Westward Ho (play)

Westward Ho was entered into the Stationers' Register on 2 March 1605, and printed in quarto in 1607 by William Jaggard for the bookseller John Hodgets.

[2] The title page states that the play was acted by the Children of Paul's, one of the companies of boy actors that constituted a distinctive feature of that era.

[3] Critics generally agree that Dekker's hand is dominant in Westward Ho, while Webster's is the minority contribution; but they have disagreed on particulars.

)[5] In their original play, Dekker and Webster took a broad-scale satirical view of contemporary events and developments in London, as it evolved "westward" into new, more egalitarian, more capitalistic and competitive forms.

Webster was capable of expressing a dark anarchic cynicism – found most blatantly in his two great tragedies, The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi.

The three wives are all pursued by a set of gallants that includes Sir Gosling Glowworm, Captain Whirlpool, Masters Linstock and Monopoly.

The group forms a plan to evade the three husbands for an outing to Brentford (in the play it is called "Brainford"), west of London, upstream on the Thames.

In the course of his masquerade Justiniano exposes hidden truths about himself: he is actually solvent and not bankrupt, and his activities are motivated by his own personal obsessions – he was so possessive and jealous over his wife that he'd stay awake nights to listen to her talk in her sleep, hoping that she'd let slip the names of lovers.

The play's risque aspect is more in its tone; in its freewheeling style more than in substance, Westward Ho casts a stark light on the society of its day.

Thomas Middleton borrowed a plot element from Westward Ho in his later city comedy The Roaring Girl (published 1611), where he sends his characters on a trip to Brentford just as Dekker and Webster do in their play.

Middleton likely expected his audience to recognise the allusion, since he mentions Westward Ho by name in his text (IV, ii, 137).