Marlowe, Christopher

views updated

Marlowe, Christopher (1564–93) English playwright and poet. Marlowe helped make blank verse the vehicle of Elizabethan drama. Much of his success derives from his ability to humanize his heroes, such as Tamburlaine the Great (1590), The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus (1604), and The Jew of Malta (1633). His masterpiece is the tragedy Edward II (1592). His greatest poems are Hero and Leander (1598) and The Passionate Shepherd (1599). Marlowe served as a spy in Francis Walsingham's intelligence service.

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Texts/Marlowe.html

More From encyclopedia.com