FRENCH'S STANDARD DRAMA. THE ACTING EDITION. NO. CLXXXIII. THE WANDERING BOYS; OR, THE CASTLE OF OLIVAL. A DRAMA, IN TWO ACTS. BY ANON. TO WHICH ARE ADDED A DESCRIPTION OF THE COSTUME - CAST OF THE CHARACTERS - ENTRANCES AND EXITS - RELATIVE POSITION OF THE PERFORMERS ON THE STAGE, AND THE WHOLE OF THE STAGE BUSINESS. AS PERFORMED AT THE PRINCIPAL LONDON AND AMERICAN THEATRESQ.
New York: Samuel French, [1849-1870]. 39, [1 blank] pp. Original printed orange wrappers [rear wrapper trimmed closely, shaving several letters]. Wood-engraved frontispiece. The pamphlet stitched into contemporary thick muslin wrappers, "Coleman Sisters" written in ink on front wrapper. Very Good.
Jewish American Mordecai Noah wrote and published this play in Charleston in 1812, under the title "Paul and Alexis; or, The orphans of the Rhine." According to Jonathan Sarna, "The Wandering Boys" was ranked among the best of its genre and only the second American play to appear on the London stage, hence it represents the first play by an American Jew to appear on the London stage [see Jonathan D. Sarna, Jacksonian Jew: The Two Worlds of Mordecai Noah, New York, 1981].
This copy lists the cast of the 1849 Boston performance, so it was not published before then, and the publisher moved from the listed address, 122 Nassau Street, in 1870 or shortly thereafter, thus providing a date range of publication. Item #40664
Price: $750.00