THE INTERACTION BETWEEN CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE AND WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE IN THE CONTEXT OF ELIZABETHAN DRAMA

Abstract

Starting from the fictional interaction between Will Shakespeare and Kit Marlowe, characters of Shakespeare in love, John Madden’s Oscar-winning film (1998), this paper examines Shakespeare’s and Marlowe’s activities in the theatrical and literary worlds of late sixteenth-century London, which ran parallel for a four-year period, during which there certainly were exchanges and mutual influences between the two playwrights. Based on critical studies a survey is made of such influences by examining in Shakespeare’s plays allusions to passages or poems of Marlowe’s , certain common topics, as well as echoes of Marlowian drama, both in dramatic technique and in the worldview of the two dramatists. Special attention is given to Shakespeare’s historical plays which focus on the history of England, in which his indebtedness to Marlowe’s drama is more evident. Some explicit citations are taken as evident homage to "the dead shepherd", by means of the use of his poetry in Shakespearean plays written after Marlowe’s death, which are the only direct quotations ever made by Shakespeare in his drama.