Edward II

by Christopher Marlowe, Martin Wiggins (Editor), Robert Lindsey (Editor)

Overview

Marlowe's play retains its power to shock even today, and this edition
gives full value to its three overriding themes of sexual favouritism,
political confrontation and sheer cruelty. Critics in the last twenty
years, who have focused on the overtly sexual relationship between
Edward and his favourite Gaveston, have hailed it as a 'gay classic';
earlier interpretations concentrated rather on the deposition by his
subjects of a weak king, reading it in tandem with Shakespeare's
Richard II. The introduction shows how the play works to give the
audience an equal emotional commitment to opposing points of view and
concludes that this is what makes Edward II such an uncomfortable and
challenging play.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781408144442
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date:	04/18/2014
Series:	New Mermaids
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Christopher Marlowe (1564-93) was an English playwright and poet, who through his establishment of blank verse as a medium for drama did much to free the Elizabethan theatre from the constraints of the medieval and Tudor dramatic tradition. His first play Tamburlaine the Great, was performed that same year, probably by the Admiral's Men with Edward Alleyn in the lead. With its swaggering power-hungry title character and gorgeous verse the play proved to be enormously popular; Marlowe quickly wrote a second part, which may have been produced later that year. Marlowe's most famous play, The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, based on the medieval German legend of the scholar who sold his soul to the devil, was probably written and produced by 1590, although it was not published until 1604. Historically the play is important for utilizing the soliloquy as an aid to character analysis and development. The Jew of Malta (c. 1590) has another unscrupulous aspiring character at its centre in the Machiavellian Barabas. Edward II (c. 1592), which may have influenced Shakespeare's Richard II, was highly innovatory in its treatment of a historical character and formed an important break with the more simplistic chronicle plays that had preceded it. Marlowe also wrote two lesser plays, Dido, Queen of Carthage (date unknown) and The Massacre at Paris (1593), based on contemporary events in France. Marlowe was killed in a London tavern in May 1593. Although Marlowe's writing career lasted for only six years, his four major plays make him easily the most important predecessor of Shakespeare.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Christopher Marlowe: A Brief Chronology of His Life and Times
A Note on the Text

Edward the Second

Appendix A: Marlowe’s Historical Sources

1. From Raphael Holinshed, The Third Volume of Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1587)
2. From John Stow, The Annals of England (1592)

Appendix B: From Michael Drayton, Mortimeriados (1596)

Appendix C: The Diana-Actæon Myth

1. From Arthur Golding, The XV Books of P. Ovidius Naso (1567)
2. Sonnet V of Samuel Daniel’s Sonnet Sequence Delia (1592)

Appendix D: On Friendship

1. Thomas Elyot, “The True Description of Amity or Friendship” (1580)
2. From Francis Bacon, “Of Friendship” (1625)
3. From Richard Barnfield, “The Tears of an Affectionate Shepherd Sick for Love or The Complaint of Daphnis for the Love of Ganymede” (1594)

Appendix E: Sodomy

1. “An Act for the Punishment of the Vice of Buggerie” (1587)
2. Edward Coke, “Of Buggery, or Sodomy” (1644)
3. From Philip Stubbes, The Anatomy of Abuses (1583)
4. From Thomas Beard, The Theatre of God’s Judgements (1597)

Appendix F: Kings and Tyrants

1. From An Homily against Disobedience and Wilful Rebellion (1570)
2. From Hugh Languet, Vindiciae contra Tyrannos: A Defence of Liberty against Tyrants (1648)
3. From James I of England and VI of Scotland, The True Law of Free Monarchies (1603)

Works Cited and Further Reading

Editorial Reviews

This is a first-rate edition of an increasingly important play. Mathew Martin’s editing of the quarto text of Edward the Second is detailed and thoughtful, with copious, insightful annotations, and his critical introduction lucidly explores the play’s theatrical contexts, historiographical concerns, and thematic imperatives. The extensive appendices that conclude the volume are invaluable for understanding the larger historical, political, and sexual contexts of the work. All in all, this is an edition that will greatly benefit both the student reader and the experienced scholar.” — Ian Munro, University of California, Irvine

“Mathew Martin’s new edition of Edward the Second will serve well the needs of students. The introduction contains a succinct and helpful summary of the pertinent aspects of Marlowe’s life and of the practical concerns of the Elizabethan stage, details the reign of the historical Edward II, and considers early modern and postmodern evaluations of “sodomitical” relationships. Appendices offer important cultural contexts, including passages from Marlowe’s historical sources in Holinshed and Stow, Michael Drayton’s very different poetic account of Edward’s reign, a selection of early modern versions of the tradition of amity (or friendship between men), and Renaissance legal and moral descriptions of sodomy.” — Ian McAdam, University of Lethbridge

From the Publisher

Mathew Martin’s new edition of Edward the Second will serve well the needs of students. The introduction contains a succinct and helpful summary of the pertinent aspects of Marlowe’s life and of the practical concerns of the Elizabethan stage, details the reign of the historical Edward II, and considers early modern and postmodern evaluations of “sodomitical” relationships. Appendices offer important cultural contexts, including passages from Marlowe’s historical sources in Holinshed and Stow, Michael Drayton’s very different poetic account of Edward’s reign, a selection of early modern versions of the tradition of amity (or friendship between men), and Renaissance legal and moral descriptions of sodomy.” — Ian McAdam, University of Lethbridge

Ian McAdam University of Lethbridge

This is a first-rate edition of an increasingly important play. Mathew Martin’s editing of the quarto text of Edward the Second is detailed and thoughtful, with copious, insightful annotations, and his critical introduction lucidly explores the play’s theatrical contexts, historiographical concerns, and thematic imperatives. The extensive appendices that conclude the volume are invaluable for understanding the larger historical, political, and sexual contexts of the work. All in all, this is an edition that will greatly benefit both the student reader and the experienced scholar.” — Ian Munro, University of California, Irvine

Ian Munro University of California