ABSTRACT
London’s 1603 plague was unusually dire. Over one-sixth of the city’s inhabitants succumbed.1 Several treatises on the nature and treatment of the disease appeared, as did three pamphlet accounts of the epidemic’s rending events and experiences written by Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton. Both men were playwrights idled by the close of the theaters during the plague. Dekker wrote one pamphlet, The Wonderful Year: Wherein is Shewed the Picture of London, Lying Sick of the Plague. The other two were collaborations, with Dekker writing almost all of News from Gravesend: Sent to Nobody, and Middleton almost all of The Meeting of Gallants at an Ordinary; Or, the Walks in Paul’s.2 All three pamphlets appeared within a few months of one another in late 1603 and early 1604.
