... -seller among all printed play-books of the period; and in the theatre it seemingly also flourished, probably first performed in the winter of 1596-7 and regularly acted throughout the seventeenth century. In 1640, in a commendatory poem to Shakespeare's Poems, Leonard Digges noted that, while Ben Jonson's plays could no longer dependably attract an audience large enough to cover the costs of ... the comic action, and, in particular, from the character of Falstaff. There are more references to the fat knight through the end of the eighteenth century than to any other literary character, ...

• Word Count: 1901
• Approx Pages: 8
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... of suspicious uncertainty. The conspiracy theorists, called the Oxfordians versus the Shakespearean traditional historian loyalists each provide compelling points of circumstantial evidence from the Elizabethan days of the sixteenth and seventeenth century. Regardless of their viewpoints, there has never been any hard documented evidence found connecting Shakespeare of Stratford on Avon nor Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford to any kind ... ...

• Word Count: 1431
• Approx Pages: 6
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... believe the play supports or sabotages structures of power? Support your view with readings and productions. Structures of power are intrinsic to the play King Lear and its function as a seventeenth century power play. Ultimately, King Lear supports structures of power, as the responder is enabled to see the destructive consequences of the reversal of what Elizabethans believed as the natural order ... ...

• Word Count: 1753
• Approx Pages: 7
• Grade Level: Undergraduate