After William Heath's print entitled 'The rival Richards or Sheakspear [sic] in danger' published by S. Knight, 18 May 1814; see BM Satires 12326. This print reversed and lettered with title "The Rival Richards or Shakspear in danger!" with publication line "Pub. by McCleary, 32 Nassau St." printed within plate. A terrified William Shakespeare is pulled by his arms in two different directions by the rival actors, Edmund Kean and Charles Mayne Young, both of whom are dressed as Richard III. Edmund Kean (at right, who was short of stature) wears an ermine cap and crown and boots with spurs on them and Charles Mayne Young (at left), who wears very large feathers in his hat and buckled shoes. Shakespeare cries "Murder : Murder"; Kean says "I have him but I will not keep him long" while Charles Mayne Young says "I hate thee Richard for thy better parts, mine be the Prize, not thine forbear". In the left background, Thomas Harris, patentee and manager of the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden remarks "they are to Kean for me & will Harris me to death"; he stands in front of the theatre, that has inscribed on it "the best Booth, in the Fair, whats a Stage without Horses" [Covent Garden was famous for staging plays in which animals were the chief attraction]. In the right background, politician Samuel Whitbread II (1764-1815, who was a son of a brewer) appears to dance while holding a tankard aloft; he stands in front of the façade of Drury Lane Theatre, on which an inscription can just be seen, that reads "Whitbre[ad] Real Home Brew'd". According to M. Dorothy George in 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', IX, 1949, Charles Mayne Young (1777-1836) was established at Covent Garden and was accepted as the leading English tragedian before Edmund Kean's début at Drury Lane. The management then put Young in rivalry with Kean as Richard and Hamlet, the plays being performed several times on the same day at both theatres. The rivalry was between two schools of acting - the Kemble declamatory manner [after John Philip Kemble (1757-1823)] and the more ‘natural’ acting of Kean.