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Theatre and humanism : English drama in the sixteenth century

Author: Kent Cartwright
Publisher: Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 1999.
Edition/Format:   Book : EnglishView all editions and formats
Summary:
"This book examines the hundred years of drama preceding Shakespeare in the light of a critical problem: English drama at the beginning of the sixteenth century was allegorical, didactic, and moralistic; but by the end of the century theatre was censured as emotional and even immoral. How could such a change occur? Kent Cartwright suggests that some theories of early Renaissance theatre - particularly the theory that  Read more...
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Details

Material Type: Internet resource
Document Type: Book, Internet Resource
All Authors / Contributors: Kent Cartwright
ISBN: 052164075X 9780521640756
OCLC Number: 39800559
Description: x, 321 p. ; 24 cm.
Contents: The humanism of acting: John Heywood's The foure pp --
Wit and science and the dramaturgy of learning --
Playing against type: Gammer Gurton's needle --
Time, tyranny, and suspense in political drama of the 1560s --
Humanism and the dramatizing of women --
The confusions of Gallathea: John Lyly as popular dramatist --
Bearing witness to Tamburlaine, part 1 --
Robert Greene's Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay: the commonwealth of the present moment.
Responsibility: Kent Cartwright.
More information:

Abstract:

"This book examines the hundred years of drama preceding Shakespeare in the light of a critical problem: English drama at the beginning of the sixteenth century was allegorical, didactic, and moralistic; but by the end of the century theatre was censured as emotional and even immoral. How could such a change occur? Kent Cartwright suggests that some theories of early Renaissance theatre - particularly the theory that Elizabethan plays are best seen in the tradition of morality drama - need to to be reconsidered. He proposes instead that humanist drama of the sixteenth century is theatrically exciting - rather than literary, elitist, and dull as it has often been seen - and socially significant, and he attempts to integrate popular and humanist values rather than setting them against each other. Taking as examples the plays of Marlowe, Heywood, Lyly and Greene, as well as many by lesser known dramatists, the book demonstrates the contribution of humanist drama to the theatrical vitality of the sixteenth century."--Jacket.

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