biography
| name: |
Marlowe, Christopher
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1564–93)
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| biography:
| Playwright and poet, born in Canterbury, Kent, SE England, UK. He studied there and at Cambridge, and was the most significant of Shakespeare's predecessors in English drama. His Tamburlaine the Great (c.1587) shows his discovery of the strength and variety of blank verse, and this was followed by The Jew of Malta (c.1590), The Tragical History of Dr Faustus (c.1592), partly written by others, and Edward II (c.1592). He wrote several translations and poems, such as the unfinished Hero and Leander, and much of his other work has been handed down in fragments. He led an irregular life, and was on the point of being arrested for disseminating atheistic opinions when he was fatally stabbed, under mysterious circumstances, apparently in a tavern brawl in Deptford; research suggests he was murdered by an agent of Walsingham, for reasons unknown. |
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