Drama

THE RENAISSANCE

The Beginning (1400 – 1550)

The End (1625 – 1660)

The Acme (1559 – 1625)

► The

Beginning

- a revolution of thought: ◦ arts ◦ letters - an intellectual movement: ◦ Western Europe . Italy: Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio . Greek: Plato, Homer, Sophocles - the invention of printing (1450) - the outbreak of the Reformation: ◦ translations

- the revival of Learning: ◦ essays: . Sir Thomas More (1478 – 1535): Utopia (1516) the true prologue to the Renaissance ◦ poetry: . Thomas Wyatt (1503 -1542): Petrarchan sonnets

an octave + sestet abba abba cdc dcc . Henry Howard/Earl of Surrey (1517 – 1547): English Sonnet three quatrains + a couplet abab cdcd efef gg

◦ drama: . Nicholas Udall Comedy Ralph Roister Doister (1533) . Thomas Norton Tragedy Gorboduc or Ferrex and Porrex (1562) . Thomas Sackville (1536 – 1608) The Mirror for Magistrates

The Acme of the Renaissance / the Elizabethan Age ▪ Poetry 1. Edmund Spenser (1552 – 1599) - Shepherd’s Calendar (1579) - Fairie Queene (1589 – 1596) Spenserian stanza: 8 lines + 1 iambic pentameter ababbcbc + alexandrine c - Amoretti (1595) - Epithalamion - Prothalamion

2. Sir Philip Sidney (1554 – 1586): - Astrophel - Stella - Arcadia - Defence of Poesie (an essay) 3. Sir Walter Raleigh (1552 – 1618): - The Discovery of the Empire of Guiana - History of yhe World 4. Thomas Campion (1567 – 1620): - songs 5. Michael Drayton (1563 -1631): - songs

 Drama Precursors of Shakespeare: 1. John Lily (1554 – 1606) - Euphues - Endymion (myth) 2. George Peele (1558 – 1597) - David and Bethsabe (old mistery) 3. Robert Green (1560 – 1592) - Friar Bacon and Friar Bangay (love story) - James IV (history) 4. Thomas Lodge (1558 – 1625) - A Looking Glass for London and England (+Green) - Rosalinde (pastoral romance)

5. Thomas Nash (1567 – 1601): - The Life of Jack Wilton (1594) picaresque novel 6. Thomas Dekker (1570 – 1632): - The Bachelor’s Banquet (tragic comedy) 7. Thomas Kyd (1558 – 1594): - The Tragedy of Blood / The Tragedy of Revenge - Spanish Tragedy (a pro-Shakespearean Hamlet) 8. Christopher Marlowe (1564 – 1593): - Tamburlaine ( 1587) - Doctor Faustus (1588) - The Jew of Malta (1590) - Edward II (1591)

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE (1564 – 1616)  Concerning the Form: - Blank verse - Heroic couplets  Concerning the Plot: The idea and the subject of the story are taken from - the history - novels (esp. Italy and France) - romances -daily life - heroes from England’s history

 Style of Writing: - poetic drama - beauty, spontaneity and passion to strictness of order - formal and dignified language of the classics - followed the fashion of the time  Concerning the extent of work: - 37 plays: 16 comedies 10 tragedies 11 historical - 2 long narrative poems - 154 sonnets + other poems

Shakespeare’s Plays  the Brilliant Apprentice (26 – 30): - 1590-1594: Venus and Adonis (1593) Lucrece (1594) King Henry Love Labour’s Lost The Comedy of Errors (15921594) Two Gentlemen of Verona

 The Successful Craftsman (30 – 36) - 1594-1600: Midsummer Night’s Dream Much Ado about Nothing As You Like It Twelfth Night Merchant of Venice Richard II (1596) Henry V (1598-99) Romeo and Juliet Julius Caesar (1598-99) Taming of the Shrew (1594-97) Marry Wives of Windsor (1597-1600)

 The Accomplished Master (36 – 43) - 1600 - 1607: Hamlet (1600-01) All’s Well that Ends Well (160004) Troilus and Cressida (1601-03) Measure to Measure (1603-04) Othelo (1604-05) King Lear (1605-06) Macbeth (1605-06)

 The Ease of Genius (43 – 49) - 1607 – 1613: Antony and Cleopatra (160708) Timon of Athens (1608-10) Pericles Coriolanus Cymbeline The Winter’s Tale (1610-11) The Tempest (1611-12) Henry VIII (1612-13)

The Great Art of Shakespeare

 The universality of his genius: tragedies comedies historical plays narrative verse sonnets  His profound insight into the psychology of man, and his characters are the real men and women with complex personality  His characters are as a rule so well conceived  Enormous dramatic tension dramatic irony  The dialogue form highest perfection in a complete harmony of poetry and drama

Shakespeare’s Contemporaries George Chapman (translator of Homer) - a pleasant wit - a sober manner - a graceful style of in comedies: 1. Al Fooles (1605) 2. Monsieur d’Olive (1606) 3. The Gentleman Usher (1606) - tragedies: 1. Bussy d’Ambois (1598) 2. The Revenge of Bussy d’Ambois (1613) 3. Conspiracie and Tragedie of Charles (1608) 4. Duke of Byron (1608) 5. Marshall of France (1608)

Ben Jonson (1573 – 1639) - concept of Humor: 1. Every Man in His Humor (1598) 2. Every Man out of His Humor (1599) 3. Cynthia’s Revels (1601) 4. Poetaster (1602) 5. Volpone, or the Fox 6. Epicaene, or the Silent Woman (1606) 7. The Alchemist (1610) 8. Bartholomew Fayre (1614) - tragedy: 1. Sejanus (1603) 2. Catiline (1611) 3. Julius Caesar (1599) 4. The Sad Shepherd (unfinished)

John Marston (1575 – 1634) - melodrama: 1. Antonio and Mellida (1600) 2. Antonio’s Revenge (1600) - a tragi-comedy - a violent comedy: 1. The Malcontent (1601) - cynisism: 1. The Dutch Courtezan (1605) 2. The Honest Whore (with Dekker) 3. Parasitaster, or the Fawne (1606) - comedy of manner: 1. Eastward Hoe

Thomas Middleton (1580 – 1627) - comedies: 1. Michaelmas Terme (1604) 2. A Trick to Catch The Old One (1606) 3. A Mad World 4. My Masters, Your Five Gallants 5. A chast Mayd

John Fletcher (1579 – 1625): 1. Tragedie of Valentinian (1614) 2. The Tragedie of Bonduca (1614) 3. The Loyal Subject (1618) 4. The Humorous Lieutenant (1619) 5. Monsieur Thomas (1621) 6. The Pilgrim 7. The Wild-goose Chase

Philip Massinger (1583 – 1639) - comedies: 1. A New Way to Pay Old Debts (1626) 2. The City Madam (1632) 3. The Guardian (1633) 4. The Fatall Dowry (1619) 5. The Duke of Millaine (1620) 6. The Unnatural Combat (1621) 7. The Maid of Honour (1626) 8. The Bond-Man (1623) 9. The Renegado (1624) 10. The Roman Actor (1626) 11. The Picture (1629)

John Ford (1586 – 1639): 1. Perkin Warback 2. The Lover’s Melancholy 3. ‘Tis Pity Shee’s a Whore 4. The Broken Heart James Shirley (1596 – 1666): 1. The Traytor (1631) 2. The Cardinall (1631) 3. The Wedding 4. Changes 5. Hyde Park 6. The Gamester 7. The Lady of Pleasure 8. The Young Admirall 9. The Opportunitie 10. The Imposture

METAPHYSICAL POETRY 

Characteristics: - metaphysical conceit - obscure language - metaphor

 Poets 1. John Donne (1572 – 1631) - Elegies, satyres, divine poems 2. George Herbert (1593 – 1633) - The Temple - The Pulley

Andrew Marvell (1621 – 1678): 1. To His Coy Mistress Abraham Cowley (1618 – 1667): 1. Pindarique Odes 2. Miscellanies 3. Ode to the Royal Society John Milton (1608 – 1674) - religious poem: 1. Ode on the Morning of Christ’s Nativity 2. L’Allegro 3. Il Penseroso 4. Arcades 5. Comus (1634) 6. Lycidas (1637) 7. Paradise Lost (1667) 8. Paradise Regained (1671) 9. Samson Agonistes (1671)

The Anglican Poets 

George Herbert (1593 – 1633)

 1. 2. 3. 4.

Richard Crashaw (1612 –1649): Music’s Duel Wishes to a supposed Mistress The Weeper The Flaming Heart



Henry Vaughan (1622 – 1695) - secular verses, myticism: Scintillans The Retreat

1. 2.

 Francis Quarles (1592 – 1644): 1. Emblems (1635)  

Andrew Marvell (1621 –1678) Abraham Cowley (1618 – 1667)

Sir John Denham (1615 – 1669) - descriptive, didactic poems: 1. Cooper’s Hill (1642) 

The Cavalier Poets  1.

Sir John Suckling (1609 – 1642): A Ballad upon a Wedding

 1. 2. 3.

Thomas Carew (1598 – 1639): Ask me no more When Thou, poor Excommunicate Read in These Roses the Sad Story

 1. 2. 3.

Robert Herrick (1591 – 1674): Hesperides/Works both humane and divine (1648) The Hock-cart or Harvest Home Corinna’s going a-Maying

 1.

Richard Lovelace (1618 – 1658): To Althea from Prison

The End of the Renaissance  Prose Sir Thomas Browne (1603 – 1682) - a physician, theologian/preacher: 1. Pseudo-doxia Epidemica (1646) 2. Religio Medici (1643) 3. The Garden of Cyrus 4. Hydriotaphia Jeremy Taylor (1613 – 1667) - Anglican prosaist, dreamer: 1. Liberty of Prophesying (1646) 2. Holy Living (1650) 3. Holy Dying (1651) 4. The Marriage Ring

Francis Bacon (1567 – 1626) - lawyer, statesman, philosopher: 1. Essays 2. The Advancement of Learning 

John Bunyan (1628 – 1688) - a traveling thinker, Puritan preacher, allegorist (49 books): 1. The Pilgrim’s Progress (1678) 2. Everyman 3. The Life and Death of Mr. Badman (1680) 4. Grace Abounding (1666) 5. The Holy War (1682) 

Thomas Hobbes (1588 – 1679) - philosophy: 1. Elements of Law, Natural and Politics (1640) 2. Leviathan (1651) Sir Thomas Urquhart of Cromarty (1611 – 1660) 1. Church History of Britain (1655-6) 2. Holy and Profane State (1642) 3. The History of the Worthies of England (1662)

Izaac Walton (1593 – 1683) 1. The Compleat Angler (1653)

 Drama - the decay of drama: no drama produced closing of the theatres -Drama was restored by John Dryden in the Restoration period