Thomas Middleton

As the Elizabethan era gave way to the reign of James I, England grappled with corruption within the royal court and widespread religious anxiety. Dramatists responded with morally complex plays of dark wit and violent spectacle, exploring the nature of death, the abuse of power and vigilante justice. In Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy a father failed by the Spanish court seeks his own bloody retribution for his son's murder. Shakespeare's 1603 version of Hamlet creates an avenging Prince of unique psychological depth, while Chettle's The Tragedy of Hoffman is a fascinating reworking of Hamlet's themes, probably for a rival theatre company. In Marston's Antonio's Revenge, thwarted love leads inexorably to gory reprisals and in Middleton's The Revenger's Tragedy, malcontent Vindice unleashes an escalating orgy of mayhem on a debauched Duke for his bride's murder, in a ferocious satire reflecting the mounting disillusionment of the age. Emma Smith's introduction considers the political and religious climate behind the plays and the dramatic conventions within them. This edition includes a chronology, playwrights' biographies and suggestions for further reading.

One of a series designed to provide a new, accessible approach to the works of great poets and playwrights. Each text includes general notes on the text; discussion of themes, issues and context; and suggestions for further reading.

Title: The Mayor of Quinborough; a comedy in five acts and in verse]. Publisher: British Library, Historical Print EditionsThe British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. It is one of the world's largest research libraries holding over 150 million items in all known languages and formats: books, journals, newspapers, sound recordings, patents, maps, stamps, prints and much more. Its collections include around 14 million books, along with substantial additional collections of manuscripts and historical items dating back as far as 300 BC. The POETRY & DRAMA collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. The books reflect the complex and changing role of literature in society, ranging from Bardic poetry to Victorian verse. Containing many classic works from important dramatists and poets, this collection has something for every lover of the stage and verse. ++++The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to insure edition identification: ++++ British Library Middleton, Thomas; 1661. 76 p.; 4 . Ashley 1161.

Title: Annals of Hyde and district. Containing historical reminiscences of Denton, Haughton, Dukinfield, Mottram, Longdendale, Bredbury, Marple, and the neighbouring townships. Illustrated.]Publisher: British Library, Historical Print EditionsThe British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. It is one of the world's largest research libraries holding over 150 million items in all known languages and formats: books, journals, newspapers, sound recordings, patents, maps, stamps, prints and much more. Its collections include around 14 million books, along with substantial additional collections of manuscripts and historical items dating back as far as 300 BC. The HISTORY OF BRITAIN & IRELAND collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. As well as historical works, this collection includes geographies, travelogues, and titles covering periods of competition and cooperation among the people of Great Britain and Ireland. Works also explore the countries' relations with France, Germany, the Low Countries, Denmark, and Scandinavia. ++++The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to insure edition identification: ++++ British Library Middleton, Thomas; 1899. xxii. 350 p.; 8 . 010360.e.38.

Title: The Phoenix, etc. A dramatic piece, in verse and prose. By T. Middleton.]Publisher: British Library, Historical Print EditionsThe British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. It is one of the world's largest research libraries holding over 150 million items in all known languages and formats: books, journals, newspapers, sound recordings, patents, maps, stamps, prints and much more. Its collections include around 14 million books, along with substantial additional collections of manuscripts and historical items dating back as far as 300 BC. The POETRY & DRAMA collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. The books reflect the complex and changing role of literature in society, ranging from Bardic poetry to Victorian verse. Containing many classic works from important dramatists and poets, this collection has something for every lover of the stage and verse. ++++The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to insure edition identification: ++++ British Library Anonymous; Middleton, Thomas; 1630. 4 . 644.f.9.

This Norton Critical Edition of Thomas Middleton and Thomas Dekker’s The Roaring Girl is based on the text from English Renaissance Drama: A Norton Anthology. It is accompanied by generous explanatory annotations, five illustrations, and a detailed introduction. “Contexts” is thematically arranged to include almost all known documents from the period concerning Mary Frith (aka Moll Cutpurse), among them records of her court appearances, letters recounting the same, and her last will. Also reprinted are significant passages from her purported 1662 “autobiography,” The Life and Death of Mrs. Mary Frith. While of dubious veracity, the “autobiography” is useful for comparing the play’s portrayal of Moll with later developments in Moll Cutpurse lore, which the Norton Critical Edition traces through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Perhaps most engaging for classroom discussion are substantial excerpts from the 1620 cross-dressing pamphlets—Hic Mulier; or, The Man-Woman and Haec Vir; or, The Womanish Man—which appear in annotated, modern-spelling versions. Together they give insight into how gender-bending trends in clothing, similar to those practiced by Moll, were understood in the early seventeenth century. A related passage from A Sermon of Apparel adds another perspective on cross-dressing practices. Fourteen critical essays chart the development of scholarly interest in The Roaring Girl, from the first half of the twentieth century, when the play received only passing reference, through the work on city comedy in the 1970s and 1980s, to the explosion of analyses in the late 1980s and 1990s, when the play became a major focus for early modern gender studies. The more recent critical essays move beyond a strict focus on gender and cross-dressing to explore The Roaring Girl’s depiction of other aspects of early modern London, including consumer culture and the contemporary fascination with the language of the criminal underworld. Contributors include, among others, T. S. Eliot, Alexander Leggatt, Mary Beth Rose, Jonathan Dollimore, Jean E. Howard, and Jonathan Gil Harris. A Selected Bibliography is also included.

Timon, avokätinen mesenaatti, kylvää varoituksista huolimatta rahojaan onnenonkijoille, kunnes hänestä lopulta sukeutuu parantumaton ihmisvihaaja. ALKIBIADES:Mikä on nimesi? Noinko paljon vihaat ihmistä,sinä joka olet ihminen? TIMON:Olen Misantropos, ja vihaan ihmiskuntaa. Mitä sinuun tulee, olisitpa koira, että voisinjossain määrin rakastaa sinua. Varakas mesenaatti Timon kylvää varoituksista huolimatta rahojaan onnenonkijoille. Hän on niin avokätinen, että joutuu itse velkoihin, mutta on varma, että saa vuorostaan apua avustetuilta. Toisin käy: yksi toisensa jälkeen torjuu Timonin pyynnöt. Hän järjestää pidot ja ilmaisee mielipiteensä vieraista tarjoamalla vain vettä ja kiviä. Timon lähtee vihoissaan Ateenasta ja asettuu luolaan erakoksi. Hän löytää sattumalta kultaa, ja löytö tuo taas pyytäjät mukanaan. Osan kullasta Timon antaa sotapäällikkö Alkibiadeelle, jotta tämä tuhoaisi Ateenan. Timonista sukeutuu pettymysten myötä armoton ihmisvihaaja. "Pettymys voisi olla myös kehityksen alkupiste, mutta Timon Ateenalaisessa ego ei lähde kehittymään, vaan tuhoutuu. Lohduttavampaa on sulautua kuolemaan kuin erillistyä, individuoitua, tulla yksilöksi", kirjoittaa Harri Virtanen esipuheessaan. Vielä haudasta huutaa Timonin viha kiveen hakatuin kirjaimin: Nielköön jälkipolvet ruton nielu! Terävänäköisen satiirin synkät sivallukset eivät säästä ketään.

Thomas Middleton (1580-1627) was a writer of great versatility, and his career as a London dramatist spans the most productive, innovative, and exciting period of theatrical activity in the history of English drama. Best known for his tragedies, he also wrote many successful comedies of city life. This volume brings together the greatest among them: A Mad World, My Masters, Michaelmas Term, A Trick to Catch the Old One, and No Wit, No Help Like a Woman's. The first three plays, written between 1604 and 1606, are witty and rambunctious satires on the predatory life of the aspiring London citizen. Sex and money are the characters' obsessions; their caustic exposure Middleton's. In the later play, No Wit (1612), satire shades into romance, prose into verse. Together the four plays reveal the range and exuberance of Middleton's writing for the comic stage. Under the General Editorship of Michael Cordner of the University of York, the plays have been newly edited and are presented with modernized spelling and punctuation. In addition, there is a scholarly introduction and detailed annotation. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.