Customer Reviews

Christopher Marlowe: A Renaissance Life

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If you're going to buy one book on Marlowe, this should be it. Kuriyama does an extraordinary job of sifting through the mystery and garbage to tell the story of Marlowe. Too many writers have sensationalized and distorted the facts, whereas Kuriyama not only provides the evidence but interprets them analytically and beautifully. Also, this is the only book where you'll find all the original source documents in one place. Plus, she knows how to keep you interested, writing in a well-thought out style that doesn't insult your intelligence, but doesn't lose you either. Well worth the read.

Clear and level-headed is how I would describe the style of presentation in this wonderful biography about the famous Elizabethan playwright, Christopher Marlowe. Kuriyama succeeds in giving us a more objective account of his life and experiences, unlike other modern publications that tend to over-exaggerate the accusation made by one of his acquaintances that he had a `cruel heart'. The author concentrates on portraying the real man through concrete documentation and sound theories. If you are unfamiliar with Marlowe's life and times, I would certainly recommend this book to you first to keep your feet on the ground before delving into other publications that have offered some strange speculations, such as the notion Marlowe faked his own death, or have veered off into a confusing tangle of espionage history to speculate on the nature of his employment within the Elizabethan secret service. Kuriyama's text is a breath of fresh air.

This book includes an easy to follow chronology of Marlowe's life and career, an excellent 67 page appendix featuring a reprint of every extant first-hand document relating to the playwright and his close acquaintances, a number of illustrations, and an index. A must-have for every Marlowe devotee.

E.A. Bucchianeri, author of "Faust: My Soul be Damned for the World"

...is that we can never really know the complete truth. I once did a paper on Marlowe (1564-1593) during my college days and I have been fascinated with him ever since. Like his exact contemporary Shakespeare, Marlowe has left us only a paper trail to follow. He didn't have the advantage of having a set of his plays published during his lifetime and of course he didn't plan to be stabbed to death when he was 29. Because all we have are a few documents and a possible portrait at Cambridge you have to fill in the blanks with a lot of conjecture which can't be based on solid evidence.

Some biographers have followed in the footsteps of writers such as George Garrett (ENTERED FROM THE SUN) and Anthony Burgess (A DEAD MAN IN DEPTFORD) and have created quite a fanciful life for the poet. It makes for good reading but often distorts what little truth there is. Constance Brown Kuriyama in her well documented book is able to show us what is known and then gives us the luxury of making our own observations. Of course she draws her own conclusions but unlike most other Marlowe biographies (and I have read a number of them) she lets the facts speak for themselves without a lot of embellishment. Marlowe emerges as a powerful personality whose ideas as presented in his few plays show him to be one of the most original thinkers and observers of the Elizabethan age. His early and violent death continue to strike a resonant chord to this day as we think on what was lost and on the impact he had on other writers who followed him.

If you are interested in Elizabethan drama beyond Shakespeare and the effect of the Renaissance in England then you really need to be acquainted with Christopher Marlowe and this is the ideal place to start. The book is easy to follow without dumbing down the material and almost half of it consists of documents and other details that ground the proceedings in a reality that few others can match. Thank you Constance Brown Kuriyama for a job well done.