The Letter Writers Or, a New Way to Keep a Wife at Home is a play by Henry Fielding and was first performed on 24 March 1731 at Haymarket with its companion piece The Tragedy of Tragedies. It is about two merchants who strive to keep their wives faithful. Their efforts are unsuccessful, however, until they catch the man who their wives are cheating with.
The play, a farce dealing with sex and adultery, was a failure. While Fielding avoided the traditional cliches of the genre, he lost the moral purpose. Critics disagree over the quality of the play, but most agree that the missing moral purpose is the key failure of the play.