|
Pandosto
''Pandosto: The Triumph of Time'' is a prose romance written by the English author Robert Greene, first published in 1588. A later edition of 1607 was re-titled ''Dorastus and Fawnia''. Popular during the time of William Shakespeare, the work's plot was an inspiration for that of Shakespeare's play ''The Winter's Tale''. Greene, in turn, may have based the work on ''The Clerk's Tale'', one of ''The Canterbury Tales'' of Chaucer. Edward Chaney suggested that Robert Greene when writing ''Pandosto'' may have had in mind the Earl of Oxford's suspicions about the paternity of his daughter (granddaughter of Lord Burghley) when he returned in 1576 from his continental tour that may have included Sicily. Description Greene's story contains darker elements than Shakespeare's version (who lightened the mood of the play for comic and romantic purposes). In Greene's tale, Pandosto, King of Bohemia, accuses his wife Bellaria of adultery committed with his childhood friend, the King of Sic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Winter's Tale
''The Winter's Tale'' is a play by William Shakespeare originally published in the First Folio of 1623. Although it was grouped among the comedies, many modern editors have relabelled the play as one of Shakespeare's late romances. Some critics consider it to be one of Shakespeare's " problem plays" because the first three acts are filled with intense psychological drama, while the last two acts are comic and supply a happy ending. The play has been intermittently popular, revived in productions in various forms and adaptations by some of the leading theatre practitioners in Shakespearean performance history, beginning after a long interval with David Garrick in his adaptation ''Florizel and Perdita'' (first performed in 1753 and published in 1756). ''The Winter's Tale'' was revived again in the 19th century, when the fourth " pastoral" act was widely popular. In the second half of the 20th century, ''The Winter's Tale'' in its entirety, and drawn largely from the First ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Greene (16th Century)
Robert Greene (1558–1592) was an English author popular in his day, and now best known for a posthumous pamphlet attributed to him, '' Greene's Groats-Worth of Witte, bought with a million of Repentance'', widely believed to contain an attack on William Shakespeare. Robert Greene was a popular Elizabethan dramatist and pamphleteer known for his negative critiques of his colleagues. He is said to have been born in Norwich. He attended Cambridge where he received a BA in 1580, and an M.A. in 1583 before moving to London, where he arguably became the first professional author in England. Greene was prolific and published in many genres including romances, plays and autobiography. Family According to the author Brenda Richardson, the "chief problem" in compiling a biography of Robert Greene was his name. ''Robert'' was one of the most popular given names of the era and ''Greene'' was a common surname. L. H. Newcomb suggests that Robert Greene "was probably the Robert Greene, so ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Romance (heroic Literature)
As a literary genre, the chivalric romance is a type of prose and verse narrative that was popular in the noble courts of High Medieval and Early Modern Europe. They were fantastic stories about marvel-filled adventures, often of a chivalric knight-errant portrayed as having heroic qualities, who goes on a quest. It developed further from the epics as time went on; in particular, "the emphasis on love and courtly manners distinguishes it from the ''chanson de geste'' and other kinds of epic, in which masculine military heroism predominates." Popular literature also drew on themes of romance, but with ironic, satiric, or burlesque intent. Romances reworked legends, fairy tales, and history to suit the readers' and hearers' tastes, but by c. 1600 they were out of fashion, and Miguel de Cervantes famously burlesqued them in his novel ''Don Quixote''. Still, the modern image of "medieval" is more influenced by the romance than by any other medieval genre, and the word ''me ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Francis Sabie
Francis Sabie (''fl.'' 1595) was an English poet. Sabie was a schoolmaster at Lichfield in 1587 (Arber, Stationers' Registers, ii. 146). He published three volumes of verse—two in 1595, and one in 1596. His earliest publication, in two parts, was ''The Fishermans Tale: Of the famous Actes, Life, and Loue of Cassander, a Grecian Knight,'' 1595. The second part bears the heading ''Flora's Fortune. The second part and finishing of the Fisher-mans Tale.'' The poem, which was licensed for publication to Richard Jones on 11 Nov. 1594, is a paraphrase in blank verse of ''Pandosto,'' afterwards renamed ''Dorastus and Fawnia,'' a romance by Robert Greene (1560?–1592). A reprint from a Bodleian manuscript, limited to ten copies, was issued by James Orchard Halliwell (afterwards Halliwell-Phillipps) in 1867. Later in 1595 there appeared ''Pan's Pipe, Three Pastorall Eglogues in English Hexameter, with other poetical verses delightfull.'' The publisher was again Richard Jones, who obtain ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the " Bard of Avon" (or simply "the Bard"). His extant works, including collaborations, consist of some 39 plays, 154 sonnets, three long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. He remains arguably the most influential writer in the English language, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted. Shakespeare was born and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Clerk's Tale
"The Clerk's Tale" is the first tale of Group E (Fragment IV) in Geoffrey Chaucer's '' The Canterbury Tales''. It is preceded by The Summoner's Tale and followed by The Merchant's Tale. The Clerk of Oxenford (modern Oxford) is a student of what would nowadays be considered philosophy or theology. He tells the tale of Griselda, a young woman whose husband tests her loyalty in a series of cruel torments that recall the biblical Book of Job. Plot The Clerk's tale is about a marquis of Saluzzo in Piedmont in Italy named Walter, a bachelor who is asked by his subjects to marry to provide an heir. He assents and decides he will marry a peasant, named Griselda. Griselda is a poor girl, used to a life of pain and labour, who promises to honour Walter's wishes in all things. After Griselda has borne him a daughter, Walter decides to test her loyalty. He sends an officer to take the baby, pretending it will be killed, but actually conveying it in secret to Bologna. Griselda, because ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Canterbury Tales
''The Canterbury Tales'' ( enm, Tales of Caunterbury) is a collection of twenty-four stories that runs to over 17,000 lines written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer between 1387 and 1400. It is widely regarded as Chaucer's ''magnum opus''. The tales (mostly written in verse, although some are in prose) are presented as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together from London to Canterbury to visit the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral. The prize for this contest is a free meal at the Tabard Inn at Southwark on their return. It has been suggested that the greatest contribution of ''The Canterbury Tales'' to English literature was the popularisation of the English vernacular in mainstream literature, as opposed to French, Italian or Latin. English had, however, been used as a literary language centuries before Chaucer's time, and several of Chaucer's contemporaries—John Gower, William Langland, the Pearl Poet, and Jul ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer (; – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for ''The Canterbury Tales''. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He was the first writer to be buried in what has since come to be called Poets' Corner, in Westminster Abbey. Chaucer also gained fame as a philosopher and astronomer, composing the scientific '' A Treatise on the Astrolabe'' for his 10-year-old son Lewis. He maintained a career in the civil service as a bureaucrat, courtier, diplomat, and member of parliament. Among Chaucer's many other works are '' The Book of the Duchess'', '' The House of Fame'', '' The Legend of Good Women'', and '' Troilus and Criseyde''. He is seen as crucial in legitimising the literary use of Middle English when the dominant literary languages in England were still Anglo-Norman French and Latin. Chaucer's contemporary Thomas Hoccleve hailed him as "the firste fy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Chaney
Edward Chaney (born 1951) is a British cultural historian. He is Professor Emeritus at Solent University and Honorary Professor at University College London (School of European Languages, Culture and Society (SELCS) – Centre for Early Modern Exchanges London). He is an authority on the evolution of the Grand Tour, Anglo-Italian cultural relations, the history of collecting, Inigo Jones and the legacy of ancient Egypt. He also publishes on aspects of 20th-century British art. In 2003, he was made a Commendatore of the Italian Republic. He is the biographer of Gerald Basil Edwards, author of ''The Book of Ebenezer Le Page'' which he succeeded in publishing following the author's death in 1976. This has since been recognised as a twentieth-century classic. Life Education He was educated at Leighton Park School, Reading, Ealing School of Art and subsequently gained a first class degree in History of Art at Reading University. He completed an MPhil and PhD at the Warburg Institute ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward De Vere, 17th Earl Of Oxford
Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (; 12 April 155024 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was heir to the second oldest earldom in the kingdom, a court favourite for a time, a sought-after patron of the arts, and noted by his contemporaries as a lyric poet and court playwright, but his volatile temperament precluded him from attaining any courtly or governmental responsibility and contributed to the dissipation of his estate. Edward de Vere was the only son of John de Vere, 16th Earl of Oxford, and Margery Golding. After the death of his father in 1562, he became a ward of Queen Elizabeth I and was sent to live in the household of her principal advisor, Sir William Cecil. He married Cecil's daughter, Anne, with whom he had five children.. Oxford was estranged from her for five years and refused to acknowledge he was the father of their first child. A champion jouster, Oxford travelled widely throughout France and the many ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexandre Hardy
Alexandre Hardy (c. 1570/1572 – 1632) was a French dramatist, one of the most prolific of all time. He claimed to have written some six hundred plays, but only thirty-four are extant. He was born in Paris, and seems to have been connected most his life with a troupe of actors (the " Comédiens du Roi") headed by the actor named Valleran Lecomte, whom he provided with plays; Hardy may have toured the provinces and even acted with this company (his participation with this troupe is attested from 1611, but may have begun far earlier). Valleran Lecomte's troupe gave performances in Paris from 1598 to 1600 at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, and again from 1606 to 1612. At the death of Valleran, the troupe was headed by the actor Bellerose ( Pierre Le Messier), and the troupe would gain exclusive rights to the Hôtel de Bourgogne in 1629. Because of his difficult relations with Bellerose, in 1627 Hardy started writing for a rival troupe of actors (the " Vieux Comédiens du Roi") aro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
