Ben Jonson's neglected masterpiece opens with a devil named Pug arriving in Jacobean London, tasked with corrupting humanity. There's just one problem: the mortals have gotten so good at vice that there's nothing left for him to do. Every scheme he hatches has already been executed more creatively by the citizens themselves. Meanwhile, the hapless Fitzdottrel, a gentleman of more ambition than wit, stumbles through conspiracies he barely understands, desperate to rise above his station. What unfolds is Jonson's most gleefully misanthropic comedy, a world where greed, hypocrisy, and self-deception run so rampant that even Hell is embarrassed. The Leicester Boy Witch Trial provides the dark scaffolding, but the real spectacle is watching a demon confront the horror that humans need no help from him. Written in 1616, at the height of Jonson's powers but often overshadowed by Bartholomew Fair, this is satire that refuses to soften its targets. For readers who delight in Jacobean wit, in plays where every character is a fool or a knave, and in the fundamental comedy that evil is simply redundant in a world already so thoroughly corrupt.
