Doubleday

THOMAS DOUBLEDAY (1790 - 1870)

Born in Newcastle, Doubleday early adopted the views of William Cobbett (q.v.) and was a political supporter of Earl Grey and the Whigs. he was prominent in the agitation leading up to the Great Reform Act of 1832. In that year he published an Essay on Mundane Moral Government. In 1842, he attacked the ideas of Malthus in his True Law of Population. He also published a biography of Sir Robert Peel in 1856, and a financial history of England since 1688.

Doubleday contributed to Blackwood's Magazine and the Manchester Guardian, and also penned a Venetian romance, The Eve of St Mark's, as well as a number of plays, including Babington, which was given two performances at the Old Theatre Royal in Newcastle in 1835. His Caius Marius, the Plebeian Consul received two performances in the new Theatre Royal on Grey Street. This latter play had been written at the suggestion of the great actor Edmund Kean, whose eventual verdict, however, was not encouraging.

Doubleday composed an address for the opening night of the new Theatre Royal in Grey Street on 20 February 1837:

...Why should I doubt? Is this so cold a sky
That here the verse which lives elsewhere must die?
So rude, so icy is our northern breeze
That our hearts warm not and our bosoms freeze?
Or, is Parnassus now to be denied
To climes that have produced an Akenside?

Doubleday's Collection of Coquetdale Fishery Songs written with Robert Roxby, was printed between 1821 and 1845.

Myers Literary Guide:	The North-East
THOMAS DOUBLEDAY (1790 - 1870) Born in Newcastle, Doubleday early adopted the views of William Cobbett (q.v.) and was a political supporter of Earl Grey and the Whigs. he was prominent in the agitation leading up to the Great Reform Act of 1832. In that year he published an Essay on Mundane Moral Government. In 1842, he attacked the ideas of Malthus in his True Law of Population. He also published a biography of Sir Robert Peel in 1856, and a financial history of England since 1688. Doubleday contributed to Blackwood's Magazine and the Manchester Guardian, and also penned a Venetian romance, The Eve of St Mark's, as well as a number of plays, including Babington, which was given two performances at the Old Theatre Royal in Newcastle in 1835. His Caius Marius, the Plebeian Consul received two performances in the new Theatre Royal on Grey Street. This latter play had been written at the suggestion of the great actor Edmund Kean, whose eventual verdict, however, was not encouraging. Doubleday composed an address for the opening night of the new Theatre Royal in Grey Street on 20 February 1837: ...Why should I doubt? Is this so cold a sky That here the verse which lives elsewhere must die? So rude, so icy is our northern breeze That our hearts warm not and our bosoms freeze? Or, is Parnassus now to be denied To climes that have produced an Akenside? Doubleday's Collection of Coquetdale Fishery Songs written with Robert Roxby, was printed between 1821 and 1845.
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