Writing Robert Greene: Essays on England's First Notorious Professional Writer Book

Robert Greene, contemporary of Shakespeare and Marlowe and member of the group of six known as the "University Wits," is the subject of this essay collection, the first to be dedicated solely to his work. Although in his short lifetime Greene published some three dozen prose works, composed at least five plays, and was one of the period's most recognized-if not notorious-literary figures, his place within the canon of Renaissance writers has been marginal at best. "Writing Robert Greene" offers a reappraisal of Greene's career and of his contribution to Elizabethan culture.Rather than drawing lines between Greene's work for the pamphlet market and for the professional theatres, the essays in the volume imagine his writing on a continuum. Some essays trace the ways in which Greene's poetry and prose navigates the differing cultural economies of print and theatre. Others consider how the full spectrum of his writing contributes to an emergent professional discourse about popular print and theatrical culture.The volume includes three valuable appendices (presenting apocrypha; edition information; and a list of Greene's works by year published) and an annotated bibliography of recent relevant scholarship.Read More