Read the excerpt from The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England.As you approach the theaters you will notice that they all seem to be round; in fact, they are polygonal—the Globe is twenty-sided, the Rose fourteen-sided. Whichever one you choose, you can expect to queue with two thousand other people to get in. You will see people standing in hats with pipes in hand, and women in their headdresses, all chatting, with an eye open for people they know. Entrance costs a penny: this allows you to stand in the yard in front of the stage, an uncovered area (hence the need for a hat).
Read the excerpt from The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England.By the end of the reign he [Jonson] has married, had two children and lost one, tried to become an actor and failed, become a playwright, been arrested for a scurrilous play and released, killed another actor in a duel, been arrested again and put on trial for murder, and escaped hanging by pleading benefit of the clergy. The play for which he is arrested, The Isle of Dogs, coauthored with Thomas Nashe, is so slanderous and offensive that the privy council orders the closure not just of the play but of every theater in London.
Read the excerpt from The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England.In their stead, people increasingly choose to see secular plays on historical and moral themes. These are performed up and down the country by theater companies called after lords, for example "Lord Sussex’s Men,” "Lord Strange’s Men,” "the Lord Admiral’s Men,” and "Lord Leicester’s Men.” The reason for these names is that, while unattached actors are liable to be arrested for vagrancy, the Act of 1572 specifically excludes players properly authorized by lords from being considered vagabonds.
Descriptive details help the reader
Which sentence most effectively helps readers envision a scene?
Read the excerpt from The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England.The Elizabethan theater as we know it develops slowly. In 1562 the play Gorboduc, the first English play to include blank verse, is performed in front of the queen at the Inner Temple in London. This is written by two gentlemen, Thomas Sackville (the future earl of Dorset) and Thomas Norton, and leaves a lasting impression. Its tale of a kingdom torn between two heirs has great significance for the audience of the day. Other plays follow, drawing on classical themes as well as on ancient British and medieval history, written by (among others) John Heywood, John Pickering, and Lewis Wager. A sign of their success is the construction in 1567 of the first purpose-built theater, the Red Lion, built by John Brayne in Whitechapel.
Which of the following sentences signals a sequence of events?
Read the excerpt from The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England.These [the miracle plays] go out of favor when the privy council decrees that they are too close to Catholicism and should stop. Those at York cease in 1569. In Chester the citizens defy the privy council and continue performing their play about Noah’s Flood well into the 1570s. The Coventry mystery plays are finally suppressed in 1579, so this is the town to visit if you want to catch one later in the reign. The Guary miracle play in Cornwall continues for some years but is so amateurish it can hardly be seen as a threat.
Read the excerpt from The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England.In 1587 Thomas Kyd produces The Spanish Tragedy, and soon afterward Christopher Marlowe brings out the first part of Tamburlaine the Great. . . . They employ new verse forms, allowing different spoken rhythms, and compose bold speeches with greater resonance and meaning. The new conceptual framework of a revenge tragedy in particular allows them to portray powerful emotions voiced by strong characters. Suddenly it is possible to show so much more passion on the stage.
Did you find these answers helpful?