Tamburlaine

One of the smash hits of the late 1580s and 90s, Tamburlaine<br/>established blank verse as the poetic line of English Renaissance<br/>drama, Edward Alleyn as the first English star actor and Marlowe as one<br/>of the foremost playwrights of his time. The rise and fall of a<br/>Scythian peasant-warrior who conquers the Middle East and is struck<br/>down by illness after burning the books of the Koran is presented in<br/>two parts crammed with theatrical splendour and equally spectacular<br/>cruelty. Marlowe's original audiences were delighted with the<br/>blasphemous and ruthlessly ambitious hero; the introduction to this<br/>edition discusses the problems that such a character poses for modern<br/>audiences and highlights the undercurrents of the play that lead<br/>towards a more ironic interpretation.