The Elizabethan Theatre before Shakespeare

г. Москва

Besides fine works of poetry and prose in the

Elizabethan age, dramatic art also flourished and reached the greatest height.

1.





Between the episodes of these plays, comic scenes were usually acted, they had almost no relation to the story. They were called interludes.

The Mystery plays
(dramatic episodes from the Bible )

The Miracle plays
(episodes from the lives of saints)

The Morality plays
(allegorical performances, where virtues and vices struggled for the human soul)

RELIGIOUS DRAMA

the pageants- pantomimes reenacting episodes from the history of

that particular city.

university students. They were plays by Roman dramatists: Seneca, Plautus

and Terence. They were acted in Latin.

authors, began to appear.

century there were companies of strolling actors, who performed in

town squares, inn-yard and manor-houses.
But in 1572 Queen Elizabeth I issued a decree against vagabonds, so many of these companies enlisted as servants of some peer and began to settle down.

the first playhouse and called it “The Theatre”, using the

Greek word for the first time in England.

It was open to the sky, there was a sheltered gallery on three sides, the stage was a large raised platform, it came out into the audience.
Thus, theatres began to be established, and their popularity kept growing.
They gave public performances and were also invited to the court.

demanding and the art of theatre developed, old plays were

considered too primitive. They did not deal sufficiently with the problems of the time. The necessity for new plays became obvious.

answered the demands of the time. They belonged to the

middle class or gentry. Actually, they were the first professional authors in England who earned their living by writing.
Among them were Thomas Kyd, George Peele, John Lyly, Robert Greene, Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe.

He was the author of a pre-Shakespearean play on the

subject of “Hamlet” ( it is lost now).

novel in English literature.
( This genre originates from Spanish

literature.)
He was also a co-author of several plays.

than W.Shakespeare. He was a true genius among the University

Wits. In 1580 he went to Cambridge on a scholarship. While a student he went to the Continent on a secret mission ( to establish contacts with French protestants). Marlowe’s literary activity lasted only for a few years. He was killed in a quarrel before he was thirty.

Massacre of Paris”, “The Jew of Malta””The Tragic History of

Dr. Faustus”);
a chronicle history play “ Edward II”;
Poems “Hero and Leander”, “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love”;
translations of Roman poets.
He created an immortal place for himself in English drama and poetry.

Marlowe was the author of

end of the 16th century life in England changed

greatly: the primary accumulated capital was to be put into circulation; absolute monarchy became an obstacle to social development.

The Renaissance giants were needed no more.
The ideology of humanism faced a crisis because new trends of thought, which were hostile to humanism, appeared. As a result, pessimistic and even morbid tragedies appeared.
Their authors were John Webster and John Ford.

and John Fletcher.

Their plays are always amusing,

masterfully constructed, written in easy-flowing verse, and have interesting and very complicated plots, but in terms of treating human nature they are superficial and even shallow.

They gave birth to a new genre, the tragicomedy, which is not a mixture of tragic and comic elements, but a play with a tragic conflict and a happy ending.

literature. He was born in London and studied at Westminster

School. He was one of the most educated people of his time and received honorary degrees from Oxford and Cambridge. He started his career as an actor, and very soon became a prominent dramatist. He gained the friendship of William Shakespeare and the great philosopher Francis Bacon.

comedies.
His comic manner of depicting characters influenced the whole

of English literature.
Among his best works are: “Volpone, or the Fox”,”The Silent Woman” “The Alchemist”.
From 1605 Ben Jonson started writing masques-
expensive spectacles, involving music, song and dance, in which nobility and even royalty would take part.
He was also a fine lyrical poet.

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