James Worsdale

James Worsdale ("c." 1692 - June 10, 1767) was an Irish and English portrait painter, actor, literary fraud, and libertine whose lively conversation, wittiness, and boldness allowed him to move among the highest circles of literary life. His skills as a painter are not widely praised by art historians, but his confidence and assertiveness secured him numerous commissions for portraits.

Worsdale was born in poverty. His father was a pigment grinder, and James began as an apprentice to Godfrey Kneller. However, Kneller fired Worsdale for secretly marrying his niece. Worsdale would claim to be the son-in-law of Kneller, then the actual son of Kneller, but these were impositions.

In 1734 he must have been moving in literary circles, because he painted the portraits of Thomas Southerne and Beau Nash. In 1735, he moved to Dublin, Ireland and became the confidante and companion of Lawrence Parsons, 1st Earl Rosse and Lord Blayney. The three of them formed the Dublin Hellfire Club. Worsdale also helped form the Hell Fire Club of Limerick. He began "writing" plays and acting in them in Dublin at this time, if not earlier. He acted with the company of Smock Alley from 1737-40, with the only documented performance being as Lady Scardale in his own play, "The Assembly." From 1740-44, he acted with the Aungier Street company, and he was made a deputy Master of the Revels in Ireland in 1741. He appeared as the queen in his "The Queen of Spain" in 1744 and as Manly in his "Cure for a Scold" (written in 1735 from Shakespeare's "Taming of the Shrew"). He was (from 1733) an acquaintance of Matthew and Laetitia Pilkington, and Laetitia wrote a fiery prologue for "Cure for a Scold."

He moved to London off and on, where he remained in the company of Matthew Pilkington and continued to act and paint portraits for substantial commissions. In 1752 he appeared, again as a woman, as Lady Pentweazle in "Taste" and received the third night author's benefit. In reality, his literary productions were generally not his own. Rather, he purchased them from needy authors, including Henry Carey. Worsdale appeared on the stage with numerous ballad operas and operas, as well as poems (many of which Laetitia Pilkington sold him). "The Extravagant Justice" and "Gasconado the Great" were two of "his" operas in 1759.

He died on June 10, 1767. In his will, he left money to five acknowledged bastards, as well as to a lady to give her independence from her husband. He had, throughout his adult life, been as flamboyantly philandering as he could and had enjoyed his reputation as a rake. Laetitia Pilkington's "Memoir" gives a scathing account of him, and other memoirists record him as a short, unseemly man whose whole skill was in pretense and bravado.

References

*O'Donoghue, F. M. and Arianne Burnette. "James Worsdale" in Matthew, H.C.G. and Brian Harrison, eds. "The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography." vol. 60, 340. London: OUP, 2004.