Marlowe, Christopher,

The Dramatic Works of Christopher Marlowe

      Marlowe, Christopher, 1564-1593. The Dramatic Works of Christopher Marlowe with Prefatory Remarks,Notes, Critical, and Explanatory. By W. Oxberry, Comedian. London: W. Simpkin and R. Marshall, (1818-1820). 8vo. Original blue diaper-grain cloth, remains of hand-lettered paper label on spine, recased. A very good and clean copy with spine slightly darkened and chipped on crown. Collates: half title, general title, (x). Each play has separate pagination and individual title page. This volume collects: The Jew of Malta; Edward the Second; Doctor Faustus; Lust's Dominion; Massacre of Paris; Tamburlaine the Great, Parts I & II; Dido, Queen of Carthage. With biographical sketch and remarks. Beginning in 1818 with The Jew of Malta, eight of Marlowe's plays were first published separately by William Oxberry (1784-1824) in his Oxberry's New English Drama, and then were collected in a separate volume with the general title: The Dramatic Works of Christopher Marlowe. Oxberry seems to have issued the plays as a sidelight to his acting career. Although the plays are hastily edited, Oxberry is still credited as being "the first person to edit and print all of Marlowe's plays. Eventually he collected and edited a series of Marlowe's works into one volume" (Dabb). References: Dabb, Thomas. Reforming Marlowe: the Nineteenth Century Canonization of a Renaissance Dramatist; Bucknell, 1991. Provenance: bookshop label: Stassin et Xavier (Paris). Location: NUC: ICU, WaSpg, MH, IU, Icarbs. Not in Lowndes, not in Eureka, not in OCLC, not in COPAC (separate plays appear).