Book contents
- Frontmatter
- 1 Introduction: Marlowe in the twenty-first century
- 2 Marlowe’s life
- 3 Marlovian texts and authorship
- 4 Marlowe and style
- 5 Marlowe and the politics of religion
- 6 Marlowe and the English literary scene
- 7 Marlowe’s poems and classicism
- 8 Tamburlaine the Great, Parts One and Two
- 9 The Jew of Malta
- 10 Edward II
- 11 Doctor Faustus
- 12 Dido, Queen of Carthage and The Massacre at Paris
- 13 Tragedy, patronage, and power
- 14 Geography and identity in Marlowe
- 15 Marlowe’s men and women
- 16 Marlowe in theatre and film
- 17 Marlowe’s reception and influence
- Reference Works
- Index
- Series list
- Plate section
8 - Tamburlaine the Great, Parts One and Two
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 May 2006
- Frontmatter
- 1 Introduction: Marlowe in the twenty-first century
- 2 Marlowe’s life
- 3 Marlovian texts and authorship
- 4 Marlowe and style
- 5 Marlowe and the politics of religion
- 6 Marlowe and the English literary scene
- 7 Marlowe’s poems and classicism
- 8 Tamburlaine the Great, Parts One and Two
- 9 The Jew of Malta
- 10 Edward II
- 11 Doctor Faustus
- 12 Dido, Queen of Carthage and The Massacre at Paris
- 13 Tragedy, patronage, and power
- 14 Geography and identity in Marlowe
- 15 Marlowe’s men and women
- 16 Marlowe in theatre and film
- 17 Marlowe’s reception and influence
- Reference Works
- Index
- Series list
- Plate section
Summary
At the beginning of Tamburlaine the Great, Part One, the Prologue announces a dramatic trajectory that leads from 'jigging veins of rhyming mother-wits' to 'the stately tent of war'. Within this tent, a metaphor for the theatrical playing-space, we will be granted the privilege of listening to the hero's 'high astounding terms' (5); indeed, the extraordinary linguistic impact of Tamburlaine is singled out here as the most self-evident feature of an innovative dramaturgy and provides, as Patrick Cheney states, 'an advertisement for Marlowe as England's new poet'. But an 'astounding' dimension inheres, too, in the implication that the Prologue will 'lead' (3) the audience from one kind of theatre to another: members of a flock, spectators are herded to new horizons in such a way as to make them the sheep-like followers of the shepherd-bandit. In such a process, the visual impression of Tamburlaine plays a prominent part, since 'his picture' (7) is seen to belong with his 'astounding' verbal ability. Building upon the Prologue's suggestions, this chapter argues that Tamburlaine the Great is 'astounding' in multiple respects. Not only do the plays destabilize Elizabethan orthodoxies at the levels of language, class, and ethnicity, they simultaneously query contemporary constructions of identity and authority, to the extent that existing systems of interpretation and classification are thrown into disarray. So insistent are the plays' unmoorings of the ideologies of their time that even sexual demarcations, and divine norms, enjoy a slim purchase.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Companion to Christopher Marlowe , pp. 127 - 143Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2004
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