Download Free Ben Jonsons Dotages Book in PDF and EPUB Free Download. You can read online Ben Jonsons Dotages and write the review.

Although there has been a general revival of interest in Ben Jonson's dramatic work in the past twenty years, little critical effort has been directed to his late plays—dismissed by John Dryden as the "dotages" of an aging mind. Through a close reading of The Devil Is an Ass, The Staple of News, The New Inn, and The Magnetic Lady in light of Jonson's own theories of comedy, author Larry S. Champion demonstrates that they reveal the same precise construction and dramatic control found in his acclaimed masterpieces. Furthermore, these works reflect Jonson's continued emphasis upon realism and satiric attack, though they may not be equal in quality or dramatic effectiveness. The brief and undistinguished stage runs of the late plays are not an accurate gauge of their dramatic merit. Rather than indicating an enfeebled mind, these late plays reveal Jonson to be a continuing innovator—adapting the forms of the pastoral, the romance, and the morality play to the purposes of comic satire. Previous critics have charged that Jonson was merely desirous of regaining public favor at the expense of his artistic integrity. The present study suggests, however, that Jonson in these plays was in reality burlesqueing the popular fad of exaggerated romantic comedy, which he considered a degradation of the dramatic art.
Alexander Leggatt revisits the issue of the double plot in Volpone and finds that an emphasis on simple thematic parallels between the two plots distorts the dramatic significance of their relationship. As Kate D. Levin shows, conventional critical approaches have obscured both the structural peculiarities that Jonson's plays share with his masques and his occasional disregard of playhouse pragmatism.
Dr Butler's edition is full and informative in its annotations and survey of criticisms to date, and cautiously respectful of Jonsonian punctuation.
Though he is one of the undisputed giants of English literature, Ben Jonson is known to most people only as the author of one or two masterly plays which regularly appear in the drama repertory. He is much less well-known for his whole oeuvre, which encompasses poetry, criticism, masque-making, and a lifetime of linguistic and lexicographical study. In this book, first published in 1990, the author presents a comprehensive critical study of the whole of Jonson’s output from his earliest beginnings through to the final achievement. Looking at every word he ever wrote, in drama, masque, poetry, philosophy and literary criticism, the author reveals an interesting and varied picture of Jonson. This title will be of interest to students of English literature and Renaissance drama.
Friend and rival of Shakespeare, Ben Jonson was one of the most learned and interesting men of his age. Throughout his fascinating life, he served not only as a bricklayer but also a soldier, an adventurer, an actor, a poet, and a playwright. The breadth of his experiences, acquaintances, friends, and enemies was legendary, and his literary canon is equally as diverse. The Ben Jonson Encyclopedia covers in detail the works, life, and times of this seminal figure of the English Renaissance. The cross-referenced entries include summaries of all Jonson’s plays, masques, and entertainments, as well as sketches of Jonson’s friends, enemies, patrons, disciples, actors, and fellow writers. In addition, the book identifies historical figures, mythological characters, and classical authors, as well as Jonson’s contemporaries and London place names mentioned in the works. Individuals who danced or participated in the masques and entertainments or tournaments for which Jonson wrote speeches are noted, as are the main actors known to have acted in the plays. All major scholars—from Jonson’s own day until the twenty-first century—who have commented on Jonson or his works are also included. An extensive bibliography completes this invaluable scholarly reference tool. Because of Jonson’s centrality to—and influence in and beyond—his age, this encyclopedia provides a dynamic, unparalleled vision of the English Renaissance literary scene. Capturing the depth and breadth of Jonson’s understanding of early Modern England, The Ben Jonson Encyclopedia will be especially useful for students, librarians, and academics interested in the literary and cultural scene from 1500 to 1650.
Ben Jonson was a Londoner. He lived there from infancy, left for only brief periods of travel, and used various locales in or near London as the settings for eleven of his seventeen plays. Ben Jonson's London opens with a discussion of the purpose, scope, and success of Jonson's use of London settings as Placenames. Chalfant demonstrates that Ben Jonson brought the same judicious, erudite, and dramatically functional insight to his handling of London topography-from overall settings to very brief mentions-as he did to his well-known use of classical, mythological, and iconographical detail.
This timely book challenges conventional critical wisdom about the work of Ben Jonson. Looking in particular at his Jacobean and Caroline plays, it explores his engagement with concepts of republicanism. Julie Sanders investigates notions of community in Jonson's stage worlds - his 'theatrical republics' - and reveals a Jonson to contrast with the traditional image of the writer as conservative, absolutist, misogynist, and essentially 'anti-theatrical'. The Jonson presented here is a positive celebrant of the social and political possibilities of theatre.
Ben Jonson is, in many ways, the figure of greatest centrality to literary study of the Elizabethan and Jacobean period. He wrote in virtually every literary genre: in drama, comedy, tragedy and masque; in poetry, epigram, epistle and lyric; in prose, literary criticism and English grammar. He became the most visible poet of his age, honored more than even William Shakespeare, and his dramatic works, in particular his major comedies, continue to be performed today. This Companion brings together leading scholars from both sides of the Atlantic to provide an accessible and up-to-date introduction to Jonson's life and works. It represents an invaluable guide to current critical perspectives, providing generous coverage not only of his plays but also his non-dramatic works. The volume is informed by the latest development in Jonson scholarship and will therefore appeal to scholars and teachers as well as newcomers to his work.
Looks at the Jonson canon from the point of view of the theatre practitioner. It bridges the theory/practice divide by debating how his drama operates in performance and includes discussion with and between practitioners.