Three Elizabethan Domestic Tragedies

Three Elizabethan Domestic Tragedies
Author: Keith Sturgess
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2012-02-23
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 0241961467

Elizabethan domestic tragedies depicted the workings of Fortune in the lives of ordinary people, telling stories of sin, discovery, punishment and divine mercy, with their settings and characterization often enhanced by a highly entertaining blend of realism and sensationalism. Only some half-dozen survive to offset the dramas of kings and nobles in the tragedies of Shakespeare and his peers. They combined journalism and entertainment with a didactic concern, and their plots were often derived from contemporary events. Arden of Faversham (1592) and A Yorkshire Tragedy (1608) are both based on chronicles or pamphlets describing authentic murders, while A Woman Killed with Kindness (1603) by Thomas Heywood is a fictional creation, considered his masterpiece.

Arden of Faversham

Arden of Faversham
Author: Catherine Richardson
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 361
Release: 2022-01-27
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 1474289312

Based on the true story of the murder of Thomas Arden by his wife, her lover and accomplices in 1551, Arden of Faversham is one of the earliest domestic tragedies and a play which has continued to thrill audiences since its first staging. This comprehensive edition situates the play in its social, cultural and political context while exploring its performance and critical history through a range of historical and contemporary productions, including William Poel's Lilies That Fester (1897) and the Royal Shakespeare Company's 2014 production. Throughout, the edition aims to reanimate the play's engagement with the material culture of domestic life, using little-known evidence for the objects and spaces implicated in the murder. The introduction also accounts for recent new thinking about the play's likely authorship, including claims that Shakespeare was a key co-author. The comprehensive, illustrated introduction combined with detailed on-page commentary notes and glosses make this an ideal edition for students and teachers.