Edward Roome (died 1729) was an English lawyer, known as one of the writers of the comic opera ''The Jovial Crew''. Roome was the son of an undertaker for funerals in

Fleet Street Fleet Street is a major street mostly in the City of London. It runs west to east from Temple Bar at the boundary with the City of Westminster to Ludgate Circus at the site of the London Wall and the River Fleet from which the street was n ...

in London, and was brought up to the law. In October 1728 Roome succeeded Philip Horneck as Solicitor to the Treasury. He died on 10 December 1729.

Roome and Alexander Pope

Alexander Pope Alexander Pope (21 May 1688 O.S. – 30 May 1744) was an English poet, translator, and satirist of the Enlightenment era who is considered one of the most prominent English poets of the early 18th century. An exponent of Augustan literature, ...

refers to him in ''

The Dunciad ''The Dunciad'' is a landmark, mock-heroic, narrative poem by Alexander Pope published in three different versions at different times from 1728 to 1743. The poem celebrates a goddess Dulness and the progress of her chosen agents as they bring ...

''. A commentator remarked that Roome wrote "some of the papers called Pasquin, where by malicious innuendos he endeavoured to represent

ope Ope () is a locality situated in Östersund Municipality, Jämtland County, Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of ...

guilty of malevolent practices with a great man (

Francis Atterbury Francis Atterbury (6 March 1663 – 22 February 1732) was an English man of letters, politician and bishop. A High Church Tory and Jacobite, he gained patronage under Queen Anne, but was mistrusted by the Hanoverian Whig ministries, and bani ...

), then under prosecution of parliament"; Pope retaliated in ''The Dunciad'' by associating "Roome's funereal frown" with the "tremendous brow" of

William Popple :''To be distinguished from his grandson William Popple (colonial administrator) (1701–1764), government official and writer''. William Popple (1638–1708) was an English Unitarian merchant, the translator of John Locke's '' A Letter Concernin ...

and the "fierce eye" of Philip Horneck. (''The Dunciad'', iii. 152). Pope states that the following epigram was made upon Roome: You ask why Roome diverts you with his jokes, Yet, if he writes, is dull as other folks? You wonder at it. This, Sir, is the case: The jest is lost unless he prints his face!

''The Jovial Crew''

Fourteen months after his death, ''The Jovial Crew'', a comic opera, adapted from

Richard Brome Richard Brome ; (c. 1590? – 24 September 1652) was an English dramatist of the Caroline era. Life Virtually nothing is known about Brome's private life. Repeated allusions in contemporary works, like Ben Jonson's '' Bartholomew Fair'', ind ...

's play '' A Jovial Crew'', was produced at Drury Lane (8 February 1731); the dialogue was curtailed, some parts omitted, and some songs added (fifty-three in all), the work conjointly of Roome, Matthew Concanen and Sir William Yonge. The opera, thus enlivened, had much success, and was frequently revived.

References

Attribution * {{DEFAULTSORT:Roome, Edward 1729 deaths 18th-century English lawyers English opera librettists