Reflexión Total

41 Spielmann, op .cit, p.273. Arthur à Beckett put it rather more succinctly: “Seymour was pompous; my father

was not blessed with the organ of veneration... The successful artist met the the typical public school boy, and the result was a quarrel.” Indeed, perhaps more out of loyalty to his father than from any truly objective point of view, he went as far as to say,” I have always felt that Seymour treated my father - the boy of one-

between Seymour and à Beckett alone, and while it may have reflected Seymour’s frustration at having to compromise his artistic autonomy to an editorial voice, it did not preclude his return to the world of periodical illustration when he found an editor with whom he could work more comfortably. Thus, only a month after Henry Mayhew took over the editorial reins of Figaro, Seymour’s exile came to an end and he was reinstated as the paper’s regular artist with issue 165 (January 31st 1835). Indeed, Mayhew went to great lengths to praise the work of “THE TREMENDOUS SEYMOUR” in the announcements column on a regular basis, thereby giving some acknowledgement to the role which the artist had played in constructing the paper’s identity and reputation, and also suggesting an awareness of the commercial advantages offered by the association of a regular, well- established name with a periodical title (despite the fact that his actual cartoons were almost all unsigned). It also seems likely that Mayhew was trying to consolidate the initial success of the enterprise built up by à Beckett by reintroducing a familiar aspect of its early years.

To backtrack a little, in December 1834 à Beckett had suddenly resigned his position as editor. Under the heading ‘Singular Announcement’, he devoted the entire title page to a final address which spoke emphatically of his disillusionment with the burden which Figaro placed on his time and energies, and his growing indifference to the role which he had carved out for it.

“Figaro in London is about to commit, as it were, a

literary suicide, that is to say, the individual who projected it, and has solely conducted it from its first appearance, three years ago, to the present time, is about to discontinue his labours in this publication... the weekly execution of our editorial task is an irksome interruption to other business of a more important kind. Another reason... is candidly this, we have become thoroughly tired of furnishing, week after week, for three successive years, a series of trifling comments on political and other matters; indeed, when we have felt the tediousness of writing, we have often thought it most marvellous that the public, by its undiminished patronage of Figaro, has proved itself to be never tired of purchasing and reading it. Indeed, so profitable is it to the moment, that the publisher, we believe, intends continuing the title, though we must be understood as having ceased all connection with any thing that may

appear after this number. ”46

Towards the end of this lengthy address, à Beckett gave some Intimation of his wider reasons for abandoning Figaro. Arthur à Beckett has suggested that, by the middle of 1834, his father’s obligations as a barrister and his involvement in running the Fitzroy theatre were distracting from his role as editor, but more specifically than this, he appears to have felt uncomfortable with the conflict of interests arising from his dual role as both dramatist and dramatic critic, a fact which gives some indication as to where his primary interests and ambitions were located at the time:

“Many persons have advised us to continue Figaro, if it be merely for the sake of its unrivalled theatrical influence, but it is our unwillingness to benefit by this accidental advantage, which is one of our chief causes for resigning it. Since we have dabbled in dramatic authorship, we have found it quite repugnant to our wish to speak unfavourably of dramatic pieces. ”47

The following week, he set an even more emphatic seal upon his resignation in the preface to the collected volume for 1834: “This - the third volume - closes the publication as far as its projector and original Editor is concerned - who is no longer responsible for any thing that may appear in any periodical bearing the title

of Flgaro.”4s It is difficult to account for the rather bitter tone of à Beckett’s final

address to his readership. By all accounts - his own included - Figaro was still a remarkably buoyant enterprise in financial terms. During the six weeks after he abandoned the editorial chair four of the issues edited by Mayhew had to be reprinted (within a month of their first appearance), while issue 164 - an “election special” - was reported to have sold 200,000 copies in the space of a week.49

Strange himself was offering a shilling for any copies of issue 163 less than a