The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21).
Volume XI. The Period of the French Revolution.
§ 8. The Rovers
Burlesque of the same high rank appears in The Rovers. This delicious mock-play parodies certain productions of the German drama, then only beginning to be known in England by translations. Like its fellow-satires, it derived assistance from the extravagances to be found in some of the works it derided. These extravagances differed from one another in kind as well as in degree; but Goethe, Schiller and Kotzebue seemed alike fair game to the satirist, and the result was a spirited farce, which has remained amusing long after the close of the literary controversy which was its occasion.