Thomas Norton
English dramatist
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beginnings of English tragedy
- In tragedy: Elizabethan
by Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton, first acted in 1561, is now known as the first formal tragedy in English, though it is far from fulfilling the high offices of the form in tone, characterization, and theme. Thomas Kyd’s Spanish Tragedy (c. 1587) continued the Senecan tradition of the…
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“Gorboduc”
use of blank verse
- In blank verse
Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton used blank verse for the first English tragic drama, Gorboduc (first performed 1561), and Christopher Marlowe developed its musical qualities and emotional power in Tamburlaine, Doctor Faustus, and Edward II. William Shakespeare transformed the line and the instrument of blank verse into the…
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