| John Marston (1575-1634) |
| The eldest son of John Marston of Coventry, at one time lecturer of the Middle Temple, was born in 1575, or early in 1576. His affinities with Italian literature possibly stemmed from his mother, the daughter of Italian physician, Andrew Guarsi. He entered Brasenose College, Oxford, in 1592, taking his BA in 1594. The elder Marston in his will expresses regret that his son, to whom he left his law-books and the furniture of his rooms in the Temple, had not been willing to follow his profession. John Marston married Mary Wilkes, daughter of one of the Royal chaplains, and Ben Jonson said that Marston wrote his father-in-law's preachings and sermons. His first work was The Metamorphosis of Pigmalions Image (1598) Being an erotic poem in the metre of Venus and Adonis. In the same year, Marston published, under the pseudonym of W.Kinsayder, his Scourge of Villanie, a compilation of eleven satires, in the sixth of which he asserted that Pigmalion was intended to parody the amorous poetry of the time. Both this volume and it's predecessor were burnt by order of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The satires are course and vigerous. In addition to a general attack on the vices of his age, he avenges himself on Joseph Hall (who had attacked him in Virgidemiae) He had a great reputation among his contemporaries.On the 28th of September 1599, Henslowe's diary notes that he lent unto Mr Marston, the new poet, the sum of forty shillings, as an advance on a play which is not named. The earliest plays to which Marston's name is attached are The History of Antonio and Mellida and Antonio's Revenge. The melodrama and the exaggerated expression of these two plays offered an opportunity to Ben Jonson, who had twice ridiculed Marston, and now pilloried him in The Poetaster (1601). The quarrel was patched up, and Marston dedicated his Malcontent (1604) to Jonson, and in the next year he prefixed commendatory verses to Sejanus. Far greater restraint is shown in The Malcontent than in the earlier plays. It was printed twice in 1604, the second printing with additions by John Webster. The Dutch Courtesan (1605) and Parasitaster (or The Fawne) (1606) followed. In 1605 Eastward Ho, which gave offence to the King and his Scottish friends, caused the playwrights concerned (Marston, Chapman and Jonson) to be imprisoned at the insistance of Sir James Murray. The Wonder of Women, or The Tragedy of Sophonisba (1606) seems to have been put forward by Marston as a model of what could be accomplished in tragedy. In the preface he mocks thos authors who make a parade of their authorities and their learning, and the next play, What you Will (1607) contains a further attack on Jonson. The tragedy of The Insatiate Countess was printed in 1613, and again, this time anonymously, in 1626. It was not included in the collected edition of Marstons plays in 1633. There is no certain evidence of Marstons authorship in Histriomastix (printed in 1610, but probably prodeced before 1599), or in Jacke Drums Entertainment or Katherine (1616) though he probably had a hand in both. It is uncertain at what time he exchanged professions, but in 1616 he was presented to the living of Christchurch, Hampshire. He formally resigned his charge in 1631, and when his works were collected in 1633, the publisher (William Sheares) stated that the author in his autumn and declining age was living far distant from London. Nevertheless, he died in London, in the parish of Aldermanbury, on the 25th June 1634. He was buried in the Temple Church. |
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