The works of the English playwright John Fletcher (1579-1625) are noted for their stylistic grace, ingenious plotting, and exciting theatricality.

John Fletcher was baptized on Dec. 20, 1579. His father was an Anglican minister who became chaplain to Queen Elizabeth and eventually bishop of London. John was educated at Cambridge and acquired a reputation as a literary man. It is not known when or why he turned to the stage, but by 1608 he had launched a long and fruitful career as a dramatist.

Although some 15 plays have been attributed to him as sole author, Fletcher did most of his work in collaboration with others. From about 1608 to about 1613, he and Francis Beaumont formed one of the most famous and successful partnerships in literary history. During this period he probably also assisted Shakespeare in one or two plays. After Shakespeare's death in 1616, Fletcher became the leading playwright of the King's Men, the most prestigious theatrical company of the period. From this time until his death in 1625, he generally served as senior partner in collaboration with Philip Massinger, Nathan Field, Samuel Rowley, and others.

Fletcher's plays were written for the elite, sophisticated audiences which frequented the "private" theaters of Jacobean London. Although his plays are still admired for their dramatic craftsmanship, they are commonly thought of as refined entertainments lacking the larger significance and universality of appeal which distinguish the work of his greater contemporaries.

Fletcher employed a variety of dramatic forms, including revenge tragedy (Valentinian, ca. 1614), satiric comedy (The Humorous Lieutenant, 1619), and farce (Rule a Wifeand Have a Wife, 1624). But his most characteristic kind of play is the "tragicomedy," which he described as a play which "wants [that is, avoids] deaths … yet brings some close to it [death]"(from his first play, The Faithfull Shepherdess, ca. 1608). But his description gives an inadequate idea of this new dramatic genre. A better illustration of Fletcherian tragicomedy is to be found in a play of narrowly averted incest, A King and No King (ca. 1611, probably written with Beaumont). Only in the last scene of this play, when King Arbaces is on the verge of yielding to his incestuous passion for Panthea, is it revealed that his beloved is not really his sister after all. Fletcher's principal concern is with the effects attending the sudden surprise which turns near-tragedy into comedy.

Fletcher died in 1625, reportedly a victim of the plague. He was buried at St. Saviour's Church in London.

Further Reading

Gerald Eades Bentley, The Jacobean and Caroline Stage, vol. 3 (1956), contains most of the essential information about Fletcher's life. For further information, some of it based on early gossip of questionable value, see the first volume of Alexander Dyce's edition of The Works of Beaumont and Fletcher (1843). Clifford Leech, The John Fletcher Plays (1962), discusses Fletcher's artistic merits.

1579–1625, English dramatist, b. Rye, Sussex, educated at Cambridge. A member of a prominent literary family, he began writing for the stage about 1606, first with Francis Beaumont, with whom his name is inseparably linked, later with Massinger and others. Fletcher may have collaborated with Shakespeare on Henry VIII and The Two Noble Kinsmen. Though there is great uncertainty in dating the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher, their chief works appeared between 1607 and 1613. In Philaster, A Maid's Tragedy, A King and No King, and The Scornful Lady, they developed the form of the romance tragicomedy, which came to characterize a whole generation of later plays. In these plays a potentially tragic situation is developed until, at the end, through a twist of plot a happy solution is effected. A prolific writer, he enjoyed great success in many genres because of his entertaining and accessible poetry, masterful use of sexual intrigue, and the refined composition of his work.

Bibliography

See edition of the works of Beaumont and Fletcher by F. Bowers (7 vol., 1966–); studies by E. Waith (1952), A. E. Thorndike (1965), and J. H. Wilson (1968).

(1852-1913)

American clairvoyant and trance medium. His mother possessed the gift of second sight. As a boy he was a puzzle to his teachers; instead of the lesson he would recite a paper presented to him in a vision. When barely 17 he was known and sought out as a trance speaker.

As a young man he married Susie Willis, who was a clairvoyant and had been a public lecturer since age 15. In 1873 both embarked on professional mediumship at the Lake Pleasant camp meeting. Fletcher's control was an Indian girl, "Winona," and some of her sitters claimed to have seen her materialized.

In 1877 Fletcher visited London. Because of the Henry Slade trial, American mediums were not popular there at the time. At James Burns's Spiritual Institution he was coldly received. Although The Spiritualist newspaper never ceased to attack him, Fletcher continued his tour and gave test sittings at the house of Agnes Guppy-Volckman, at the British National Association of Spiritualists, and at the Dalston Association. In Cavendish Rooms and in Steinway Hall he delivered many platform addresses on the religion and philosophy of Spiritualism and instituted Sunday class meetings on the plan of the Children's Lyceums of America.

In 1881 the Fletchers were overtaken by disaster. Mrs. Fletcher was sentenced to 12 months' hard labor for obtaining, by undue influence, the property of Mrs. Hart Davies. Her defense was that she was sheltering the woman, who appealed to her for refuge and protection, and only reluctantly consented to take charge of her property as long as Davies desired it, since she and her husband were paying Davies's expenses while she stayed in their home. At the time of his wife's trial Fletcher was addressing an audience of three thousand in Boston. He never went back to England, fearing the same fate that befell his wife.

In his later years Fletcher practiced as a palmist in New York. In June 1913 the police made a sudden raid with a warrant for his arrest. He collapsed and died from heart failure.

Sources:

Gay, Susan E. John William Fletcher, Clairvoyant. London, 1883.

Marryat, Florence. There is No Death. New York: John W. Lovell, 1891. Reprint, New York: Causeway Books, 1973.

Quotes:

"Go far -- too far you cannot, still the farther. The more experience finds you: and go sparing. One meal a week will serve you, and one suit, Through all your travels; for you'll find it certain. The poorer and the baser you appear, The more you look through still."

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