One of the great Renaissance playwrights; Middleton wrote tragedies essentially different from either Marlowes or Shakespeares; being wittier than the former and more grittily ironic than the latter. The genre of citizen tragedy came into its own in the eighteenth century; but Middleton can claim to have created it: Bianca; wife of a middling commercial agent; arouses the lust of the Duke of Florence and becomes his mistress; first secretly; then openly and finally; after her husband has been seduced by the scheming Lady Livia and stabbed by Livias brother; the Dukes wife. Livia plots her revenge; and the play ends with a banquet and a masque that are a triumph of black farce. Middletons powerful; psychologically complex female characters and his clear-sighted analysis of misogyny are bound to impress todays audiences; but it is the pervasive irony - cynicism; even - with which he dissects the motivations of both oppressor and victim that makes him so eerily modern.
#3193784 in eBooks 2014-05-22 2014-05-22File Name: B00KINLX5K
Review
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Michael writes like he talks - a compelling narrative backed with exacting ...By CustomerMichael writes like he talks - a compelling narrative backed with exacting historical documentation. A long overdue biography on one of Texas most important artists.
