Brief biography of the life and works of Christopher Marlowe, Elizabethan playwright and poet, famous for his poem "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love."
English poet and dramatist Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593), was the first great dramatist of the English theatre and the most important writer of tragedy plays before William Shakespeare. He is best known for the play Tamburlaine the Great (two parts) and the lyric poem "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love."
Early Years of Christopher Marlowe
Marlowe was the son of a shoemaker in the city of Canterbury and attended the King's School there. At 17 he went to Cambridge University on a scholarship. He graduated after three years and then stayed on to study for a higher degree. This was nearly refused because he was away too much, but the university relented when an official letter arrived saying he was on government business.
Political Affiliations and Activities
Historians believe he was abroad, working as a spy, alleged that while still at the university, Marlowe became an agent of Francis Walsingham. The detail of any mission he undertook in the secret service of Queen Elizabeth I's great schemer is not known, but an intelligent speculation leading to his early death.
In London, Marlowe made important friends, including Sir Walter Raleigh, the famed English writer, poet and explorer, who had started the first colony in Virginia. Aged 25, Marlowe was imprisoned after a brawl in which a man was killed. He was involved in other street fights in between years, until in 1593, at 29, he was murdered in a dockside tavern. The official story released was that he had been stabbed in the eye during an argument over the bill, but a week earlier a warrant had been issued for Marlowe's arrest, and his former roommate, Tomas Hyd, had been tortured to make him give information about Marlowe.
Many people think that Marlowe was deliberately silenced to stop him exposing secrets about powerful people. His personal life, as a free-thinker and being indiscreet, added to his infamous reputation.
The Dramatist / Playwright and Poet
Marlowe first began to write poems and plays at university. It is not known exactly when his tragedies were written. Both parts of his greatest tragedy, Tamburlaine the Great, had been performed by the time he was 23. The first part of Tamburlaine the Great was a great success at the London theatre. The second part met with equal success performed in the same year. Before his death, Marlowe spent time writing his narrative poem Hero and Leander, along with his poetic masterpiece "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love."
His plays often reflected on the aspirations of characters whose outright defiance of social, political and religious morality equally invites admiration and condemnation.
Works by Christopher Marlowe
- Tamburlaine the Great, (in two parts), circa 1587
- Doctor Faustus, c. 1588
- The Jew of Malta, c. 1590
- The Massacre at Paris, 1592
- Edward II, c. 1592
- Hero and Leander, Narrative poem, 1598
- The Passionate Shepherd to His Love, Poem, 1598
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Sources:
Cambridge Guide to Literature in English by Ian Ousby (1993)
Larousse Dictionary of Writers, edited by Rosemary Goring (1994)
