{"product_id":"2940012366603","title":"Vanity Fair","description":"BEFORE THE CURTAIN\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs the manager of the Performance sits before the curtain on the boards\u003cbr\u003eand looks into the Fair, a feeling of profound melancholy comes over\u003cbr\u003ehim in his survey of the bustling place. There is a great quantity of\u003cbr\u003eeating and drinking, making love and jilting, laughing and the\u003cbr\u003econtrary, smoking, cheating, fighting, dancing and fiddling; there are\u003cbr\u003ebullies pushing about, bucks ogling the women, knaves picking pockets,\u003cbr\u003epolicemen on the look-out, quacks (OTHER quacks, plague take them!)\u003cbr\u003ebawling in front of their booths, and yokels looking up at the\u003cbr\u003etinselled dancers and poor old rouged tumblers, while the\u003cbr\u003elight-fingered folk are operating upon their pockets behind. Yes, this\u003cbr\u003eis VANITY FAIR; not a moral place certainly; nor a merry one, though\u003cbr\u003every noisy.  Look at the faces of the actors and buffoons when they\u003cbr\u003ecome off from their business; and Tom Fool washing the paint off his\u003cbr\u003echeeks before he sits down to dinner with his wife and the little Jack\u003cbr\u003ePuddings behind the canvas.   The curtain will be up presently, and he\u003cbr\u003ewill be turning over head and heels, and crying, \"How are you?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA man with a reflective turn of mind, walking through an exhibition of\u003cbr\u003ethis sort, will not be oppressed, I take it, by his own or other\u003cbr\u003epeople's hilarity.   An episode of humour or kindness touches and\u003cbr\u003eamuses him here and there--a pretty child looking at a gingerbread\u003cbr\u003estall; a pretty girl blushing whilst her lover talks to her and chooses\u003cbr\u003eher fairing; poor Tom Fool, yonder behind the waggon, mumbling his bone\u003cbr\u003ewith the honest family which lives by his tumbling; but the general\u003cbr\u003eimpression is one more melancholy than mirthful.  When you come home\u003cbr\u003eyou sit down in a sober, contemplative, not uncharitable frame of mind,\u003cbr\u003eand apply yourself to your books or your business.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI have no other moral than this to tag to the present story of \"Vanity\u003cbr\u003eFair.\" Some people consider Fairs immoral altogether, and eschew such,\u003cbr\u003ewith their servants and families: very likely they are right.  But\u003cbr\u003epersons who think otherwise, and are of a lazy, or a benevolent, or a\u003cbr\u003esarcastic mood, may perhaps like to step in for half an hour, and look\u003cbr\u003eat the performances. There are scenes of all sorts; some dreadful\u003cbr\u003ecombats, some grand and lofty horse-riding, some scenes of high life,\u003cbr\u003eand some of very middling indeed; some love-making for the sentimental,\u003cbr\u003eand some light comic business; the whole accompanied by appropriate\u003cbr\u003escenery and brilliantly illuminated with the Author's own candles.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat more has the Manager of the Performance to say?--To acknowledge\u003cbr\u003ethe kindness with which it has been received in all the principal towns\u003cbr\u003eof England through which the Show has passed, and where it has been\u003cbr\u003emost favourably noticed by the respected conductors of the public\u003cbr\u003ePress, and by the Nobility and Gentry.  He is proud to think that his\u003cbr\u003ePuppets have given satisfaction to the very best company in this\u003cbr\u003eempire.  The famous little Becky Puppet has been pronounced to be\u003cbr\u003euncommonly flexible in the joints, and lively on the wire; the Amelia\u003cbr\u003eDoll, though it has had a smaller circle of admirers, has yet been\u003cbr\u003ecarved and dressed with the greatest care by the artist; the Dobbin\u003cbr\u003eFigure, though apparently clumsy, yet dances in a very amusing and\u003cbr\u003enatural manner; the Little Boys' Dance has been liked by some; and\u003cbr\u003eplease to remark the richly dressed figure of the Wicked Nobleman, on\u003cbr\u003ewhich no expense has been spared, and which Old Nick will fetch away at\u003cbr\u003ethe end of this singular performance.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd with this, and a profound bow to his patrons, the Manager retires,\u003cbr\u003eand the curtain rises.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47073466122480,"sku":"2940012366603","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012366603_p0.jpg?v=1763567758","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012366603","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}