Scene in Bedlam, 1735, printed 1763

William Hogarth, best known for his sardonic prints of eighteenth-century London, can be credited with the invention of the British satirical print genre. The character of the “rake”—a wealthy, often aristocratic, male addicted to gambling, womanizing, and indecent behavior—was a popular stock role in English Restoration comedies of the seventeenth century. By Hogarth’s time, the term had taken on a moralizing tone, representing a life of total ethical depravity that often ended in debtor’s prison or insanity. In this series of eight engravings with narrative texts—four of which are exhibited here—Hogarth traced the decline and fall of the fictional Tom Rakewell, a wealthy young man who had moved to London following the death of his miserly father, only to squander his inheritance on luxurious living, gambling, and prostitution.

Plate 8: All is finally lost as Tom writhes naked and insane on the floor of Bethlehem Hospital—London’s notorious mental asylum, popularly known as Bedlam. Only Sarah is there to comfort him, but he can no longer recognize her.