in Book XI are numbered [https://archive.org/stream/greekanthology04newyuoft#page/150/mode/2up 165-73]</ref> It is charged of them that they are not masters of their own money if they do not spend it. Niarchus tells of one who does not commit suicide because of the cost of the rope to do so; Lucillius tells of another who dies because funeral expenses are cheaper than calling in a doctor. Elsewhere in the anthology is another epigram by Lucillius of a miser's encounter with a mouse that assures him he only wants lodging, not board.<ref>The Greek anthology for schools, [https://books.google.com/books?id=7u4pAAAAYAAJ&dq=Greek+Anthology+miser&pg=PA33 poem 29]</ref> In one more, a miser dreams that he is in debt and hangs himself.<ref>Poems of the Orient [https://archive.org/details/poetryorient00algegoog/page/n339 <!-- quote=Greek Anthology miser. --> p.323]</ref>

The Latin writer [[Horace]] put miserly behaviour at the centre of the first poem in his first collection of satires, dealing with extremes of behaviour.<ref>''Satires, Epistles and Ars Poetica'', Loeb edition translated by H. Rushton Fairclough, London 1942 [https://archive.org/stream/satiresepistlesa00horauoft#page/4/mode/2up p.5 ff]</ref> In writing an imitation of it, an English poet who provides only his surname, Minshull, was to emphasise this by titling his work ''The Miser, a Poem'' (London, 1735).<ref>{{Cite book |last = Kupersmith |first = William |year = 2007 |title = English Versions of Roman Satire in the Earlier Eighteenth Century |location = Cranbury, NJ |publisher = [[Associated University Presses]] |page = [https://books.google.com/books?id=imPB3_3EPxYC&pg=PA95 95]}}</ref>

In [[Dante Alighieri|Dante Alighieri{{'}}s]] ''[[Inferno (Dante)|Inferno]]'', misers are put in the fourth circle of hell, in company with [[spendthrift]]s as part of their mutual punishment. They roll weights representing their wealth, constantly colliding and quarreling.<ref>{{citation |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RnhlOrCgf-UC&pg=PA40 |title=Dark Way to Paradise |author=Jennifer Doane Upton|date=March 2005 |isbn=9781597310093 }}</ref>

During the 16th century, [[emblem books]] began using an illustration of [[an ass eating thistles]] as symbol of miserly behaviour, often with an accompanying poem. They appeared in various European languages, among them the illustrated [[Trencher (tableware)|trencher]] by [[Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger]], dating from about 1630, on which an ass laden with rich foods is shown cropping a thistle, surrounding which is the quatrain:
{{blockquote|<poem>The Asse which dainty meates doth beare
And feedes on thistles all the yeare
Is like the wretch that hourds up gold
And yet for want doth suffer cold.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=213402&objectId=1527520&partId=1|title=British Museum - Image gallery: Scenes from Aesop's Fables|work=British Museum}}</ref></poem>}}

In the third book of ''[[The Faerie Queene]]'', [[Edmund Spenser]] created a portrait of a man trapped between conflicting desires in Malbecco, who appears in cantos 9–10. He is torn between his miserliness and love for his wife Hellenore. Wishing to escape with a lover, she sets fire to his storeroom and forces him to choose between them:
{{blockquote|<poem>Ay when to him she cryde, to her he turnd,
And left the fyre; love money overcame:
But when he marked how him money burnd,
He left his wyf; money did love disclame.<ref>III.10, stanza 15</ref></poem>}}
Eventually losing both, he becomes the embodiment of frustrated jealousy.

The 18th century, so culturally rich in miser lore, furnished some notable poetic examples. [[Allan Ramsay (poet)|Allan Ramsay]]'s "Last speech of a wretched miser" dates from 1728 and is written in modified [[Scots language|Scots dialect]]. The miser bids farewell to his riches in a comic monologue and details some of his shifts to avoid expense.<ref>''The Poems of Allan Ramsay'', London 1800, [https://archive.org/details/poemsofallanrams01rams/page/304 pp.304-11]</ref> [[Alexander Pope]] created another masterly portrait in the character of Cotta in his ''[[Moral Essays|Epistle to Bathurst]]'' (1733). Reluctance to spend confines this aristocrat to his ancestral hall, where he refuses to engage with the world.<ref>Moral Essays III, [http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=2278&chapter=216010&layout=html&Itemid=27 lines 177-196]</ref> Later in the century another Scottish poet, William Stevenson (1719–83), included nine satirical epitaphs on misers among his collected works, of which the last begins: 
{{blockquote|<poem>A miser rots beneath this mould'ring stone,
Who starv'd himself through spleen to skin and bone,
Lest worms might riot on his flesh at last
And boast, what he ne'er could, a full repast.<ref>''Original Poems on Several Subjects'' Volume 2, [https://books.google.com/books?id=ollHAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA277 p.280]</ref></poem>}}

Poetic titles from the 19th century include the Irish Arthur Geoghegan's ''The Old Miser and Mammon: an Incident Poem'' (Newry 1818) and Frederick Featherstone's ''New Christmas Poem entitled The Miser's Christmas Eve'' (1893). There was also an anonymous didactic poem titled ''The Miser'' (London 1831). Although miserly behaviour is referenced during the course of its 78 pages, the real focus there is the attraction of money in all its manifestations.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/stream/miserapoem00misegoog#page/n4/mode/2up|title=The miser: a poem|work=archive.org|year=1831}}</ref>

===Broadside ballads===
[[File:Old Miser ballad.gif|thumb|The broadside ballad of "The Old Miser", early 19th century]]
In the realm of popular poetry, there were a range of narrative [[Broadside (music)|broadside]] ballads concerning misers from the 17th century onward. Some of the earliest deal with the grain speculators who caused such suffering to the poorest.  A representative example is "The Wretched Miser" (1682), prefaced as "a brief Account of a covetous Farmer, who bringing a Load of Corn to Market, swore the Devil should have it before he would take the honest Market price". The devil closes with the bargain and on accounting day carries off the farmer as well.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ballad/21994/xml|title=EBBA 21994 - UCSB English Broadside Ballad Archive|website=ebba.english.ucsb.edu}}</ref> The social message is carried by the refrain that follows each stanza: "O Farmers, covetous Farmers,/ why would you pinch the Poor?" The religious aspect is dealt with in the contemporary "A Looking-glass for a covetous Miser" by [[Thomas Jordan (poet)|Thomas Jordan]]. Here a West Country entrepreneur and a poor husbandman debate the respective merits of anxious profit-making and contentment.  The miser laments the current low price of grain and resolves not to sell or plant more until the price rises.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ballad/33461/xml|title=EBBA 33461 - UCSB English Broadside Ballad Archive|website=ebba.english.ucsb.edu}}</ref> The theme continued into the early 19th century, where a farmer is again the subject of "The life and awful death of a rich miser ".<ref>James G. Hepburn, ''A Book of Scattered Leaves: Poetry of Poverty in Broadside Ballads'' Bucknell University 2000 [https://books.google.com/books?id=SlhlFB07kqIC&pg=PA201 p.201]</ref>

Another common subject of these ballads was the dilemma of the miser's daughter unable to marry the man of her choice and the stratagems employed to overcome her father. In "Bite Upon the Miser", printed in the late 18th century, a sailor dresses up as the devil and scares the miser and the parson he intended as her husband into allowing the match.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://images.library.yale.edu/walpoleweb/oneitem.asp?imageId=lwlpr25361|title=Lewis Walpole Library Digital Collection|work=yale.edu}}</ref> Much the same situation occurs in "The Politic Lovers or the Windsor Miser Outwitted", where it is a butcher who impersonates the devil and scares the miser into handing over his riches.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://ballads.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/static/images/sheets/20000/15693.gif|title=Bodleian Library}}</ref> In about 1800 there appeared an English broadside ballad called "The old miser" which was to serve as basis for what grew into a [[Folk music|folk song]] with multiple versions.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.vwml.org/roudnumber/3913|title=Vaughan Williams Memorial Library - Welcome to the English Folk Dance and Song Society|work=vwml.org}}</ref> The scene is set in London, where a miser's daughter is courted by a sailor and the father arranges for him to be press-ganged to get him out of the way. As well as persisting in England, there are also versions in the US and [[Tristan de Cunha]].<ref>Folk Songs of the Catskills, State University of New York, 1982, [https://books.google.com/books?id=IEmkHeB35XEC&dq=Catskills+miser&pg=PA187 pp.187-9]</ref> Misers were notorious tricksters, so ingenuity transcending barely credible impersonations was generally needed. "Bite upon bite or the miser outwitted by the country lass" (1736–63) does not feature the miser's daughter but another sort of damsel in distress. A girl bears a child out of wedlock and is advised by her mother to name it Maidenhead and offer it for sale. A rich miser closes the bargain and is eventually forced to support the child by the magistrate.<ref>Scarlet Bowen, ''The Politics of Custom in Eighteenth-Century British Fiction'', London 2010 [https://books.google.com/books?id=XZvGAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA185 footnote on p.185]</ref>

Still another ballad theme was the privations of the miser's servant, a comic situation in drama and fiction also, and here principally concerned with how little food the household has to live on. One example is "The Miser's Man (dating from between 1863 and 1885).<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://ballads.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/static/images/sheets/05000/03336.gif|title=Bodleian Library}}</ref> At the start of the 19th century, the theme had figured as an episode in [[Robert Anderson (poet)|Robert Anderson]]'s "Croglin Watty". A simple-minded countryman down from the fells, Watty was hired by the real-life [[Carlisle, Cumbria|Carlisle]] miser Margery Jackson (1722–1812) and served her for a [[Calendar year#quarter|quarter]]. The ballad mixes sung verses with prose description, both in Cumberland dialect: 
{{blockquote|<poem>Neist my deame she e'en starv'd me, that niver liv'd weel;
Her hard words and luiks wou'd ha'e freeten'd the deil:

She hed a lang beard, for aw t' warl leyke a billy goat, wi' a kil-dried frosty feace: and then the smawest leg o' mutton in aw Carel market sarrad the cat, me, and hur for a week.<ref>''The Songs and Ballads of Cumberland'', George Routledge & Sons, 1866, [https://archive.org/stream/songsballadsofcu00gilprich#page/330/mode/2up/search/Croglin pp. 330–3]</ref></poem>}}
Dame Margery is not named in the poem because at the time of writing (1805) she was still alive and known to be litigious. We know that it is meant to be her from the fact that in William Brown's painting of the ballad, "Hiring Croglin Watty at Carlisle Cross", it is she who figures in the foreground.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/margery-jackson-17221812-hiring-croglin-watty-at-carlisle-cross-144228|title=Margery Jackson (1722–1812), Hiring Croglin Watty at Carlisle Cross|work=[[Art UK]]}}</ref> About 1811, just before her death, Brown had already devoted another painting to her alone as she tramped through the town.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/margery-jackson-the-carlisle-miser-144225|title=Margery Jackson, the Carlisle Miser|work=[[Art UK]]}}</ref> That she is still amusedly remembered there is witnessed by the modern ''Miser! The Musical'' (2011), based on her life.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.journallive.co.uk/culture-newcastle/culture-latest-news/2011/06/07/margery-jackson-s-remarkable-life-inspires-miser-the-musical-61634-28831039|archive-url=https://archive.today/20130421005724/http://www.journallive.co.uk/culture-newcastle/culture-latest-news/2011/06/07/margery-jackson-s-remarkable-life-inspires-miser-the-musical-61634-28831039|url-status=dead|archive-date=April 21, 2013|title=Margery Jackson's remarkable life inspires Miser! The Musical|author=Tony Henderson|date=6 June 2011|work=journallive}}</ref>

===Drama===
Misers were represented onstage as comic figures from Classical times. One of the earliest appears in the comic [[Phlyax play]]s developed in the Greek colonies in Italy during the 4th century BCE, which are known only from rare fragments and titles. They were also popularly represented on Greek vases, often with the names of the characters written above them. In one of these by [[Asteas]] two men are depicted robbing a miser.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Phlyax_scene_on_a_calyx_krater_by_Asteas_Antikensammlung_Berlin_F3044_5.jpg|title=File:Phlyax scene on a calyx krater by Asteas Antikensammlung Berlin F3044 5.jpg|work=wikimedia.org}}</ref> At the centre the miser Charinos has settled for sleep on top of his  strongbox in the comfort of two blankets. He is rudely awoken by two rascals mishandling him in an effort to lay their hands on his riches. On the left, Gymnilos has already pulled away the blanket on top of him while, on the right, Kosios drags out the blanket beneath. On the far right, the miser's slave Karion stands with outstretched arms and knocking knees.<ref>Klaus Neiiendam, ''The Art of Acting in Antiquity'', Museum Tusculanum Press, 1992, [https://books.google.com/books?id=CNyZ1v844P4C&dq=phlyax+play+%22miser%22&pg=PA26 pp.25-7]</ref>

Such stock figures eventually provided inspiration for the Latin dramas of [[Plautus]].<ref>Sean McGrath, ''South Italian Phylax Plays'', [http://www.u.arizona.edu/~christed/latin401/McGrath.pdf University of Arizona]</ref>
The character of Euclio in his ''[[Aulularia]]'' was to be particularly influential, as was the complicating subplot of a marriageable daughter.<ref>Translated into blank verse in the 18th century by Bonnell Thornton, [https://books.google.com/books?id=JaIrAAAAYAAJ&q=THE+TREASURE&pg=PP9 available on Google Books]</ref> One of the earliest [[Renaissance]] writers to adapt the play was the Croatian [[Marin Držić]] in about 1555, whose ''Skup'' (The Miser) is set in Dubrovnik. [[Ben Jonson]] adapted elements from Plautus for his early comedy ''[[The Case is Altered]]'' (c. 1597).<ref>The text is [http://hollowaypages.com/jonson1811case.htm online]</ref> The miser there is the Milanese Jaques de Prie, who has a (supposed) daughter, Rachel. [[Pieter Corneliszoon Hooft]] and [[Samuel Coster]] followed with their very popular Dutch comedy ''Warenar'' (1617). The play is named from the miser, whose daughter is Claartje. Molière adapted Plautus' play into French as ''L'Avare'' ([[The Miser]], 1668) while in England [[Thomas Shadwell]] adapted Molière's work in 1672<ref>Albert S. Borgman, ''Thomas Shadwell, his life and comedies'', New York 1969, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Gf_Vazee2vgC&dq=%22The+miser%22++Shadwell&pg=PA141 pp.141-7]</ref> and a version based on both Plautus and Molière was produced by [[Henry Fielding]] in 1732.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OF1MAAAAcAAJ&q=%22The+miser%22++Fielding&pg=PR4|title=The miser|work=google.co.uk|last1=Fielding|first1=Henry|year=1803}}</ref> Among later adaptations there was [[Vasily Pashkevich]]'s 18th-century Russian comic opera ''The Miser'' and pioneering dramatic works in Arabic by [[Marun Al Naqqash]] (1817–55)<ref>M.M.Badawi, "Arabic drama: early developments" in ''Modern Arabic Literature'', Cambridge 1992, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Pk5TA0sfERIC&dq=misers+play&pg=PA331 pp.331-2]</ref> and in Serbian by [[Jovan Sterija Popović]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2SrVpFGioFUC&q=miser&pg=PA154|title=McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of World Drama|year=1984|isbn=9780070791695}}</ref>
[[File:Volpone Beardsley.jpg|thumb|left|[[Aubrey Beardsley]]'s 1898 title page for [[Ben Jonson]]'s play ''[[Volpone]]'']]

There were also independent dramatic depictions of misers, some of them being variations of the Pantaleone figure in 16th-century Italian [[commedia dell'arte]]. He is represented as a rich and miserly Venetian merchant, later to become the father of [[Columbina]].<ref>''The Methuen Drama Dictionary of the Theatre'',[https://books.google.com/books?id=Tb-OAQAAQBAJ&dq=Pantaleone++%22miser%22&pg=PA374 Pantaloon entry, p.374]</ref> The Venetian characters who reappear in English drama include the Jewish moneylender [[Shylock]] in [[William Shakespeare]]'s ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]'' (1598) and the title character of [[Ben Jonson]]'s ''[[Volpone]]'' (1606). In [[Aubrey Beardsley]]'s title page for the latter, Volpone is shown worshiping his possessions, in illustration of the lines from the play, "Dear Saint, / Riches, the dumb god that giv'st all men tongues."<ref>[[:File:Volpone Beardsley.jpg|Wikimedia]]</ref> A similar scene takes place in the second act of [[Alexander Pushkin]]'s short tragedy ''Skupoi rytsar'' (1836). This concerns a son, Albert, kept short of funds by his father, the Baron. Under the title [[The Miserly Knight]], it was made an opera by [[Sergei Rachmaninoff]] in 1906.<ref>There is a complete performance on [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9HvGV7Kg-k YouTube]</ref> In the corresponding act in the latter, the Baron visits his underground storehouse, where he gloats at a new addition to his coffers and moodily contemplates the extravagance of his son during a 15-minute solo.

Following on from the continuing success of Molière's ''L'Avare'', there was a spate of French plays dealing with misers and their matrimonial plans over the next century and a half. What complicates matters is that several of these had the same title but were in fact separate plays written by different authors. ''L'Avare Amoureux'' (The Miser in Love) by Jean du Mas d' Aigueberre (1692–1755) was a one-act comedy acted in Paris in 1729.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A5m0Rcp94K8C&q=l%27avare+-Moliere|title=Les trois spectacles, ou Polixene|work=google.co.uk|year=1729}}</ref> It is not the same as the anonymous one-act comedy of the same title published in 1777.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=w7MWAAAAQAAJ&q=l%27avare+-Moliere|title=L'Avare amoureux|work=google.co.uk|year=1777}}</ref>

Another set of plays borrows a title from the Italian dramatist [[Carlo Goldoni]], who was working in France at the end of his life. He had already produced a one-act comedy titled ''L'avaro'' (The Miser) in Bologna in 1756. In 1776 he produced in France the five-act ''L' avare fastueux'' (The Spendthrift Miser).<ref>Edward Copping, ''Alfieri and Goldoni: Their Lives and Adventures'', London 1857, [https://books.google.com/books?id=bss5AAAAcAAJ&dq=%22avare+fastueux%22+Goldoni&pg=PA259 p.259]</ref> The same title was used by L. Reynier for his five-act verse drama of 1794<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8UU6AAAAcAAJ&q=l%27avare+-Moliere|title=L' avare fastueux|work=google.co.uk|last1=Reynier|first1=L.|year=1794}}</ref> and by Claude Baron Godart d'Aucourt de Saint Just (1769-1826) for his three-act verse drama of 1805.<ref name="La fille de l'avare">{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fVJUAAAAcAAJ&q=l%27avare+-Moliere|title=La fille de l'avare|work=google.co.uk|last1=Bayard|first1=Jean François Alfred|last2=Duport|first2=Paul|year=1835}}</ref>

The early 19th century saw misers become the subject of the musicals then fashionable in France. [[Eugène Scribe]] and [[Germain Delavigne]] collaborated on
''L'avare en goguette'' (The miser's spree) in 1823,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H4MUAAAAQAAJ&q=l%27avare+-Moliere|title=L'avare en goguettes|work=google.co.uk|last1=Scribe|first1=Eugène|last2=Delavigne|first2=Germain|year=1823}}</ref> while [[Jean-François Bayard]] and [[Paul Duport]] collaborated on the two-act ''La fille de l'avare'' (The Miser's Daughter) in 1835.<ref name="La fille de l'avare" /> The latter play was freely adapted in 1835 by [[John G. Millingen]] under the title of ''The Miser's Daughter''. Two further adaptations of the French play were to follow later: ''Love and Avarice'' (1859) by J. V. Bridgeman (1819–89), and [[John Palgrave Simpson]]'s ''Daddy Hardacre'' in 1857. Meanwhile, [[William Harrison Ainsworth]]'s period novel  ''[[The Miser's Daughter]]'' (first serialised in 1842) was spawning a fresh crop of dramas of that title. Two were played in 1842 and a further adaptation called ''Hilda'' in 1872. A similarly titled play was the five-act comedy partially in verse, ''The Miser's Daughter or The Lover's Curse'' of 1839, a schoolboy indiscretion of the future controversial churchman, Rev.[[John Purchas]].<ref>''New Monthly Magazine'' 1839 [https://books.google.com/books?id=LdwRAAAAYAAJ&dq=Miser+poem&pg=PA583 p.583]</ref> And on the other side of the Atlantic there was a stage production of ''Julietta Gordini:The Miser's Daughter'', a verse play in five acts, which claimed to derive its plot 'from an Italian story'.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qb09AAAAYAAJ&pg=PP11|title=Julietta Gordini|work=google.co.uk|last1=Pray|first1=Isaac Clarke|year=1839}}</ref>

[[Douglas William Jerrold]]'s ''John Overy or The Miser of Southwark Ferry'', (1828)  also brings in a daughter whom the miser attempts to sell off as a mistress to her disguised lover.<ref>The Dramatic Magazine 1, 1829 [https://books.google.com/books?id=oDY5AAAAIAAJ&dq=%22%27John+Overy%22++%22The+dramatic+magazine%22&pg=PA78 p.79]</ref> Earlier Jerrold had written a one-act farce, ''The Smoked Miser or The Benefit of Hanging'' (1823), in which a miser tries to marry off his ward to advantage.<ref>[http://victorian.worc.ac.uk/modx/assets/docs/pdf/Vol58xivSmoked.pdf Text at Victorian Plays project] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140407080516/http://victorian.worc.ac.uk/modx/assets/docs/pdf/Vol58xivSmoked.pdf |date=2014-04-07 }}</ref> Another farce produced in Canada, Major John Richardson's ''The Miser Outwitted'' (1841), had an Irish theme and dealt with a plot to trick a miser out of his money.<ref>''Theatre Research in Canada'', [https://web.archive.org/web/20140407071710/http://journals.hil.unb.ca/index.php/tric/article/view/7403/84627.1 Spring 1986]</ref> The later [[Thomas Peckett Prest]]'s ''The Miser of Shoreditch or the Curse of Avarice'' (1854) was based on a [[penny dreadful]] story by him; later he adapted it as a two-act romantic drama set in time of Henry VIII.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20141017130216/http://victorian.worc.ac.uk/modx/assets/docs/pdf/Vol18xiiMiser.pdf Victorian Plays project] </ref>

The popularity of these theatrical misers is evident from the number of paintings and drawings based on them, many of which were then adapted as prints. In 18th-century England, it was Fielding's "The Miser" that attracted most attention. [[Samuel Wale]]'s drawing of the second act was also made into a print.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=279279&objectId=748809&partId=1|title=British Museum - Image gallery: drawing|work=British Museum}}</ref> But it was principally depictions of various actors in the character of Lovegold, the play's anti-hero, which attracted artists.  [[Samuel De Wilde]] pictured [[William Farren]] in the role at the [[Theatre Royal, Bath]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/william-farren-as-lovegold-in-the-miser-by-henry-fielding-228483|title=Art UK - William Farren as Lovegold in 'The Miser' by Henry Fielding|work=[[Art UK]]}}</ref> Several other works became plates in one or another book dedicated to English drama. James Roberts II  (1753 – c. 1810) executed a pen and ink watercolour of [[Edward Shuter]] in character which was adapted as a print for the six-volume play collection, ''Bell's British Theatre''.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=1243799&objectId=3482300&partId=1|title=British Museum - Image gallery: Mr Shutter in the Character of Lovegold|work=British Museum}}</ref> [[Charles Reuben Ryley]] made a print of Thomas Ryder in the role for ''Lowndes' British Theatre'' (1788),<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=3504942&partId=1&searchText=Miser&page=1|title=British Museum - Mr Ryder in the character of Lovegold|work=British Museum}}</ref> while  [[Thomas Parkinson (painter)|Thomas Parkinson]]'s painting of [[Richard Yates (actor)|Richard Yates]] as Lovegold was adapted for the 1776 edition of that work.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=3511028&partId=1&searchText=Miser&page=1|title=British Museum - Mr Yates in the character of Lovegold|work=British Museum}}</ref> In the following century, Thomas Charles Wageman's dramatic head and shoulders drawing of [[William Farren]] as Lovegold illustrated [[William Oxberry]]'s collection of texts, ''The New English Drama'' (1820).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=1238006&objectId=3466137&partId=1|title=British Museum - Image gallery: Mr W. Farren, as Lovegold|work=British Museum}}</ref> From this time too dates the coloured print of Samuel Vale acting the part of Goliah Spiderlimb, the comic servant in Jerrold's ''The Smoked Miser''.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=3473661&partId=1&searchText=Miser&page=1|title=British Museum - Mr Vale as Goliah Spiderlimb|work=British Museum}}</ref>

Molière's ''L'Avare'' was not altogether eclipsed in England by the work adapted from it. A drawing by [[William Hogarth]] of the play's denouement was included as a print in the translation of Molière's work<ref>P.J.De Voogd, ''Henry Fielding and William Hogarth'', Amsterdam NL 1981, [https://books.google.com/books?id=EXBb9xiowoEC&dq=Hogarth++%22L%27Avare%22&pg=PA38 pp.38-9]</ref> and prints based upon it were made by various other engravers.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O182837/h-beard-print-collection-print-hogarth|title=H Beard Print Collection|work=vam.ac.uk}}</ref> [[William Powell Frith]] devoted one of his theatrical paintings to a scene from L'Avare in 1876<ref>{{cite web|url=http://19thcenturybritpaint.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/william-powell-frith-ctd.html|title=Victorian British Painting|author=rfdarsie|work=19thcenturybritpaint.blogspot.co.uk|date=6 July 2012 }}</ref> while the French actor [[Grandmesnil (actor)|Grandmesnil]] in the role of Harpagon was painted by [[Jean-Baptiste François Desoria]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.artflakes.com/en/products/the-actor-grandmesnil#show-zoom?__affiliate=webgains&__siteid=54264|title=The Actor Grandmesnil, picture art prints and posters by Jean Baptiste Francois Desoria - ARTFLAKES.COM|work=artflakes.com|access-date=2013-03-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130608095240/http://www.artflakes.com/en/products/the-actor-grandmesnil#show-zoom?__affiliate=webgains&__siteid=54264|archive-date=2013-06-08|url-status=dead}}</ref>

In addition, the challenging and complex part of Shylock was favoured by English artists. [[Johann Zoffany]] painted [[Charles Macklin]] in the role that had brought him fame at [[Royal Opera House|the Covent Garden Theatre]] (1767–68)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.shmoop.com/merchant-of-venice/photo-shylock.html|title=The Merchant of Venice|work=Shmoop}}</ref> and Thomas Gray portrayed a confrontation between Shylock and his daughter Jessica (1868).<ref>[[:File:Shylock&Jessica.JPG|Wikimedia]]</ref> Character portraits of other actors in Shylock's role have included Henry Urwick (1859–1931) by Walter Chamberlain Urwick (1864-1943),<ref>{{cite web|url=https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/henry-urwick-18591931-as-shylock-54952|title=Art UK - Henry Urwick (1859–1931), as Shylock|work=[[Art UK]]}}</ref> [[Herbert Beerbohm Tree]] by [[Charles Buchel]]<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.shmoop.com/merchant-of-venice/photo-shylock-2.html|title=The Merchant of Venice|work=Shmoop}}</ref> and [[Arthur Bourchier]], also by Buchel.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/arthur-bourchier-18631927-as-shylock-54890|title=Art UK - Arthur Bourchier (1863–1927), as Shylock|work=[[Art UK]]}}</ref>

===Fiction===
Characterisation of misers has been a frequent focus in prose fiction:
[[File:Cruickshank miser.jpg|thumb|The miser discovers the loss of his money, [[George Cruikshank|George Cruickshank]]'s 1842 illustration for [[William Harrison Ainsworth|Ainsworth's]] ''[[The Miser's Daughter]]'']]

* The miserly priest who was [[Lazarillo de Tormes]]' second master in the Spanish [[picaresque novel]] published in 1554.<ref>The Universal Anthology vol.12, 1899, [https://books.google.com/books?id=TCoPAQAAMAAJ&dq=Greek+Anthology+miser&pg=PA94 pp.94-103]</ref>
* Yan Jiansheng in an episode of ''[[The Scholars (novel)|The Scholars]]'' by Wu Jingzi (吳敬梓), written about 1750. This miser was unable to die easily until a wasteful second wick was removed from the lamp at his bedside.<ref>C. T. Hsia, ''The Classic Chinese Novel: A Critical Introduction'', Chinese University Press, 2016</ref>
*Jean-Esther van Gobseck – an affluent usurer in the novel ''[[Gobseck]]'' (1830) by [[Balzac]].<ref>A translation on the [http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1389 Gutenberg site]</ref>
*Felix Grandet – whose daughter is the title character in the novel ''[[Eugénie Grandet]]'' (1833) by [[Balzac]].<ref>A translation on the [http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1715 Gutenberg site]</ref>
*Fardarougha Donovan in the Irish [[William Carleton]]'s ''Fardarougha the Miser'' (1839).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16002/16002-h/16002-h.htm|title=Fardorougha, the Miser, by William Carleton|work=gutenberg.org}}</ref>
*John Scarve – in the novel ''[[The Miser's Daughter]]'' (1842) by [[William Harrison Ainsworth]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IsEBAAAAQAAJ&pg=PP1|title=The miser's daughter|work=google.co.uk|last1=Ainsworth|first1=William Harrison|year=1855}}</ref> 
*[[Ebenezer Scrooge]] – the lead character of ''[[A Christmas Carol]]'' (1843) by [[Charles Dickens]].<ref>Available on the [http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46 Gutenberg site]</ref> He may have been partly based on John Elwes.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4y78YB9vVMG1xYrW8CmzjPw/a-life-wasted-who-was-the-real-ebenezer-scrooge|title=BBC Arts - BBC Arts - ‘A life wasted’: Who was the real Ebenezer Scrooge?|website=BBC}}</ref> The story has been [[Adaptations of A Christmas Carol|adapted many times]] for stage and screen.
*Mr. Prokharchin – title character of the short story ''[[Mr. Prokharchin]]'' (1846) by [[Fyodor Dostoyevsky]].<ref>{{cite book|last= Lantz|first=K. A.|title=The Dostoevsky encyclopedia|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|year=2004 |isbn=0-313-30384-3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XfDOcmJisn0C&pg=PA118|page=118}}</ref>
*Uncle Jan and his nephew Thijs in [[Hendrik Conscience]]'s novel of Flemish peasant life, ''De Gierigaard'' (1853, translated into English as "The Miser" in 1855).<ref>Available in [https://books.google.com/books?id=osABAAAAQAAJ Google Books]</ref>
*Silas Marner – title character of [[George Eliot]]'s novel ''[[Silas Marner]]'' (1861), who eventually abandons his avaricious ways.<ref>Available on the [http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/550 Gutenberg site]</ref>
*Ebenezer Balfour the villain of [[Robert Louis Stevenson]]'s ''[[Kidnapped (novel)|Kidnapped]]'' (1886), which is set during the [[Jacobitism|Jacobite]] disturbances in 18th century Scotland. Attempting to deprive his nephew David (the hero of the novel) of his inheritance, he arranges to have the young man kidnapped.<ref>Available on the [http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/421 Gutenberg site]</ref>
*Francisco Torquemada, the main character in [[Perez Galdós]]' ''Torquemada en la hoguera'' (Toquemada on the pire, 1889). The novel is centred on a Madrid moneylender who had appeared incidentally in earlier novels of his and now had three more devoted to him: ''Torquemada en la cruz'' (Toquemada on the cross, 1893), ''Torquemada en el purgatorio'' (Toquemada in Purgatory, 1894) and ''Torquemada y San Pedro'' (Torquemada and Saint Peter, 1895). All of these deal with Spanish social trends in the closing years of the 19th century.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://gep.group.shef.ac.uk/abctorq.htm|title=The Perez Galdos Editions Project - Summary of the Torquemada novels|work=shef.ac.uk}}</ref>
*Trina McTeague, the miserly wife in ''[[McTeague]]: a story of San Francisco'' (1899) by [[Frank Norris]].<ref>Available online at [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/165/165-h/165-h.htm Gutenberg]</ref> As avarice slowly overtakes her, she withdraws her savings so that she can gloat over the money and even roll about in it. The book was the basis for a silent film in 1916 and [[Erich von Stroheim]]'s ''[[Greed (1924 film)|Greed]]'' in 1924.  More recently, it was also the basis for [[William Bolcom]]'s opera ''McTeague'' (1992).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=s-QCAAAAMBAJ&q=mcteague+opera&pg=PA99|title=New York Magazine|work=google.co.uk|date=16 November 1992}}</ref>
*Henry Earlforward in [[Arnold Bennett]]'s novel ''[[Riceyman Steps]]'' (1923), who makes life miserable for the wife who married him in the hope of security.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://severalebooks.com/386064/riceyman-steps-arnold-bennett.html|title=Riceyman Steps – Arnold Bennett|work=Several eBooks Free|access-date=2014-08-20|archive-date=2020-08-04|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200804015232/http://severalebooks.com/386064/riceyman-steps-arnold-bennett.html|url-status=dead}}</ref>
*Séraphin Poudrier, the central figure in [[Claude-Henri Grignon]]'s ''Un Homme et son péché'' (1933). This French-Canadian novel was translated into English as "The Woman and the Miser" in 1978. Set at the end of the 19th century, the novel broke with the convention of extolling rural life and depicts a miser who mistreats his wife and lets her die because calling in a doctor would cost money. There have been adaptations for stage, radio, TV and two films, of which the most recent was ''Séraphin: un homme et son péché'' (2002), titled [[Séraphin: Heart of Stone]] in the English-language version.

There were beside many other prolific and once popular novelists who addressed themselves to the subject of miserliness. For the most part theirs were genre works catering to readers in the [[Public library#Origins as a social institution|circulating libraries]] of the 19th century. Among them was the [[gothic novel]] ''The miser and his family'' (1800) by [[Eliza Parsons]] and [[Catherine Hutton]]'s ''The miser married'' (1813). The latter was an [[epistolary novel]] in which Charlotte Montgomery describes her own romantic affairs and in addition those of her mother, an unprincipled spendthrift who has just married the miser of the title.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/details/misermarriednove03hutt|title=The miser married : a novel. In three volumes : Hutton, Catherine, 1756-1846 : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive|work=Internet Archive|year=1813 }}</ref> Another female novelist, Mary E. Bennett (1813–99), set her ''The Gipsy Bride or the Miser's Daughter'' (1841) in the 16th century.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=REFWAAAAcAAJ|title=The Gipsey Bride: Or, the Miser's Daughter. By the Author of Jane Shore ...|work=google.co.uk|last1=Bennett|first1=Mary E.|year=1841}}</ref> [[Mary Elizabeth Braddon]]'s [[Aurora Floyd]] (1863) was a successful [[sensation novel]] in which banknotes rather than gold are the object of desire and a motive for murder.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/stream/aurorafloydnovel00brad#page/n5/mode/2up|title=Aurora Floyd. A novel|work=archive.org|year=1863 }}</ref> It was dramatised the same year and later toured the US; in 1912 it was made a silent film. Later examples include [[Eliza Lynn Linton]]'s ''Paston Carew, Millionaire and Miser'' (1886); ''Miser Farebrother'' (1888) by [[Benjamin Leopold Farjeon]];<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MN_HhLbRqxkC|title=Miser Farebrother: A Novel (Complete)|isbn=9781465528162|last1=Farjeon|first1=Benjamin Leopold|year=1889}}</ref> and ''Dollikins and the Miser'' (1890) by the American Frances Eaton.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/details/dollikinsandmis00eatogoog|title=Dollikins and the Miser : Frances Eaton : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive|work=Internet Archive|year=1890 }}</ref> In 1904 [[Jerome K. Jerome]] created ''Nicholas Snyders, The Miser of Zandam'' in a sentimental story of the occult in which the Dutch merchant persuades a generous young man to exchange souls with him.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/869/869-h/869-h.htm|title=The Soul of Nicholas Snyders, Or the Miser Of Zandam, by Jerome K. Jerome|work=gutenberg.org}}</ref>