The alchemist

[Samuel Taylor Coleridge](/authors/OL26099A/Samuel_Taylor_Coleridge) said of Ben Jonson's _The Alchemist_ that it had one out of the three most perfect plots in literature. This play, with its sharp portrayal of human folly, is considered by many to be Jonson's best comedy. First performed 1610, its popularity has endured to this day.