English literature the book is designed to acquaint students with the main outlines

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Christopher Marlowe was one of the greatest dramatists of his time. He was the first Elizabethan writer of tragedy.

Marlowe was born in Canterbury and studied at Cambridge. Bern in the same year as Shakespeare, he was killed in a brawl when he was only twenty-nine. If Shakespeare died at twenty- nine, his greatest plays would have remained unwritten, and we would scarcely know his name. Yet, Marlowe, by the time of his death had already established himseif as a powerful dramatist, earning the title “father of English tragedy”. He wrote the tragedies: “Dido, Queen of Carthage”, “Tamburlaine the Great”, “The Jew of Malta”. “The Tragical Histop,' of Dr. Faustus”, a chronicle history play “Edward 1 ”.

Marlowe’s literary activity lasted a few years, but he created an immortal place for himself in English drama and poetry. Marlowe established his theatrical reputation with “Tamburlaine the "Great” written about 1587. In this tragedy Marlowe wrote about the great conqueror, Tamburlaine.

In “Tamberlaine the Great” the author tells how a Scythian

shepherd rises from his lowly birth, and by the power of his personality becomes conqueror of the world. Elizabethan spectators found a keen pleasure in watching a brave bu t ruthless hero struggle against titanic forces on his way to the success. The story of Tamburlaine seemed to them an idealization of the lives of adventurers.

As we know, an outstanding feature of Renaissance ideology was the belief in man, himselfthe master and creator of his destiny. Marlowe’s tragedies portray heroes who passionately seek power

• the power of absolute rule (Tamburlaine), the power of money (Barabas, the Jew of Malta), the power of knowledge (Faustus). Marlowe delights in the might and the strong will of his heroes.

Marlowe’s major achievement lay in adapting blank verse to the stage. Ben Jonson expressed admiration when he referred to “Marlowe’s mighty line”. Marlowe’s ability to compress thought, image and idea into superb lines of blank verse paved ths way for Shakespeare and later practitioners of the art.

In addition to his plays, Marlowe wrote one ofthe most famous of Elizabethan lyric poems, ‘The Passionate Shepherd to His Love.” This carpe diem poem is an invitation to the pastoral life, the happy peaceful life of country shepherds.