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John Marston (baptised October 7, 1576 – June 25, 1634) was an English poet, playwright and satirist during the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods whose work is noted for a lively style, a sense of emerging literary fashion, and an extensive vocabulary.

Marston's father was a successful and eminent lawyer of the Middle Temple. He first argued in London and then became the counsel to Coventry before being named its steward. John Marston entered Brasenose College, Oxford in 1592 and received his bachelor of arts in 1594. By 1595, he was in London, living in the Middle Temple, where he had been admitted a member three years prior, with his father. He had an interest in poetry and play writing, and his father's will of 1599 expresses the hope that he would give up such vanities.

While traditionally it has been assumed that his first play was Histriomastix, there is weak evidence for that attribution. In 1598, he published Metamorphoses of Pigmalian's Image and Certaine Satyres, a book of poetry in imitation of, on the one hand, Ovid, and, on the other, Juvenal. He also published The Scourge of Villanie in 1598. The satires in these books are savage, wild, and highly misanthropic, and some see William Shakespeare's Thersites and Iago, as well as the mad speeches of King Lear as influenced by The Scourge of Villanie. The Bishop of London banned the Scourge and had it publicly burned on June 4, 1599.

In September of 1599, John Marston began to work for Philip Henslowe as a playwright. In 1600, he wrote Jack Drum's Entertainment and Antonio and Mellida, and in 1601 he wrote Antonio's Revenge. In 1601, he contributed to Robert Chester's Love's Martyr.

By 1601, he was well known in London literary circles, being both satirized and celebrated by fellow authors. In particular, he was alleged to be an exceptionally rude person who was quick to pick fights with others. His What You Will shows the inability of satire to effectively correct poor manners and vicious behavior, and the note of pessmism and misanthropy in his writing was one of the features that other authors picked up upon for comment. The Return from Parnassus, Part Two, a satirical plays published in 1601 and 1602 attacked Marston as a poet whose writings are a lift of the leg and "pissing against the world" (Knowles 895).

John Marston and Ben Jonson collaborated and fought with one another. Jonson's late remembrance of Marston indicates that he found him an excellent writer and a difficult person. In the war of the theatres that broke out in 1600-1602, the two playwrights satirized each other on the stage. Jonson has Marston in Clove and Orange in Every Man out of his Humour and as Hedon in Cynthia's Revels, and Marston may have satirized Jonson as Brabant Senior in Jack Drum's Entertainment. However, the two playwrights were reconciled after the theatrical hostilities, and Marston wrote a prefatory poem for Jonson's Sejanus in 1605 and dedicated his The Malcontent to Jonson.

In 1603, Marston became a shareholder in the Children of Blackfriars company, which was known for putting on plays that tested the bounds of the law. He wrote and produced two plays with the company. The first was The Malcontent in 1603, and the second was The Dutch Courtesan in 1604-5. In 1605, he worked with George Chapman and Ben Jonson on Eastward Ho, a satire of popular taste and the vain imaginings of wealth to be found in Virginia. Chapman and Jonson were arrested for, according to Jonson, a few clauses that offended the Scots, but Marston escaped any imprisonment. No one knows the actual cause of the arrest, or the details of the detainment, but the charges were dropped. Also in 1605, he married Mary, a daughter of one of King James's priests.

In 1606, Marston seems to have offended and then soothed the new King James. First, in Parasitaster, or, The Fawn, he satirized the king specifically. However, in summer of that year, he put on a production of The Dutch Courtesan for the King of Denmark's visit, with a Latin verse on King James that was presented by hand to the king. That year, he also wrote a final salvo in his battle with Jonson. In a prefatory epistle to Sophonisba, or, The Wonder of Woman, he criticized Jonson for being too pedantic to make allowances for his audience or the needs of aesthetics. Finally, in 1607, he wrote The Entertainment at Ashby, a masque for the Earl of Huntingdon. At that point, he stopped his dramatic career altogether. He sold his shares in the acting company.

He moved into his father-in-law's house and began studying philosophy. In 1609, he became a reader at the Bodleian library at Oxford, was made a deacon on September 24 and a priest on December 24, 1609. Contemporary authors were bemused or surprised by Marston's change of career, with several of them commenting on its seeming abruptness. In October of 1616, Marston was assigned the living of Christchurch, Hampshire, and he died on June 24, 1634, in London. He was buried in the Middle Temple Church.

Works

Plays and Production dates

• Histriomastix, London, Paul's Theatre, 1599 (attrib.).
• Antonio and Mellida, London, Paul's theater, 1599-1600.
• Lust's Dominion, by Marston, Thomas Dekker, John Day, and William Haughton, London, The Rose, Spring 1600.
• Jack Drum's Entertainment, London, Paul's theater, 1600.
• Antonio's Revenge, London, Paul's theater, 1600.
• What You Will, London, Paul's theater, 1601.
• The Malcontent, London, Blackfriars Theatre, 1603-1604.
• Parasitaster, or The Fawn, London, Blackfriars theater, 1604.
• Eastward Ho, by Marston, George Chapman, and Ben Jonson, London, Blackfriars theater, 1604-1605.
• The Dutch Courtesan, London, Blackfriars theater, 1605.
• The Wonder of Women, or The Tragedy of Sophonisba, London, Blackfriars theater, 1606.
• The Spectacle Presented to the Sacred Majesties of Great Britain, and Denmark as They Passed through London, London, 31 July 1606.
• The Entertainment of the Dowager-Countess of Darby, Ashby-de-la-Zouch in Leicestershire, 1607.
• The Insatiate Countess, by Marston and William Barksted, London, Whitefriars Theatre, 1608?.

Books

• The Metamorphosis of Pigmalions Image. And Certaine Satyres (London: Printed by J. Roberts for E. Matts, 1598).
• The Scourge of Villanie. Three Bookes of Satyres (London: Printed by J. Roberts & sold by J. Buzbie, 1598; revised and enlarged edition, London: J. Roberts, 1599).
• Jacke Drums Entertainment: Or, The Comedie of Pasquill and Katherine (London: Printed by T. Creede for R. Olive, 1601).
• Loves Martyr: or, Rosalins Complaint, by Marston, Ben Jonson, William Shakespeare, and George Chapman (London: Printed for E. B., 1601).
• The History of Antonio and Mellida (London: Printed by R. Bradock for M. Lownes & T. Fisher, 1602).
• Antonios Revenge (London: Printed by R. Bradock for T. Fisher, 1602).
• The Malcontent (London: Printed by V. Simmes for W. Aspley, 1604).
• Eastward Hoe, by Marston, Chapman, and Jonson (London: Printed by G. Eld for W. Aspley, 1605).
• The Dutch Courtezan (London: Printed by T. Purfoote for J. Hodgets, 1605).
• Parasitaster, or The Fawne (London: Printed by T. Purfoote for W. Cotton, 1606).
• The Wonder of Women, or The Tragedie of Sophonisba (London: Printed by J. Windet, 1606).
• What You Will (London: Printed by G. Eld for T. Thorppe, 1607).
• Histrio-mastix: Or, The Player Whipt (London: Printed by G. Eld for T. Thorp, 1610).
• The Insatiate Countesse, by Marston and William Barksted (London: Printed by T. Snodham for T. Archer, 1613).
• The Workes of Mr. J. Marston (London: Printed by A. Mathewes for W. Sheares, 1633); republished as Tragedies and Comedies (London: Printed by A. Mathewes for W. Sheares, 1633).
• Comedies, Tragi-comedies; & Tragedies, Nonce Collection (London, 1652).
• Lust's Dominion, or The Lascivious Queen (presumably the same play as The Spanish Moor's Tragedy), by Marston, Thomas Dekker, John Day, and William Haughton (London: Printed for F. K. & sold by Robert Pollard, 1657).

References

• Knowles, James. "John Marston," in Matthew, H.C.G. and Brian Harrison, eds. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. vol. 36, 894-897. London: OUP, 2004.

External Links

• Luminarium: John Marston - Life, works, essays

• 1576 births
• 1634 deaths
• English poets
• English dramatists and playwrights
• English satirists
• Former students of Brasenose College, Oxford