Reformation is a comic interlude in one act.

The authorship of this work is very uncertain, , it being credited, depending on the source, to an Anonymous author, a "J.B.Pulham" (possibly a publisher), or a "Mr Bernard".

The original text

Usually indicated as written by an Anonymous author in the South African source (F.C.L. Bosman, 1928[1]) and also most copies of the play on sale on the internet today.

However, in a list of "Dramatic Works published by C.Chapple..", published in the back of the published text of My Wife or My Place (Shannon and Thackeray, C. Chapple: 1831), a play by this name is listed as having been written by "J.B.Pulham" and available at a price of "1s 6d"[2] Pulham may in fact have been the publisher responsible for the text, since elsewhere he appears in this capacity for a publication by C. Withers[3].

In The Tatler No 241 of Saterday June 11, 1831[4] on the other hand, a playbill from the Queen's Theatre is reproduced which claims the authorship for a "Mr Bernard".

These authorship claims, and the South African performance, seem to suggest two things: (a) that a play by this name must have been first performed in England no later than 1827 and (b) (a little more unlikely) that there may be two - or even three - plays by exactly the same name from that period.