Born, in London, 21 Oct. 1762. Educated at Marylebone School, Christmas 1770 to March 1771; at Westminster School, 30 June 1772 to 1778. To Christ Church, Oxford, 23 Jan. 1779; removed from Oxford, autumn of 1781. At King’s Coll., Aberdeen, 1781–83. Farce “The Female Dramatist” anonymously produced at Haymarket, 16 Aug. 1782. Admitted Mem. of Lincoln’s Inn, 1784. “Two to One,” produced at Haymarket, 19 June 1784; “Turk and no Turk,” 9 July 1785; “Inkle and Yarico,” 4 Aug. 1787; “Ways and Means,” 10 July 1788; “Battle of Hexham,” 11 Aug. 1789; “Surrender of Calais,” 30 July 1791; “Poor old Haymarket,” 15 June 1792; “Mountaineers,” 3 Aug. 1793; “New Hay at the Old Market” (afterwards known as “Sylvester Daggerwood”), 9 June 1795; “The Heir at Law,” 15 July 1797. Married Clara Morris, 3 Oct. 1784, at Gretna Green; remarried publicly, at Chelsea Church, 10 Nov. 1788. Manager of Haymarket, 1789. Purchased patent of Haymarket, 1794. “The Iron Chest” produced at Drury Lane, 12 March 1796; “Blue Beard,” 23 Jan. 1798; “Feudal Times,” 19 Jan. 1799. “Blue Devils” produced at Covent Garden, 24 April 1798; “Poor Gentleman,” 11 Feb. 1801; “John Bull,” 5 March 1803; “Who wants a Guinea?” 18 April 1805; “We Fly by Night,” 28 Jan. 1806; “X. Y. Z.,” 11 Dec. 1810; “The Law of Java,” 11 May 1822. “Review” produced at Haymarket, 2 Sept. 1800; “Gay Deceivers,” 22 Aug. 1804; “Love Laughs at Locksmiths,” 25 July 1803; “The Africans,” 29 July 1808. Reckless management of Haymarket, and constant financial difficulties. Lieutenant of Yeoman of the Guard, 13 May 1820 to 1831. Examiner of Plays, 19 Jan. 1824 till death. Possibly a second time married to Mrs. Gibbs, with whom he had lived [since 1795?]. Died, in Brompton Square, 17 Oct. 1836. Buried in vaults of Kensington Church. Works: “The Man of the People” (anon.), 1782, “Two to One,” 1785; “Inkle and Yarico,” [1787]; “Ways and Means,” 1788 (2nd edn. same year); “The Battle of Hexham” (anon.), 1790; “The Surrender of Calais,” 1792; “The Mountaineers” (anon.), 1794; “New Hay at the Old Market,” 1795 (2nd end. under title “Sylvester Daggerwood,” 1808); “The Iron Chest,” 1796 (2nd edn. same year); “My Night-Gown and Slippers,” 1797 (other edns. under title “Broad Grins,” 1802, etc.); “Blue-Beard,” 1798 (2nd, 3rd, 4th edns. same year); “Feudal Times,” 1799 (2nd edn. same year); “The Heir at Law,” 1800; “The Poor Gentleman” (1801); “Epilogue to the … Maid of Bristol,” [1803]; “John Bull,” 1805; “Who Wants a Guinea?” 1805; “The Africans,” 1808; “Blue Devils,” 1808; “The Gay Deceivers,” 1808; “Love Laughs at Locksmiths,” 1808; “The Review,” 1808; “Poetical Vagaries,” 1812; “The Maskers of Moorfields,” 1815; “Eccentricities for Edinburgh,” 1816; “The Gnome King” (anon.), 1819; “X. Y. Z.” (anon.), 1820; “The Law of Java,” 1822; “The Circle of Anecdote and Wit,” 1823; “Dramatic Works,” ed. with life, by J. W. Lake, 1827; “Random Records,” 1830; “Sermons for a General Fast … by a Layman” [no date]. He edited: Gay’s “Achilles in Petticoats,” with alterations, 1774; Palmer’s “Like Master, like Man,” 1811; “Posthumous Letters … addressed to F. Colman and G. Colman the elder,” 1820. Life: in Peake’s “Memoirs of the Colman Family,” 1841.

Personal

  I have met George Colman occasionally, and thought him extremely pleasant and convivial…. Sheridan was a grenadier company of life-guards, but Colman a whole regiment—of light infantry, to be sure, but still a regiment.

  It has never fallen to my lot to witness “in the hour of death,” so much serenity of mind, such perfect philosophy, or resignation more complete. Up to within one hour of his decease, he was perfectly sensible of his danger, and bore excruciating pain with the utmost fortitude…. It is remarkable, that although the disease of Colman was of a most painful and irritating nature, yet his mind and temper were seldom disturbed: it appeared often to me, that in the same ratio he lost physical power and suffered bodily pain, there was increased cerebral energy, intellectual activity, and wit of the most genuine character…. His funeral was private: he was buried in the vaults under Kensington church, by the side of his father; his old friends General Lewis, Mr. Harris, myself, and one or two others only attending.

  As a manager, Colman the younger was liberal, affable, and assiduous; he assumed no affected reserve or superiority, but was with all his performers familiar and friendly, though he never lost sight of the respect due to the audience, and of the proper interests of the theatre; and though, as Sir Fretful Plagiary says, “he writes himself,” yet he was exempt from the narrow jealousy too often prevalent in the literary character, and they who aspired at dramatic distinction were sure to meet at his theatre with counsel, assistance, and protection…. Although Colman was more nearly allied to the character of a punster than that of a wit, he was more than either, that of a humorist; he said thousands of good things which would entirely lose their poignancy by repetition, since the inimitable chuckle of his voice, and the remarkable expression of his countenance, would be wanting. The intelligent roll of his large and almost glaring eyes, with the concurrent expression of his handsome face, were ever the unerring avant couriers of his forthcoming joke; and if anything curtailed the mirth he had provoked, it was the almost interminable laughter with which he honoured his own effusion.

  His vanity and his desire to be talked about were inordinate. When in his later years he was in danger of being forgotten, he wrote anonymous abuse of himself to bring his name before the public again. As a manager he was jovial and pleasant; but in his business transactions he was selfish and ungenerous. When poor O’Keefe, who had lost his sight, was preparing an edition of his dramatic works to be published by subscription, he applied to Colman for permission to reprint some farces which he had sold to his father for a mere trifle, and was refused. His later managerial career was not prosperous.

  Colman was an entertaining companion and a genuine humourist. He was, however, disorderly if not profligate in his writings and in his life. The trustworthiness and stability of his father did not descend to him. As a manager he was capable, but his extravagance led to constant difficulties and feuds.

General

  The pertinacious ribaldry of Mr. Colman, and his affectation of regarding its reprovers as hypocrites,—things which look more like the robust ignorance of a vulgar young rake, than the proceeding of even an old man of the world who is approaching his grave,—have met with their just reprobation from every reader of common sense. The truth is, that Mr. Colman the Younger, as he calls himself, has been prodigiously overrated in his time, partly perhaps from his real superiority to the Dibdins and Reynoldses as a writer of huge farces, and partly from the applauses of a set of interested actors and gratuitous playwrights, whom he has helped to spoil in return; so that it really seems to be half vanity as well as sottishness, that persuades him he has a right to talk as he pleases, and to make us acquainted with this obscene dotage of his over his cups.

  “The Heir at Law” was his first regular comedy; and we doubt very much whether he ever excelled it, or, indeed, if it has been excelled by more than a very few plays in the English language. We know that the theatrical world, and we believe the author himself, gave a decided preference to “John Bull;” but we admit that as we are unfashionable enough to prefer Sheridan’s “Rivals” to his “School for Scandal,” so are we prepared unhesitatingly to declare our opinion that “The Heir at Law” is Colman’s chef-d’œuvre.

  No modern dramatist has added so many stock pieces to the theatre as Colman, or imparted so much genuine mirth and humour to all play-goers…. The comedies of Colman abound in witty and ludicrous delineations of character, interspersed with bursts of tenderness and feeling, somewhat in the style of Sterne, whom, indeed, he has closely copied in his “Poor Gentleman.”

  His humour was of the broad kind, popular in his day, and as such was marred by indelicacies of subject and allusion, which make the reproduction of it impossible. Of his longer efforts, “The Lady of the Wreck,” a clever parody, dedicated to the author of “The Lady of the Lake” is perhaps the best; of his shorter pieces, “The Newcastle Apothecary” and “Lodgings for a Single Gentleman” have been immensely popular as recitations.

  Coleman was a very clever manufacturer of comedy. His best characters are ingenious mechanisms constructed upon methods which he is not artist enough to be at any pains to disguise; an oddity, incessantly repeated, a professional trait harped upon in every sentence, are the formulas which, expanded, become a Pangloss (“Heir at Law”) or an Ollapod (“Poor Gentleman”). Colman’s sentiment is still more theatrical than his humour…. Besides his plays he adventured in the field of burlesque verses, in the manner of Peter Pindar; his “Broad Grins” (1802), “Poetical Vagaries,” and similar collections, have a certain coarse effectiveness, but scarcely belong to literature. Compared with the classical work of Goldsmith in humorous verse they fairly measure the literary decline of the drama in the generation between “She Stoops to Conquer” and “John Bull.”