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Marlowe's Mastery of Blank Verse

Christopher Marlowe was considered the creator of blank verse in English literature. The document analyzes Marlowe's use of blank verse in his play Doctor Faustus. It discusses how earlier writers like Sackville experimented with blank verse but failed, while Marlowe mastered it. Examples are provided from the chorus and soliloquies in Doctor Faustus that illustrate Marlowe's skillful and versatile use of blank verse to convey emotion.

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286 views2 pages

Marlowe's Mastery of Blank Verse

Christopher Marlowe was considered the creator of blank verse in English literature. The document analyzes Marlowe's use of blank verse in his play Doctor Faustus. It discusses how earlier writers like Sackville experimented with blank verse but failed, while Marlowe mastered it. Examples are provided from the chorus and soliloquies in Doctor Faustus that illustrate Marlowe's skillful and versatile use of blank verse to convey emotion.

Uploaded by

AR Malik
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

The unrhymed decasyllabic line is known as blank verse, Marlowe was the real creator of the

most versatile of English measures. Sackville, Norton and Surrey experimented with this metre
more than twenty years before Marlowe. They failed because they worked on wrong principles
and the results which they produced were of an intolerable tedious monotony.

Marlowe's achievement in developing blank verse can be illustrated by the study of "Doctor
Faustus". In the chorus passage for example, the verse seems more consistently regular in its
beat.

"Not marching now in fields of Thrasymene....................................... Intends our muse to vaunt


his heavenly verse" (Line 1-6 I, chorus line)

Marlowe's "middle style" is illustrated in Faustus's first soliloquy in Act I scene 'i'

"Settle thy studies, Faustus, and begin.................................................................... Then read no


more: Thou hast attained that end."(I, i lines 1-10)

The final monologue is the most striking specimen of blank verse. It is emotional passages which
illustrate Marlowe's highest achievement as a writer of blank verse.

"O, I'll leap up to my God!- who pulls meme down?-..................stretches out his arms" (Act, V,
scene iii, lines 78-84)

The unrhymed decasyllabic line is known as blank verse, Marlowe was the real creator of the
most versatile of English measures. Sackville, Norton and Surrey experimented with this metre
more than twenty years before Marlowe. They failed because they worked on wrong principles
and the results which they produced were of an intolerable tedious monotony.

Marlowe's achievement in developing blank verse can be illustrated by the study of "Doctor
Faustus". In the chorus passage for example, the verse seems more consistently regular in its
beat.

"Not marching now in fields of Thrasymene....................................... Intends our muse to vaunt


his heavenly verse" (Line 1-6 I, chorus line)

Marlowe's "middle style" is illustrated in Faustus's first soliloquy in Act I scene 'i'

"Settle thy studies, Faustus, and begin.................................................................... Then read no


more: Thou hast attained that end."(I, i lines 1-10)

The final monologue is the most striking specimen of blank verse. It is emotional passages which
illustrate Marlowe's highest achievement as a writer of blank verse.

"O, I'll leap up to my God!- who pulls meme down?-..................stretches out his arms" (Act, V,
scene iii, lines 78-84)

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