The Malcontent

The Malcontent, usually recognized as John Marston's masterpiece, is one of the most original and complex plays of the Elizabethan theatre. Complex in genre, structure and language, it poses interesting problems for theatre history and textual transmission. The aim of this edition is to offer answers to the various questions raised by the play (derived from the thirty-six copies now extant), to establish a reliable text, to date the play and relate it to the aesthetic cross-currents flowing at the turn of the seventeenth century. It also seeks to place The Malcontent within the theatrical traditions both of boy-players and of Shakespeare's company, which stole the play from the boys and adapted to their own theatre.