Elizabethan Playwrights: A Short History of the English Drama from Mediaeval Times to the Closing of the Theatres in 1642 |
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acted actor Admiral's men authorship bethan Blackfriars Burbage Cæsar Chambers Chapel Chapman chronicle play classical collaboration comedy contemporary court Cymbeline Davenant Dekker dialogue dramatists E. K. Chambers Earl earlier Eliza Elizabeth Elizabethan Drama Elizabethan Stage England English drama entertainment especially example extant followed Gorboduc Hamlet Henry VIII Henslowe Henslowe's Heywood humors imitation Inigo Jones interlude Italian James Burbage John Jonson Julius Cæsar King's later Latin less London Lyly Lyly's manner Marlowe Marlowe's Marston masque Massinger Massinger's Master medieval Middleton modern moral play old drama Oxford passion pastoral Paul's Peele personages players playhouse playwright plot poet poetry Prince quarto queen reign reprinted Revels revenge Richard Richard Burbage romantic Rowley royal satire scenes Sejanus Senecan Shake Shakespeare Shirley Spanish Tragedy speare speare's spirit story success Tamburlaine theaters theatrical theme Thomas tion tragic tragicomedy vols W. W. Greg Webster William Rowley writing wrote
Popular passages
Page 278 - If I were a woman I would kiss as many of you as had beards that pleased me, complexions that liked me, and breaths that I defied not.
Page 119 - How would it have joyed brave Talbot, the terror of the French, to think that after he had lain two hundred years in his tomb, he should triumph again on the stage and have his bones new embalmed with the tears of ten thousand spectators at least (at several times), who, in the tragedian that represents his person, imagine they behold him fresh bleeding...
Page 285 - Farewell ! a long farewell, to all my greatness ! This is the state of man : to-day he puts forth The tender leaves of hopes ; to-morrow blossoms, And bears his blushing honours thick upon him ; The third day comes a frost, a killing frost, And, when he thinks, good easy man, full surely His greatness is a-ripening, nips his root, And then he falls, as I do.
Page 138 - Our revels now are ended... These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits, and Are melted into air, into thin air, And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind: we are such stuff As dreams are made on; and our little life Is rounded with a sleep..
Page 83 - From jigging veins of rhyming mother wits, And such conceits as clownage keeps in pay, We'll lead you to the stately tent of War...
Page 20 - As to the beginning of the said gild, be it known that, once on a time, a play setting forth the goodness of the Lord's Prayer was played in the city of York; in which play all manner of vices and sins were held up to scorn, and the virtues were held up to praise.
Page 119 - How would it have joyed brave Talbot (the terror of the French) to think that after he had lain two hundred years in his 180 tomb, he should triumph again on the stage, and have his bones new embalmed with the tears of ten thousand spectators at least (at several times), who in the tragedian that represents his person imagine they behold him fresh bleeding.
Page 116 - Though, as Ben Jonson says of him that he had but little Latin and less Greek, he understood Latin pretty well, for he had been in his younger years a schoolmaster in the country.
Page 212 - A tragicomedy is not so called in respect of mirth and killing, but in respect it wants deaths, which is enough to make it no tragedy, yet brings some near it, which is enough to make it no comedy...
Page 122 - This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England, This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings, Fear'd by their breed and famous by their birth, Renowned for their deeds as far from home, For Christian service and true chivalry...