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| Cressida's Transformations - art and photography |
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Christopher Marlowe influenced the work of England’s greatest dramatist, William Shakespeare. For example it was Marlowe’s “Edward ll” that was a model for Shakespeare’s “Richard lll".
Had he lived longer than 29 years, there is no doubt that the adventurous and unorthodox Marlowe would have rivalled Shakespeare’s place in English literature.
The son of a shoemaker, Marlowe was educated at Cambridge University and like Shakespeare moved to London. There he joined a company of actors “The Admiral’s Men” for whom he wrote most of his plays.
But there was a dark side to Marlowe. It is suggested that he was a spy for the government and numbered some prominent men among his friends and associates.
At the age of twenty-nine, he was stabbed to death during a brawl in a tavern in Deptford over a dispute about payment of a dinner bill. The year was 1593. He had been denounced as a heretic and died before action could be taken.
Perhaps Marlowe’s greatest legacy is his poem “The Passionate Shepherd” that contains the lyric:
'Come Live with Me and Be My Love'
