University Wits

The term University wits refers to a group of late 16th-century English writers who were educated at the universities i.e. Oxford or Cambridge University. They were popular secular writers of that time. The most prominent members of this group were:

Christopher Marlowe (Cambridge)

Robert Greene (Cambridge)

Thomas Nashe (Cambridge)

John Lyly (Oxford)

Thomas Lodge (Oxford)

George Peele (Oxford)

Thomas Kyd

Coinage of Terms

The term University Wits was not used in their lifetime. It was later coined by George Saintsbury who was a 19th-century journalist and author. He writes,

“The rising sap of dramatic creativity in the 1580’s showed itself in two separate branches of the national tree.”

In the first place, we have a group of University Wits. They had a university education and were men of letters. In the second, we have the players (by players here we mean actors) and other people who felt themselves forced into literacy and principally dramatic composition. They boast Shakespeare as their chief.

Characteristics of Plays Written by University Wits

The plays written by University Wits had several features in common.

·
There was a fondness for heroic themes, such as the lives of great figures. Such heroic themes needed heroic treatment. Therefore, there was frequent use of splendid descriptions, long swelling speeches, and the handling of violent incidents and emotions. Sometimes unrestricted use of the aforementioned qualities led to loudness and disorder.

·
The style was also heroic. The chief aim was to achieve strong and sounding lines, magnificent epithets, and powerful declamations. This again sometimes led to abuse and mere bombast, mouthing, and in the worst cases to nonsense.

·
The themes were usually tragic in nature. The general lack of real humor in the early drama is one of its most prominent features. When humor is used, it is coarse and immature.

Robert Greene (1558-1592)

He is considered as the first professional English author in England. He was a popular Elizabethan dramatist and pamphleteer known for his negative critiques of his colleagues. He is best known for a posthumous pamphlet attributed to him, “Greene’s Groats-worth of witte,” bought with a million of repentance. He wrote

“……. there is an upstart crow beautified with our feathers, that with his tiger’s heart in a player’s hyde, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blank verse as the best of you.”

The notable works of Greene include ‘The Scottish History of James IV’, ‘Alphonsus’, and his greatest success was ‘Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay’.

Thomas Nashe (1567-1601)

A famous playwright, poet, and satirist best known for the novel ‘The Unfortunate Traveler’. He is considered as one of the greatest English Elizabethan pamphleteers. His father William Nashe was a parson. Most of his life is dominated by two concerns, finding an adequate patron and participating in controversies. He co-wrote the play ‘the isle of Dogs’ with Ben Jonson. It caused a major controversy for its seditious content. Jonson was jailed, Nashe’s house was raided and his papers were seized but he managed to escape.

John Lyly (1554-1606)

John Lyly was a poet, dramatist, and courtier. His father was the registrar for the Archbishop Mathew Parker. His grandfather was a grammarian. Lyly is best known for his books ‘Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit (1578) and Euphues and his England (1580). The style used by John Lyly was branded as Euphuism. (To say the nastiest thing in the nicest manner). In 1632, Lyly’s first printed collection of six court comedies was published. These comprise,

Endymion

Campaspe

Sapho and phao

Gallathea

Midas

Mother bombie

Thomas Lodge (1558-1625)

He was an English author and physician. His dramatic work is rather small in quantity. He is the writer of the prose work Rosalynde printed in 1590 which afterward furnished the story for Shakespeare’s famous play ‘As You Like It’. After receiving an M.D. from Oxford University, his works took a serious note. He did translations of ‘Josephus’(1602), ‘Seneca’(1614)

George Peele (1556-1596)

George Peele is a translator, poet, and dramatist. His father was a clerk at Christ’s Hospital commonly known as Bluecoat School. Peele was educated at Christ’s Hospital and entered Broadgates Hall, Oxford in 1571. His famous plays include;

The Arraignment of Paris (1584)

Famous Chronicle of king Edward the second (1593)

The Old wives’ tales (1595)

The maid’s metamorphosis (1600)

George Peele excelled all University Wits except Marlowe. Greene says that Peele belonged to the group of University scholars who ‘spent their wits in making plays’. He went on to say that he was ‘in somethings rarer, in nothing inferior to Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe’.

Thomas Kyd (1558-1594)

He was an English playwright and one of the important figures in the development of Elizabethan drama. He is the writer of the play ‘The Spanish Tragedy’. He is controversially said to be the author of a Hamlet play pre-dating Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Hamlet written by Kyd is now known as Ur-Hamlet.

Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593)

He was an English playwright, poet, and translator of the Elizabethan era. He was the foremost Elizabethan tragedian. He greatly influenced Shakespeare who was born in the same year as Marlowe. It is often said that without Marlowe there would have been no Shakespeare. He was murdered in 1593. A warrant was issued for Marlowe’s arrest on May 1593 supposedly connected to allegations of blasphemy. He was brought to attend the privy council for questioning. Ten days later, he was stabbed to death by Ingram Frizer. There is an interesting theory about his death as well. It is based on the notion that Marlowe may have faked his death and continued to write under the assumed name of Shakespeare. However, orthodox academic consensus rejects it.

The famous works of Marlowe include

The Jew of Malta (printed in 1592)

Edward the Second

The Massacre at Paris

Tamburlaine the great

Dr. Faustus

Marlowe’s plays had immense commercial success thanks to the imposing presence of Edward Alleyn. He was unusually tall for his time and it is said that the haughty roles of Tamburlaine and Faustus were probably written for him. Marlowe was the first English author to make full use of the potential of Blank Verse. The last soliloquy of Dr. Faustus is the most celebrated in English literature. It is often said that it is unsurpassable even by Shakespeare.

Now hast thou but one bare hour to live

And then thou must be damned perpetually

Stand still you ever-moving spheres of heaven

That time may cease and midnight never come

Fair nature’s eye, rise, rise again, and make

Perpetual day. Or let this hour be but a year,

A month, a weak, a natural day,

That Faustus may repent and save his soul.