The Young Pretender

by Michael Arditti

'An engrossing, enthralling and utterly captivating read, The Young Pretender tells a simply remarkable story with bounce, energy, wit, and lively authenticity . . . Michael Arditti's brilliant imaginative achievement offers high comedy, dark tragedy and everything between' STEPHEN FRY

Mobbed by the masses, lionised by the aristocracy, courted by royalty and lusted after by patrons of both sexes, the child actor William Henry West Betty was one of the most famous people in Georgian Britain.

At the age of thirteen, he played leading roles, including Romeo, Macbeth and Richard III, in theatres across the country. Prime Minister William Pitt adjourned the House of Commons so that its members could attend his debut as Hamlet at Covent Garden. Then, as rivals turned on him and scandal engulfed him, he suffered a fall as merciless as his rise had been meteoric.

The Young Pretender takes place during Betty's attempted comeback at the age of twenty-one. As he seeks to relaunch his career, he is forced to confront the painful truths behind his boyhood triumphs. Michael Arditti's revelatory new novel puts this long forgotten figure back in the limelight. In addition to its rich and poignant portrait of Betty himself, it offers an engrossing insight into both the theatre and society of the age. The nature of celebrity, the power of publicity and the cult of youth are laid bare in a story that is more pertinent now than ever.

'Michael Arditti is a writer who takes risks. His material is always compelling and provocative, his techniques sophisticated and oblique' PATRICIA DUNCKER, Independent on Sunday

'Arditti is a master storyteller' PETER STANFORD, Observer

Genres: Historical Fiction

Unknown Binding

About the author

Michael Arditti FRSL is an English writer. He has written twelve novels, including Easter, The Enemy of the Good, Jubilate and The Breath of Night, and also a collection of short stories, Good Clean Fun. His most recent novel, The Anointed, was published in April 2020. He is a prolific literary critic and an occasional broadcaster for the BBC. Much of his work explores issues of spirituality and sexuality. He has been described by Philip Pullman as "our best chronicler of the rewards and pitfalls of present-day faith".

Reviews

[Liam Ostermann · Rating 4 out of 5]

I came close to giving this novel five stars but I am not sure it is a really great novel, though it a first rate one. Ultimately if I give it five stars I am giving it the same rating I give to Lampedusa's 'The Leopard' and that I can't do.

When the book came out a number of reviewers, I particularly recall one in The Financial Times, remarking on this novel being a change for Michael Arditti who they described as normally writing about religion and faith a la Graham Greene (as if no other author dealt with these subjects, had they never heard of George Bernanos or Francois Mauriac or even, the slightly absurd, English author A.N. Wilson). But what the reviewers didn't see is that Mr. Arditti's novels dealing more specifically with religion, such as 'Breath of the Night', are all about searching for truth and knowing thyself and are based on the idea of the unexamined life as not being worth living. Admittedly Socrates was the first to say this but it is fundamental to living a Christian life, what do you think the examination of conscience is for?

The Young Pretender is about a once famous child actor, now grown both up and portly, who discovers, as he attempts to rebuild his career as an adult, what he did not know, or did not want to know or chose to forget the reality of his life as a celebrity. The tawdry, complex, reality behind his celebrity was something he made himself forget. That the reality was squalid is unsurprising. Today we are living in a culture soaked in 'celebrity' and happy to ignore the 40 confirmed suicides associated (as of 2024) with reality TV so, although this novel is set over two hundred years ago, it resonates powerfully with our times.

A finely written, rather short, novel that handles its period beautifully. Arditti may not be Lampedusa but he is a fine writer and this is a very good novel.

Although it is not listed, or illustrated, on Goodreads it was the hardback edition of this novel I bought and read.

[Soozee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Based on a real person, this is the story of William Betty, an acclaimed child actor in Georgian England. At a very young age he was on the stage, acting parts designed for much older actors, and became the pet of society, adored by all the 'ton' and invited everywhere, meeting royalty and prime ministers.

We meet Betty when he is some years older, as his precocious acting career ended, his studies at university terminated early in order to be with his dying father, and he now intends to return to the stage. He looks through the many memoirs written of his original career, and coupled with his mother's memories, begins to reconstruct the experience as he tries to relaunch his career, but with little success as he is no longer a beautiful youth but a paunchy man.

We learn about the theatre at this time - the hushmen, the rowdy audience, throwing apple cores and orange peel onto the stage itself, the importance of 'being seen' rather than actually attending to the play. There are some wonderful moments.

Betty eventually discovers the darker side of his youth, how his father gambled and wasted his earnings, and possibly pandered him to disreputable men. What he remembered and what actually happened don't originally match, but he begins to piece it together and the theatre loses its shine for him.

An interesting, historical tale, obviously padded with fiction but very cleverly so, it gives an insight into celebrity, which is very poignant. Sometimes I struggled to work out whether he was talking in the present or his past. An enjoyable read. Thank you to NetGalley and Quercus Books for allowing me access to the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Annarella · Rating 5 out of 5]

A charming and witty historical fiction based on a real characters. It was the first book i read by this author and I was fascinated by the excellent storytelling and the style of writing.
The historical background is well researched and vivid, the characters are fleshed out.
It's an entertaining and brilliant story that I strongly recommend.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

[Lauren C. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book reads like something much older than it really is, which gives it an interesting antique feel. I do feel like this is a book which only people interested in history, theatre or are familiar with Master Betty would be into. I knew who he was, and am fascinated with ideas around fandom and the 18th century, so this was a read that matched my interests. It was a quick read, but not an overly simple one which I really enjoyed. It sort of transported you back in time, which I liked.

[Kathy King · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very well researched and presenting an enthralling look at theatre in Regency (and late Georgian) times, in London and the regions. Lots of detail and insights about actors, audiences, theatres, reputations, the "ton", social life (of the poor and "insane", as well as the wealthy) of this period. Sometimes hard to judge if the story was the now or the past. A rich read.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

A satisfactory read of a sort outside my usual experience.

[Graeme Reid · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved the historical dialogue etc used in this book. Very interesting story. Child actor exploited by various people including his father trying to make a comeback told in his own words.

[Amberly · Rating 2 out of 5]

Started and finished date - 28.01.25 to 29.01.25.
My rating - two Stars.
This book was okay read but bit boring and the cover of book was fine. Both the writing and the paced of plot was okay. The atmosphere was okay and the the ending of the book was fine. The characters was okay but I would have like them flash out bit more.

[Adam Stevenson · Rating 3 out of 5]

William Betty first came as one of the side-stories in Andrew McConnell Stott’s The Pantomime Life of Joseph Grimaldi. At the turn of the 18th century, both society and theatre was extremely chaotic, leading to all sorts of fads. There were fads for ‘aqua-dramas’, which took place on flooded stages, a rise in speciality acts, a number of celebrity dogs - and there was Bettymania.

Rather like Beatlemania, Bettymania created huge crowds but unlike Beatlemania, people died in Betty’s crowds. There were duels, not even about whether Betty was a good actor, but about which role he fulfilled best. For just over a year, the whole of the UK were obsessed with one actor, someone who played all the main roles in Shakespeare and beyond, playing Hamlet and Macbeth in the same year, and was only 12 years old.

When I picked up The Young Pretender, I thought, for a moment, that I was picking up a biography but this is a novel. Set a few years after his heyday, the now 21 year old William Betty has decided to make a comeback. He navigates the difficulties of returning to the theatrical world but also comes face-to-face with the memories of his former life as a supposed prodigy.

Betty is a very engaging character, trying to hang on to his dignity, having to remind everyone he meets that he is ‘Mister’ now, not ‘Master’. He has very little arrogance about his former dominance, hyper-aware that he is meeting fellow actors at a far more even level than he was in his superstar years. He hopes that his maturity will have improved him as an actor and is not blind to the idea that he was never a great actor so much as a fad. True, it hurts him if other people tell him these things, but they are not new ideas to him. He also holds a truly sweet and naive hope that, with work, he may become the actor he was previously hyped up to be. It’s charming how he amuses his little sister, tries to connect with old friends and just tries to be a decent professional, without becoming despondent by the increasingly clear ambivalence that audiences have to him as an adult. He also weathers a number of comments about his increased weight with aplomb.

There’s a lovely scene where he meets up with Dora Jordan, ditched by her royal partner. The two reminisce, not about life on stage but about the time she took an exhausted Betty and let him recuperate at the family home. There’s also a very good scene where Betty decides to be ‘a man’ and sleep with a prostitute. It just so happens that the one he picks up saw him on stage a few years earlier and she remembers it as one of the high-points of her life. Not wanting to ruin her memories, he gives her the money and leaves with the deed undone.

The biggest problem with the novel is the matter of amnesia. Whether it’s because of suppression, or the drugged up haze a lot of his acting career was performed in, but Betty has almost no actual memories of his time in the spotlight. These memories leak in as the book progresses, with Betty and the reader discovering them at the same time. The trouble is, this element of the book tests disbelief too hard. There is no way Betty wouldn’t be able to remember whether his tutor, Gough, sexually abused him or not. Nor is there anyway he couldn’t remember a certain ‘fan’ certainly tried to until the end of the book. Betty’s access to his own memory is plot-convenient in a way which breaks realism too much.

Were I to write a book about William Betty, I’d have been tempted to write a farce. The notion of a boy taking the central male roles in popular plays and playing them against adult casts (indeed, adult love interests and antagonists) and it being phenomenally successful, is a farce. Michael Arditti has chosen to write a drama, however. This is probably fairer to Betty, who ended his own life following a second unsuccessful comeback but it does mean the book is a fairly drab affair, full of disappointment, hazy memories of parental abuse and possible child abuse. What’s more, the character of adult Betty is so passively accepting of what has happened to him, his realisations are met calmly, until at the end he decides to kill himself (an attempt which failed, incidentally).

As such, Arditti probably respects the historical Betty more in his dour telling but didn’t give me all that much joy.