“Is this my native country?”: Reviving Elizabeth Inchbald’s Every One Has His Fault in Postcolonial Philadelphia

Abstract

This paper considers the socio-political implication of two productions of Elizabeth Inchbald’s tragic-comedy Every One Has His Fault. First produced at Covent Garden in 1793, the play reflects London back to itself in ways that question the moral fiber of “this civilized city.” The play was offered in postcolonial America a year later, in the wake of a devastating influx of yellow fever and for the patriotic cause of relieving and redeeming American citizens suffering as captives in Algiers. Under such circumstances, politically charged elements of Every One Has His Fault took on more potent meaning. Though Inchbald herself rejected the charge of sedition that her play prompted from conservative parties, Every One Has His Fault obtained a life of its own in post-revolutionary America, where a perspective emboldened by distance and independence could critique the land in which the play was born. This discussion of its afterlife in America highlights the play’s core values of moral attentiveness and governance, illuminates its latent radicalism, and recognizes the transformative power of a change in production venue from a theatre venerated in a land of oppression to one newly opened in the land of the free.