The World of Christopher Marlowe

by David Riggs

  Astrology was an important part: See Thomas 1971 289–322 for an overview of astrological practitioners and their patrons, and 347 for the 1563 statute; Feingold 1984a 80–83 and passim; Perkins 1585 Sig. B1v.

  Harvey’s Astrological Discourse: Harvey 1583 Sig. q3v, 40–41, 38; Heath 1583 Sigs. B3r–v.

  Harvey’s rash forecast: Harvey 1583 8; Perkins 1585 Sig. B4r; Nashe 1958, I 196–98, III 85.

  Majestical roof: Hamlet II.4.302–03.

  The quarrel: Harvey 1583 Q3R; DNB, s.v. Nashe, Harvey.

  The universe of spirits: Schmitt 1983 47–52, 162–67; Walker 1958 42–44; Feingold 1984a 84, 87; Perkins 1585 1.

  Pagan theology: See Josten 1964 for a translation of Dee’s Propaedeumata Aphoristica. Bruno quoted from Yates 1964 212; Hermes’ Asclepius quoted from Benston 1980 89.

  William Perkins: Feingold 1984a 83.

  Dee’s Hieroglyphic Monad: Josten 1964.

  A marginal note: Clulee 1977 652n69: ‘hominem ut fecit natura – corpus, spiritus, anima’.

  A few select mortals: Josten 1964 102.

  The Privy Council: Document transcribed in Kuriyama 2002 202–03.

  Name nowhere appears … used an alias: Kendall 1998 211–12.

  Ceased to be a major centre: The next three paragraphs draw upon Gray 1928, esp. 684, 687, 691–93 and 698–700.

  Marlowe’s case stands out: Goldberg 1984 372–73 and passim; Archer 1993 70.

  ‘There be no trust’: Nicholl 2002 130, 122–37 and passim.

  Opposing roles: Goldberg 1984 376–77.

  William Harrison: Harrison 1968 71.

  The seven peers: Urry 1988 48–54 and 99–105.

  The group of poets: For biographical details see DNB and Fraunce 1906, xiv–xl.

  The case for armed resistance: Quint 1993 147–51.

  These two strains: Levin 1952 10.

  Passages of vivid description: James Welwood’s eighteenth-century translation of Sulpitius’s Preface quoted from Shapiro 1983 79.

  Thinking about Tamburlaine: Cheney 1997 231.

  Lucan’s panoramic view: Gill 1973 402.

  CHAPTER NINE In the Theatre of the Idols

  Norton Folgate: Eccles 1934a 114–27.

  Burbage erected the Theatre: Chambers 1923 II 353–374 and Ingram 1992 relate the early history of the public playhouses.

  Unsavoury places: Ingram 1992 158–160; Salgado 1977 55; Bakeless 1942 I 145.

  Peculiar houses: Samuel Kiechel quoted from Gurr 1992 122; Nashe quoted from Griffiths 1993 54; Guilpin’s Skialetheia and Jonson’s Bartholomew Fair quoted from Salgado 1977 58–59; Burford 1976 149–152, 154, 158; Chambers 1923 II 397.

  Lewd behaviour: Ingram 1992 168; Harrison 1968 186n12; Gager quoted from Boas 1914 235; Stow quoted from Bentley 1971 47.

  Marlowe’s neighbours: Eccles 1934a 114–127.

  A precarious existence: Chambers 1923 IV 269–71, II 87–88, IV 285–87.

  A strong reaction: Chambers 1923 IV 203–5, 208–212, 213–19, 219–220, 221–25; Northbrooke 1577 65.

  The court responded: Chambers 1923 IV 292.

  The Queen’s Men: McMillin 1998.

  Stephen Gosson: Chambers 1923 IV 205; Ringler 1942 1–52.

  Sidney’s response: Smith 1904 I 197. See Chambers 1923 IV 206 for Lodge.

  Our sole glimpse: Dekker, A Knight’s Conjuring (1607), quoted from Freeman 1967 13.

  This body of work: For biographical details about Watson, Kyd and Achelley, see DNB, Eccles 1934a 7, Freeman 1967 7–24 and Eccles 1982 passim.

  Rowland Broughton: McMillin 1998 4, 7.

  The first explicit ascription: Dent 1969 360.

  The going rate: Bentley 1971 88, 98–108 ; William Davenant’s Playhouse to Let quoted from Bentley 1971 130; Henslowe 2002 24.

  Thomas Kyd: Kuriyama 2002 228–231 transcribes Kyd’s letters regarding Marlowe.

  Charles Howard: Gurr 1996 230–32; Kenny 1970 25–32, 63–87.

  An unusually close association: Chambers 1923 II 120, 123, 137–38, 296–99; Ceresano 2001 85–89.

  An ideal reader: Williams 1962 99.

  Whetstone’s English Mirror: Whetstone 1586 245 and 240–47.

  Tamburlaine was the glaring exception: Whetstone 1586 79; Levin 1952 32; Marlowe 1981 13.

  Tamburlaine’s poverty: Voegelin 1998 22 53; Feinberg 1986 152; Burnett 1987.

  Ovid’s account of creation: Metamorphoses i.25–27, 29 quoted from Ovid 2000 4; Benston 1980 131.

  The mythic moment: Smith 1904 II 6, I 234; Clement 1967 45.

  Marlowe’s blank verse: Shapiro 1983 67–148 and esp. 101–05.

  Sir Francis Drake’s puff: Sir George Peckham A True Report (1583) quoted from Robertson 1976 124.

  The multitude of their enemies: Whetstone 1586 81.

  Giordano Bruno: Bruno 1998 68.

  White, red and black: Cutts 1958.

  Prophecy and eschatology: Hunt 1964 I 16–34.

  Quintilian: Quintilian 1920 III 375; Puttenham 1971 207.

  In-depth authorial research: Marlowe 1981 17–20; Seaton 1924 18ff; Seaton 1929b.

  His own awareness of Spenser’s masterpiece: Cheney 1997 16–17, 131–33.

  Pointed questions about Providence and the afterlife: Goldberg 1993 582–87.

  Fatal flaw in this logic: Raman 1997.

  Lake Limnasphaltis: Seaton 1924 25.

  Bacon: ‘Of Atheism’ quoted from Bacon 1887 VI 414.

  A somatic explanation: Parr 1953 3–23.

  A terrifying series of apparitions: Seaton 1929b 398–99; Whetstone 1586 242.

  The Lucretian precept: Woolton 1576 61v; Segal 1990 3–25.

  CHAPTER TEN Notoriety

  Philip Gawdy: Marlowe 1981 23; Gurr 1996 232.

  An urban legend: Brooke 1922 365–73 and below.

  Mimic Marlowe’s success: Berek 1982.

  Greene’s Alphonsus: Riggs 1971 73–74, 77–78; Berek 1982.

  Greene announced: Greene 1988 xiv–xxv, 3–4, 105–08.

  A race of imitators: Riggs 1971 62–92; Berek 1982.

  Lodge vowed: DNB, s.v. Lodge, Thomas.

  The Queen’s Men: McMillin 1998 157–59; Vitkus 2000 59.

  ‘The fall of Babylon’: Kyd 1959 107–08.

  Thomas Nashe: Nashe 1958 III 311–16.

  Ben Jonson: Jonson 1925 VIII 587.

  Most able men to revive poetry: Nashe 1958 III 323.

  A clique: Freeman 1967 18.

  Lowest species of literary life: Nashe 1958 III 315–16; Freeman 1967 41–47.

  ‘A prophetical full mouth’: Bakeless 1942 I 96.

  The evidence is literary: Berek 1982 58; Levin 1984.

  The terrifying operations of divine wrath: J. F. quoted from Hunt 1964 II 610.

  Thomas Fineaux: Eccles 1935; Kendall 1998 303.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN ‘He is like Dr Faustus’

  The date of Dr Faustus: Marlowe 1992 1–3; Jones 1994 46–50; McMillin 1998 156–58; Fehrenbach 2001.

  An international bestseller: Jones 1994 9–11; Jantz 1952; Kocher 1940.

  The historical Dr Georgius Faustus: Baron 1978.

  Simon the Magician: Watt 1996 3–7.

  The demonization of Faustus: Baron 1978 74, 67–88 passim; Watt 1996 15, 19, 11–26; Baron 1992 58–59, 128, 139–40, 145, 9–168 passim; Jones 1994 5–6.

  Dr Faustus stubbornly refused: Baron 1992 52–75.

  Thomas Fineaux: Eccles 1935 40.

  Marlowe’s Prologue: I have retained the reading ‘Wertenberge’ from the 1604 quarto here and elsewhere in this chapter.

  The word ‘perform’: OED, s.v. ‘perform’.

  Stories about an extra devil: Chambers 1923 III 423–24; Brooke 1922 375.

  Wirtenberg: Marcus 1989 7; Jantz 1952 140–47; Baron 1985 534.

  Curious mistakes: Maxwell 1964; Bose 1991; Marlowe 1991 5–7; Marlowe 1992 16–17.

  Devil’s syllogism: Keefer 1985 523 and passim.

  The Thirty-Nine Articles: Leith 1982 271–72.

  Calvin explains:
Calvin 1961 II 980.

  The letter: See Hammill 2002 97–127, esp. 98, 123–24.

  The discrepancy: These paragraphs are indebted to Orgel 2002 224–29.

  Simon’s Helen: Brown 1939 92–94; Marlowe 1991 81–82; Jones 1994 6.

  Stubbes’s besotted playgoers: Chambers 1923 IV 224.

  broke with his sources: Baron 1992 145; Jones 1994 180; Honigmann 1991 183–89, esp. 186.

  Shore’s Wife: Martin 1950; Elton 1950.

  The motto: Honigmann 1991 189–90. It is unclear whether or not this printed motto is authorial.

  Transformed the Faust legend into dramatic poetry: Hammill 2002 97–127.

  Sidney: Smith 1904 I 184–85.

  ‘Profane scoffing’: ‘Of Atheism’ quoted from Bacon 1887 VI 414.

  CHAPTER TWELVE Double Agents

  On 18 September: The best account of this episode is still Eccles 1934a 9–101, which I follow in these paragraphs.

  One of Walsingham’s premier spies: Read 1925 II 336–37.

  John Poole: Eccles 1934b; Nicholl 2002 286–91.

  Humphrey Gunson: Great Britain 1856 5 372–73. The entry in the Calendar of State Papers Domestic identifies the informant as ‘John Gunstone’.

  Coining: Challis 1978 esp. 274–79.

  Ferdinando Stanley, Lord Strange: Nicholl 2002 268–77; Gurr 1996 258–74. Freeman 1967 32–37 plausibly speculates that Kyd’s patron was Henry Radcliffe, fourth Earl of Sussex. But the discovery of Marlowe’s statement that he was ‘very well known’ to Lord Strange tilts the balance in favour of Strange; see Wernham 1976.

  A powerful friend at court: Ceresano 2001.

  Thomas Watson: Eccles 1934a 6–152 passim; Nicholl 2002 209–18.

  Henry Percy: Nicholl 2002 227–40.

  Jove’s Ganymede: Watson 1997 I 21.

  The English Secretary: Quoted from Rambuss 1993 30.

  Thomas Walsingham: Kuriyama 2002 98–100.

  Meliboeus: Watson 1997 II 149.

  To the Tower: Seaton 1929a 28; Nicholl 2002 185–86, 193–94; Boas 1929 52–55.

  Poley remained a dangerous man: PRO SP 222/12/13; Nicholl 2002 299–301.

  Baines returned to England: Kuriyama 2002 199–201.

  The lawyer William Ballard: Kuriyama 2002 68, 207–08.

  Problems with this story: Kendall 1998 219–22, 658–665.

  A new, Latin text: Kendall 1994 509n6, English translation 543–46.

  Strange’s Men: Chambers 1923 II 118–127, IV 305–06; Gurr 1996 258–64. Kyd’s first letter to Puckering is in Kuriyama 2002 229–230.

  The printed text: Marlowe 1981 86–90, 111-12, 22, ii.

  The Admiral’s Men: Wallace 1913 19; Gurr 1996 234–37.

  Thomas Kyd: See Kyd’s first letter to Puckering in Kuriyama 2002 229–30 and Bodenham 1600 Sig. A5v.

  Strange’s Men prospered: Chambers 1923 IV 164; Henslowe 2002 16–19.

  The Jew of Malta: Marlowe 1978 1, 193; Gurr 1996 237.

  Marlowe’s approach to drama: Levin 1952 72.

  Marlowe borrowed: Marlowe 1978 4–15.

  The word Marrano signified: Shapiro 1996 5–21, 62–76. Passages quoted from Shapiro 1996 13, 18.

  For Christian theologians: Hunter 1964, esp. 64–65, 74–80.

  Scriptural allusions: Deats 1988 31–36.

  Christian readers: See Berry 1969 for the gloss on John 10:50 in The Geneva Bible (1560) Sig. NN.i r.

  Allegory and irony: J. C. Scaliger quoted from Sonnino 1968 106.

  Poetry and spying: Passages quoted from Rambuss 1993 1.

  The spy’s deictic lines: Simmons 1971 96. I have preserved the quarto reading ‘truce’.

  Public executions: Cunningham 1990 210ff.

  Machiavelli’s truest followers: Hodge 1981 5–22, esp. 9.

  Thomas Heywood: Marlowe 1978 193.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN The Counterfeiters

  Sir Robert Sidney: Hay 1984 73 quoted from Kendall 1998 303.

  Michael Moody: Nicholl 2002 304.

  Required a passport: Kendall 1998 269–270, 325.

  A fine town for counterfeiters: Challis 1978 291–92; Nicholl 1998 366n3. See Kuriyama 2002 for transcripts of Sidney’s letter to Burghley (209–10) and Baines’s ‘Note’ (219–22).

  Took a serious interest in coinage: Hay 1984 206 cited in Kendall 1998 367n4.

  The so-called Stanley plot: Great Britain 1856 III 118. See also Seaton 1929a 283–85; Nicholl 2002 271–76, 291–98; Kendall 1998 337; Edwards 2002 172–76. In 1593–94 the ongoing conspiracy to involve William Stanley and Lord Strange in a coup d’état evolved into the ‘Hesketh plot’ – see Devlin 1953. I use the more generic term ‘Stanley plot’ since the Hesketh plot came to a head after Marlowe’s death.

  Killing the queen: Great Britain 1856 III 541, 546; Seaton 1929a esp. 283–85.

  Marlowe was better positioned: Kendall 1998 322–31.

  Queen Elizabeth reprimanded him: Nicholl 2002 304.

  It is hard to believe that the Governor: Kendall 1998 308–16.

  A haven for underground printers: Nicholl 1996 38–50. See Kendall 1998 371–81 for the theory that Marlowe intended to publish his ‘book against the trinity’ at Middelburg.

  Sidney’s ensign David Lloyd: Nicholl 2002 283–85.

  Justice Owen Hopton: The document is transcribed in Kuriyama 2002 210–11.

  Henslowe’s Diary: Henslowe 2002 16–19.

  Thomas Nashe: Nashe 1958 I 212.

  Earl of Pembroke’s Men: Chambers 1923 II 128–34; Gurr 1996 266–73; Edmond 1974; Kendall 1998 478.

  The Countess of Pembroke: Kendall 1998 317–18; Hannay 1990 124.

  Robert Greene: Chettle 1994 84.

  Line of influence: Riggs 1971 93–139; Hopkins 2000 7–12.

  The three Henries: 2 Henry VI V.i.6–7; 3 Henry VI III.iii.182–95.

  Marlowe was the borrower: Marlowe 1994 18.

  The first half of 1592: Marlowe 1994 14–17.

  Holinshed’s Chronicles relate: Marlowe 1994 41–66, 329.

  A homosexual relationship: Orgel 1996 46.

  The most vivid modern analogues: Briggs 1983 284; Marlowe 1994 356; Potter 1996 70; Cady 1996 140–41.

  An Elizabethan critic: Abraham Fraunce quoted from Batman 1576 43.

  Gaveston’s transvestite stage: My discussion of Edward II is indebted to Goldberg 1992 105–26.

  Counterfeiting and sodomy: Fisher 1999.

  A trained band: Urry 1988 30–31.

  William Lambarde: Quoted in Aylmer 1978 24.

  Stigmatic regalia: Brady 1991 177–78ff; Marlowe 1994 355.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN Waiting for the End

  The playhouses: Bentley 1971 44; Chambers 1923 IV 310–11, 347–48.

  Robert Greene: Chettle 1994, esp. 80–87, 117–21.

  Public anxiety about atheism: Riggs 1997 44.

  Robert Persons: Strathmann 1951 esp. 31, 25.

  Nashe’s Pierce Penniless: Nashe 1958 I 171–72.

  The blasphemous claim: See Kuriyama 2002 219–22 for Baines’s Note and 228–230 for Kyd’s letter.

  Royden told his fellow-poet George Chapman: Quoted from Nicholl 2002 308–09.

  His father: Urry 1988 26, 31–32, 27–29.

  He attacked the tailor William Corkine: Urry 1988 65–68, 130–31.

  Lady Mary Herbert: Eccles 1934a 162–71; DNB; Hannay 1990 106–42.

  Fraunce: Batman 1976, The Countess of Pembroke’s Ivychurch Sig. A2r, title page, Sigs. M2r, M4r–N1v.

  Musaeus: See Braden 1978 81, 56, 81–83, 55–153 passim.

  The original Greek text: Baldwin 1955 478; Lamberton 1986 157–61; Callimachus 1975 297–322, 363, 389.

  ‘If it pleases, it is lawful’: Turner 1975 405.

  Chastity is a weapon of Venus: Keach 1977 90–93.

  The digression: Neuse 1970 433–39; Miller 1989 776–78.

  A baroque array of dilatory tactics: Haber 1998 382 and passim.

  Love and strife: Fraunce quoted from Batman 1976, The Countess of Pembroke’s Iv
ychurch, M4r. My interpretation of love and strife in Hero and Leander is indebted to Hulse 1981 93–124, esp. 122.

  A fragment that remains coherent: Campbell 1985.

  Edward Blount: Marlowe 1968a 3.

  Manwood’s eldest son Peter: Kendall 1998 248n40.

  The latter part of Marlowe’s working life: Shapiro 1988.

  Lucan’s biography: Lucan 1992 1–3 and 1–45 passim.

  Lucan was off limits: Googe 1989 129; Turberville 1587 7–12; Shapiro 1983 72–73; Rollins 1918 136–40.

  The rhetoric of vivid description: Quint 1993 147–51; James Welwood’s eighteenth-century translation of Sulpitius’s Preface quoted from Shapiro 1983 79; Pharsalia vii.210–13 and vii.695–96 quoted from Quint 1993 150.

  Its destruction: Hardie 1986 381.

  Narrative strategy: Quint 1993 151.

  Henry Chettle: Chettle 1923 6.

  Massacre at Paris: Marlowe 1968b xlvii–lxi; Maguire 1996 279–81 and passim.

  Twenty killings: Levin 1952 59.

  League pamphleteers: Cady 1966 126, 128.

  A source in his own right: Kocher 1947; Briggs 1983 261–63ff; Archer 1993 91–92.

  Rising mortality rates: Chambers 1923 IV 348–49; Littleton 1996 239; Urry 1988 17.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN In the Theatre of God’s Judgements

  Queen Elizabeth: See Sprott 1974; Riggs 2000 241, 244; and above 334, 336, and Notes (‘Command given by herself’) 374–75.

  The trouble started in London: These three paragraphs draw upon Greenwood 1970 295, 316–18, 271–78, 264, 284.

  A new Royal Commission: Rymer 1726 XVI 201.

  Written libels: Littleton 1996 222, 243–44; Cardinal Allen quoted from Breight 1996 157.

  Evil May Day: Holmes 1965, McMillin 1987 60–73 and Long 1989 50–54 offer pertinent commentary on this episode and the provenance of More. See Blayney 1972 and relevant works cited in Metz 1982 for Hand D and Shakespeare. Tilney’s order is in Chambers 1923 IV 32.

  On the night of 5 May: Freeman 1973 50–51; Henslowe 2002 21.

  The queen’s attention: Great Britain 1890 XXIV 222, italics added.

  Thomas Kyd: See the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Library, MS 6848, fols 187–89 for the vile heretical conceits and the Council’s endorsement. Masten 1997 362 notes that the italic hand of the vile heretical conceits ‘is also the hand Kyd uses, in the signed letter [that is, the letter to Puckering] for emphasis (the word “Atheist”) and for Latin quotations’. Kuriyama 2002 transcribes the documents pertaining to Kyd on 217–18, 228–31.