The Escapades of Tribulation Johnson.
Karen Brooks.
Harper Collins. 2023. 560 pp.
ISBN 978 1 86722 724 3.
Papa always said I was unnatural—that I'd too much to say for myself. He said a great many other things beside, all of which included the prefix un: ungrateful, ungodly, unguarded, unlike other girls.
It was lucky for Tribulation that at the age of 17, after a disastrous failure (or refusal) to control her tongue, she was banished from her father's house and sent to live in London as a "companion" to her widowed cousin.
It was especially lucky that her cousin happened to be Aphra Behn, who was already notorious for her own outspokenness and was known to make her living from her writing. Tribulation's father, desperate to get rid of her so that her older, widowed, sister's prospective second marriage could go ahead without hindrance, believed (mistakenly) Mrs Behn lived with her mother and only wrote "on men's behalf," or he never would have agreed to let her go there.
The opening sentence of the "Prologue" to this book—"The potshotten woman tangled in the sheets beside me looked and smelled like a corpse"—almost put me off reading more, but it soon became apparent this "foul-smelling" woman had appeared sober and reliable when she had met Tribulation's father and he had employed her to escort Tribulation safely to London. Tribulation, typically, has other ideas and has planned ahead. She dons the clothes of a brother who had died fighting for the Royalist cause before she was born, pays off the woman with the money her father has given her for this purpose, and because she has learned that on stage "a woman can be whatever she wishes" she daringly adopts the "breeches part" and makes her way independently to London. Her arrival at Aphra's house is a disaster, but Aphra takes her in and looks after her, and so begins "Act 1" of her five act drama.
Tribulation's account of her "escapades" is lively and detailed, full of her hopes, joys, woes and ambitions. Her descriptions of life in Restoration London, and of London itself and its inhabitants, are vivid and fascinating and, if occasionally her appreciation of the scene is a little flowery, she can be forgiven, for she is learning under Aphra's guidance to be a writer.
Having spent her "entire life" in the village of Chartham, cared for after her mother's death by her much older sister, and with no friends because of her stern and forbidding clergyman father, Tribulation finds London a source of wonder.
There were women in flounced dresses and velvet capes, wearing pattens over their pretty shoes. Their faces were artificially pale; some wore black patches on their cheeks and breasts. These included star shapes, a crescent moon and even a horse and carriage galloping across a generous décolletage. The poor beasties forever plunging into a fleshy canyon.
The men, too, were "ostentatiously garbed" and wore "towering periwigs" and high heels. Aphra's conversation amazes her, peppered as it is with casual references to White Hall ("where the King lives"), New Exchange and St James's Park, and with the names of famous people. "Mrs Behn counted John Wilmot, the Earl of Rochester, among her dearest friends"; the King's favorite mistress, Nell Gwyn is her "favored companion." All this made Tribulaton's head "reel."
When Tribulation tells Mrs Behn (who soon becomes just "Aphra") she would like to find some employment in order to supplement the allowance her father is paying for her upkeep, Aphra agrees to allow her to accompany her to the Dorset Garden Theatre, for which she writes her plays. She suggests there might even be a small part for her in one.
We locked eyes, "Imagine what your father would say," she said with mock severity.
"Aye," I said breaking into a grin. "I am."
The Dorset Garden Theatre, owned by the King's brother, The Duke of York, is one of the two permanent theaters in London. The other, owned by the King, is Drury Lane. Both are very popular and attract people from all walks of life. Peeping through the curtain, when she first accompanies Aphra to the Dorset Garden, Tribulation sees men in huge wigs shaped like "devil's horns" and women in hooped skirts:
The great and the small took their seats waving at those they knew, climbing over barriers to shift closer, offering powdered and pockmarked cheeks, wet lips and gloved hands to be kisses... Arguments broke out... Some slurped and burped down drinks... The noise grew... Women carrying baskets of oranges... wove through the press of people, selling them. The women were squeezed, grabbed, forced onto laps; there were scuffles and shouts and much laughter.
"Are they always like this?" she asks Mrs Betterton, the theater manager. "Oh no dear," says Mrs Betterton. "Usually they are much much worse."
Weeks later, during a performance of a provocative play by Aphra, a fight breaks out—swords are drawn, the actors join in using stage props, and only when the man who began the argument gets on stage and orders, "For the sake o" God, peace," does it stop.
Much of what Tribulation relates is historically true. There was such a fight at the Dorset Garden Theatre; many of the actors she names really did act at the Dorset Garden and at Drury Lane; Aphra's life was as she describes it; and, especially, the Titus Oats Popish Plot threatening the assassination of the King and his replacement with a Catholic monarch did cause widespread suspicion of anyone who was known to favor Catholicism.
A second strand to Karen Brooks' novel, introduced early, is largely fictional. Gabriel Freeman is a spy infiltrated into the Dorset Garden company and tasked with seeking out Catholic conspirators. He needs, in particular, to watch Aphra Behn, who had been a spy herself and once had a close relationship with William Scot, a fugitive regicide, and might still be in touch with him.
Inevitably, the two strands of the novel intertwine, and Tribulation becomes involved in Gabriel's dark, secret world. Ultimately, too, she discovers secrets about her own family, along with the reason she was christened "Tribulation."
Meanwhile her own writing career, guided by Aphra, burgeons. Her pamphlets discussing current issues, hawked around London by the Mercury women along with newssheets and tracts, become topics for discussion, but because she writes anonymously, often signing herself "One of the Fair Sex," her work is attributed to men.
So, too, are Aphra's controversial writings. When Tribulation and Aphra collaborate on a play based on a recent notorious marriage—The Revenge or, A Match in Newgate—Tribulation notes the dialogue was so "bold, quite libertine, and didn't hesitate to be brutal," that Aphra made the decision "not to claim authorship—for either of us."
It was performed in late June; as word flew around there was a production so salacious even the author hadn't put his name to it, crowds flocked to see it.
The Revenge or, A Match in Newgate was performed at the Dorset Gardens in 1680, and is still sometime attributed to Thomas Betterton, who was an actor and theater manager at that time. There are also other plays written by Aphra or with a Prologue written by her, which have anonymous authors.
Both Tribulation and Aphra are delightful characters, both determined to change the way women are seen (or are required to not be seen) in their society. Karen Brooks, in her Author's Note, outlines the known details of Aphra's life and declares her long love of her and her work. She frequently heads her chapters with quotations from Aphra's writings, and she quotes Virginia Woolf's acknowledgement of Aphra's role in earning women "the right to speak their minds." For that, Woolf wrote, "All women together ought to let flowers fall upon the tomb of Aphra Behn." Karen Brooks has done better. She has revived Aphra and her words while weaving a fictional tale into the facts of her life, at the same time offering a fascinating picture of the way theaters functioned in Restoration England and of Aphra's huge role in their popularity.
Editor Note: Thinking about buying The Escapades of Tribulation Johnson or another book today? Please click the book cover link above. As an Amazon Associate, Eclectica Magazine earns a small percentage of qualifying purchases made after a reader clicks through to Amazon using any of our book cover links. It's a painless way to contribute to our growth and success. Thanks for the help!
