Ben Jonson Popular Books
Ben Jonson Biography & Facts
Benjamin Jonson (c. 11 June 1572 – c. 6 August 1637) was an English playwright and poet. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence on English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours; he is best known for the satirical plays Every Man in His Humour (1598), Volpone, or The Fox (c. 1606), The Alchemist (1610) and Bartholomew Fair (1614) and for his lyric and epigrammatic poetry. He is regarded as "the second most important English dramatist, after William Shakespeare, during the reign of James I." Jonson was a classically educated, well-read and cultured man of the English Renaissance with an appetite for controversy (personal and political, artistic and intellectual) whose cultural influence was of unparalleled breadth upon the playwrights and the poets of the Jacobean era (1603–1625) and of the Caroline era (1625–1642). Early life In midlife, Jonson said his paternal grandfather, who "served King Henry 8 and was a gentleman", was a member of the extended Johnston family of Annandale in the Dumfries and Galloway, a genealogy that is attested by the three spindles (rhombi) in the Jonson family coat of arms: one spindle is a diamond-shaped heraldic device used by the Johnston family. His ancestors spelt the family name with a letter "t" (Johnstone or Johnstoun). While the spelling had eventually changed to the more common "Johnson", the playwright's own particular preference became "Jonson". Jonson's father lost his property, was imprisoned, and, as a Protestant, suffered forfeiture under Queen Mary. Becoming a clergyman upon his release, he died a month before his son's birth. His widow married a master bricklayer two years later. Jonson attended school in St Martin's Lane in London. Later, a family friend paid for his studies at Westminster School, where the antiquarian, historian, topographer and officer of arms William Camden (1551–1623) was one of his masters. The pupil and master became friends, and the intellectual influence of Camden's broad-ranging scholarship upon Jonson's art and literary style remained notable, until Camden's death in 1623. At Westminster School he met the Welsh poet Hugh Holland, with whom he established an "enduring relationship". Both of them would write preliminary poems for William Shakespeare's First Folio (1623). On leaving Westminster School in 1589, Jonson attended St John's College, Cambridge, to continue his book learning. However, because of his unwilled apprenticeship to his bricklayer stepfather, he returned after a month. According to the churchman and historian Thomas Fuller (1608–61), Jonson at this time built a garden wall in Lincoln's Inn. After having been an apprentice bricklayer, Jonson went to the Netherlands and volunteered to soldier with the English regiments of Sir Francis Vere (1560–1609) in Flanders. England was allied with the Dutch in their fight for independence as well as the ongoing war with Spain. The Hawthornden Manuscripts (1619), of the conversations between Ben Jonson and the poet William Drummond of Hawthornden (1585–1649), report that, when in Flanders, Jonson engaged, fought and killed an enemy soldier in single combat, and took for trophies the weapons of the vanquished soldier. Johnson is reputed to have visited the antiquary Sir Robert Cotton at a residence of his in Chester early in the 17th century. After his military activity on the Continent, Jonson returned to England and worked as an actor and as a playwright. As an actor, he was the protagonist "Hieronimo" (Geronimo) in the play The Spanish Tragedy (c. 1586), by Thomas Kyd (1558–94), the first revenge tragedy in English literature. By 1597, he was a working playwright employed by Philip Henslowe, the leading producer for the English public theatre; by the next year, the production of Every Man in His Humour (1598) had established Jonson's reputation as a dramatist. Jonson described his wife to William Drummond as "a shrew, yet honest". The identity of Jonson's wife is obscure, though she sometimes is identified as "Ann Lewis", the woman who married a Benjamin Jonson in 1594, at the church of St Magnus-the-Martyr, near London Bridge. The registers of St Martin-in-the-Fields record that Mary Jonson, their eldest daughter, died in November 1593, at six months of age. A decade later, in 1603, Benjamin Jonson, their eldest son, died of bubonic plague when he was seven years old, upon which Jonson wrote the elegiac "On My First Sonne" (1603). A second son, also named Benjamin Jonson, died in 1635. During that period, Jonson and his wife lived separate lives for five years; Jonson enjoyed the residential hospitality of his patrons, Esme Stuart, 3rd Duke of Lennox and 7th Seigneur d'Aubigny and Sir Robert Townshend. Career By summer 1597, Jonson had a fixed engagement in the Admiral's Men, then performing under Philip Henslowe's management at The Rose. John Aubrey reports, on uncertain authority, that Jonson was not successful as an actor; whatever his skills as an actor, he was more valuable to the company as a writer. By this time Jonson had begun to write original plays for the Admiral's Men; in 1598 he was mentioned by Francis Meres in his Palladis Tamia as one of "the best for tragedy." None of his early tragedies survive, however. An undated comedy, The Case is Altered, may be his earliest surviving play. In 1597, a play which he co-wrote with Thomas Nashe, The Isle of Dogs, was suppressed after causing great offence. Arrest warrants for Jonson and Nashe were issued by Queen Elizabeth I's so-called interrogator, Richard Topcliffe. Jonson was jailed in Marshalsea Prison and charged with "Leude and mutynous behaviour", while Nashe managed to escape to Great Yarmouth. Two of the actors, Gabriel Spenser and Robert Shaw, were also imprisoned. A year later, Jonson was again briefly imprisoned, this time in Newgate Prison, for killing Gabriel Spenser in a duel on 22 September 1598 in Hogsden Fields (today part of Hoxton). Tried on a charge of manslaughter, Jonson pleaded guilty but was released by benefit of clergy, a legal ploy through which he gained leniency by reciting a brief Bible verse (the neck-verse), forfeiting his "goods and chattels" and being branded with the so-called Tyburn T on his left thumb. While in jail Jonson converted to Catholicism, possibly through the influence of fellow-prisoner Father Thomas Wright, a Jesuit priest. In 1598 Jonson produced his first great success, Every Man in His Humour, capitalising on the vogue for humorous plays which George Chapman had begun with An Humorous Day's Mirth. William Shakespeare was among the first actors to be cast. Jonson followed this in 1599 with Every Man out of His Humour, a pedantic attempt to imitate Aristophanes. It is not known whether this was a success on stage, but when published it proved popular and went through several editions. Jonson's other work for the theatre in the last years of Elizabeth I's reign was marked by fighting and contro.... Discover the Ben Jonson popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Ben Jonson books.
Best Seller Ben Jonson Books of 2024
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Ben Jonson
Rosalind MilesThe extraordinary character of Ben Jonson has only recently been brought into the light. Critics traditionally exalted Shakespeare, at Jonson’s expense. In this biography, first pu...
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Ben Jonson
David RiggsBen Jonson’s contemporaries admired him above all other playwrights and poets of the English Renaissance. He was the “great refiner” who alchemized the bleakest aspects of everyday...
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Ben Jonson
James LoxleyNext to Shakespeare, Ben Jonson is perhaps the most widely studied Renaissance dramatist. Very few students of literature or drama would not encounter Volpone or Bartholomew Fai...
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Ben Jonson
John Addington SymondsThis biography of famed English poet Ben Jonson details his life, career and the infamous duel he participated in that left Gabriel Spenser, a renowned actor, dead. Although he was...
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The Pentagon Papers
Katharine GrahamDrawn from Katharine Graham’s Pulitzer Prizewinning memoir Personal History, a dramatic account of how she piloted the Washington Post through the Pentagon Papers an...
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The Fastest Men on Earth
Neil Duncanson & Usain BoltWith an exclusive foreword by Usain Bolt, The Fastest Men on Earth tells the fascinating inside stories of the Olympic Men's 100m Champions. It takes just under ten seconds to run,...
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Ben Jonson
John PalmerWhile most critical writing on Jonson concentrates on the plays, poems or masques seen in isolation, this title, first published in 1981, ranges across the genres to explore Jonson...
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The Poems of Ben Jonson
Tom Cain & Ruth ConnollyBen Jonson, who was with Shakespeare and Marlowe one of three principal playwrights of his age, was also one of its most original and influential poets. Known best for the country ...
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Ben Jonson
Alexander LeggattWhile most critical writing on Jonson concentrates on the plays, poems or masques seen in isolation, this title, first published in 1981, ranges across the genres to explore Jonson...
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Greed and Glory
Sean DeveneyOn October 28, 1986, just one day after winning one of the most thrilling World Series in history, the New York Mets were feted by more than two million fans with a parade through ...
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Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher
Samuel Taylor ColeridgeLectures on the notes and works of famous personalities of the literary world. Poetry is not the proper antithesis to prose, but to science. Poetry is opposed to science, and prose...
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The Prince Who Would Be King
Sarah FraserHenry Stuart’s life is the last great forgotten Jacobean tale. Shadowed by the gravity of the Thirty Years’ War and the huge changes taking place across Europe in seventeenthcentur...
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Ben Jonson
Ben Jonson & Helen OstovichThis edition of Ben Jonson's four middle comedies places the works in the popular history and culture of the times, 16051614, and surveys the influences, both classical and contemp...
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Ben Jonson
Rosalind MilesThough he is one of the undisputed giants of English literature, Ben Jonson is known to most people only as the author of one or two masterly plays which regularly appear in the dr...
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Walking on the Wind
Michael Tlanusta GarrettIn the spirit of the highly acclaimed Medicine of the Cherokee, coauthored with his father J. T. Garrett, Michael Garrett shares with us the delightful, allages stories passed down...
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Russian Black Magic
Natasha HelvinA rare look into the history, theory, and craft of the black mages and sorcerers of Russia Examines practical rituals and spells, the demonic pantheon, places of power, offerings ...
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Rogue Warrior of the SAS
Martin Dillon & Roy BradfordMore than half a century after his death, Lt Col. Robert Blair Mayne is still regarded as one of the greatest soldiers in the history of military special operations. He was the mos...
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Ben Jonson
Ian DonaldsonSoldier, satirist, duellist, principal masquewriter to the early Stuart court, tutor to the son of Sir Walter Ralegh, and Shakespeare's greatest contemporary, Ben Jonson was a ...
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They Were Soldiers
Joseph L. Galloway & Marvin J. WolfThey Were Soldiers showcases the inspiring true stories of 49 Vietnam veterans who returned home from the "lost war" to enrich America's present and future...
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Ben Jonson
Ben JohnsonThis book is a new edition of Ben Johnson's famous play "Volpone." This edition includes a frontpiece, five intial letters, a eulogy and a cover design illustrative by ...
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How The Secret Changed My Life
Rhonda ByrneAn aweinspiring compilation of the most uplifting and powerful reallife stories from readers of the worldwide bestseller The Secret. Discover how everyday people completely transfo...
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The Secret to Love, Health, and Money
Rhonda ByrneThis indepth masterclass from the author of the groundbreaking bestseller The Secret illustrates how to apply the law of attraction to three of life’s most important areas: relatio...
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The Dirtiest Race in History
Richard Moore'A captivating and detailed account ... it reads like a thriller, which is exactly the right tone to adopt by author Richard Moore for a story dripping with skulduggery and int...
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Ben Jonson
John PalmerOriginally published in 1934, Palmer’s biography of famous playwright Ben Jonson delves into his life and works and what he achieved in both. As first poet laureate of England, Jon...
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Galveston
Nic PizzolattoFrom the creator, writer, and executive producer of the HBO crime series True Detective, comes a dark and visceral literary debut set along the seedy wastelands of Galveston.On the...
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Target Basra
Mike RossiterIn the dead of night on 20 March 2003, Royal Navy Marines from 40 and 42 Commando board a fleet of twenty helicopters. With faces blackened and mouths dry at the thought of what li...
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Eden
D R ThorpeAnthony Eden, who served as both Foreign Secretary and Prime Minister, was one of the central political figures of the twentieth century. He had good looks, charm, a Military Cross...
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All Men Want to Know
Nina Bouraoui & Aneesa Abbas Higgins'Intense, gorgeous, troubling, seductive a novel that has to be surrendered to rather than read' Sarah Waters AN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERWINNER OF AN ENGLISH PEN TRANSLATES AWARD ...
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Ben Jonson
Richard DuttonInterest in Ben Jonson is higher today than at any time since his death. This new collection offers detailed readings of all the major plays Volpone, Epicene, The Alchemist and Ba...
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Ben Jonson
D.H. CraigThe Critical Heritage gathers together a large body of critical sources on major figures in literature. Each volume presents contemporary responses to a writer's work, enabling stu...