Spring, Streets, and Chimney Sweeps: May Day in Regency London and Benjamin Robert Haydon’s Punch (1829)

Robinson, Alistair (2025) Spring, Streets, and Chimney Sweeps: May Day in Regency London and Benjamin Robert Haydon’s Punch (1829). Studies in Romanticism, 64 (1). pp. 27-51. ISSN 0039-3762

Abstract

May Day in Regency London was a festival for the climbing boy, the chimney sweep’s apprentice. An icon of poverty in Romantic Britain, the climbing boy stirred sympathy across the nation. However, on May Day, in London, this compassion was troubled by concerns for public safety and social order. Analyzing essays, illustrations, and ephemera, this article reframes the climbing boy, arguing that his raucous festivities often alienated him from the sympathy he typically evoked. It then examines how Benjamin Robert Haydon engaged with this pitiable yet disreputable figure in his major metropolitan genre painting Punch, or May Day.

Text project_muse_958614.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (2MB)

Official URL:	https://muse.jhu.edu/article/958614
Item Type:	Article
Disciplines:	Humanities > Art History Humanities > English
Depositing User:	Alistair Robinson
Date Deposited:	08 May 2025 13:08
Last Modified:	08 May 2025 13:08
URI:	https://nul.repository.guildhe.ac.uk/id/eprint/2525

Actions (login required)

Edit Item