The Plays of Christopher Marlowe and George Peele: Rhetoric and Renaissance SensibilityUniversal-Publishers, 1999 - 358 sivua This work is concerned with the evaluation of rhetoric as an essential aspect of Renaissance sensibility. It is an analysis of the Renaissance world viewed in terms of literary style and aesthetic. Eight plays are analysed in some detail: four by George Peele: The Battle of Alcazar, Edward I, David and Bethsabe, and The Arraignment of Paris; and four by Christopher Marlowe: Dido Queen of Carthage, Tamburlaine Part One, Dr Faustus and Edward II. The work is thus partly a comparative study of two important Renaissance playwrights; it seeks to establish Peele in particular as an important figure in the history and evolution of the theatre. Verbal rhetoric is consistently linked to an analysis of the visual, so that the reader/viewer is encouraged to assess the plays holistically, as unified works of art. Emphasis is placed throughout on the dangers of reading Renaissance plays with anachronistic expectations of realism derived from modern drama; the importance of Elizabethan audience expectation and reaction is considered, and through this the wider artistic sensibility of the period is assessed. |
Sisältö
1 | |
31 | |
The Battle of Alcazar Epideictic Rhetoric Morality and the | 49 |
Edward I The Rhetoric of Ethos and Theatrical Display | 69 |
David and Bethsabe and the Clash between Ethos and Delectatio | 100 |
The Arraignment of Paris Court Ritual and the Resolution | 134 |
Christopher Marlowe Critical Approaches | 164 |
Dido Queen of Carthage Mortals versus Gods and the Ethos | 197 |
Ethical SelfCreation in Tamburlaine Part One | 223 |
Doctor Faustus and the Tragedy of Delight | 266 |
Edward II The Emergence of Realism and the Emptiness | 303 |
Conclusion | 323 |
341 | |