Robert Greene (2) (1558–1592)
Author of Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay
For other authors named Robert Greene, see the disambiguation page.
About the Author
Greene was a notorious figure in his own time, leading a life of excess and debauchery (or at least so he represents himself in his many journalistic pamphlets). His exposes of the Elizabethan underworld may or may not be based on real experience. He died, according to his friend Thomas Nashe, from show more a "banquet of Rhenish wine and pickled herring." In addition to his plays, Greene wrote many charming prose romances, with interpolated lyric poems. His works helped lay the foundations of the English drama, and even his worst plays have historical value. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: From Greene in Conceipt by John Dickenson, 1598.
Works by Robert Greene
Groats-worth of witte, bought with a million of repentance ; The repentance of Robert Greene, 1592 (1923) 19 copies
Greene's Pandosto Or Dorastus And Fawnia: Being The Original Of Shakespeare's Winter's Tale (1907) (1902) 12 copies
The descent of Euphues, three Elizabethan romance stories: Euphues, Pandosto [and] Piers Plainness (2015) 10 copies
Robert Greene 8 copies
The Blacke Bookes Messenger, 1592: 'Cutthbert Conny-catcher'; The defence of conny-catching catching, 1592. (1966) 7 copies
Old English Drama : Marlowe's Tragical History of Doctor Faustus and Greene's Honourable History of Friar… (1887) 6 copies
Robert Greene's Planetomachia (1585) (Literary and Scientific Cultures of Early Modernity) (2007) 4 copies
The Life and Complete Works in Prose and Verse of Robert Greene, M.A, Vol. 8 of 12: Prose: Greenes Never Too Late, And,… (2016) 4 copies
A Most Pleasant Comedy Of Mucedorus, The King's Son Of Valentia And Amadine The King's Daughter Of Arragon (2010) — attributed author — 4 copies
George-a-Greene the pinner of Wakefield, 1599 — attributed author — 4 copies
The life and complete works in prose and verse of Robert Greene, Volume 2 of 15 (Mamillia pts 1 and 2; Anatomie of… (2016) 2 copies
The second part of coney-catching 2 copies
Two Elizabethan Stage Abridgements: The Battle of Alcazar and Orlando Furioso Double volume (Malone Society Reprints) (1922) 2 copies
The life and complete works in prose and verse of Robert Greene, Volume 4 (Carde of Fancie; Follie & Love; Pandosto) (2001) 2 copies
Repentance. 1592 1 copy
The Complete Cony-Catching 1 copy
A Groat's Worth of Wit 1 copy
The notable discovery of coney-catchers' cozenage;: As well as The cozenage of colliers (1859) 1 copy
Robert Greene. Six Plays. Edited with introduction and notes by Thomas H. Dickinson (Mermaid Series.) (1909) 1 copy
Blacke Booke's Messenger, The, The Defence of Conny-Catching, Philomela: The Lady Fitzwaters Nightingale, A Quippe for… (1999) 1 copy
The Mirror of Modesty 1 copy
The Mermaid Series (Plays) 1 copy
The Poems of Robert Greene 1 copy
Associated Works
English Renaissance Poetry: A Collection of Shorter Poems from Skelton to Jonson (1963) — Contributor — 158 copies
Illustrations of Old English Literature. 3 Volumes — Contributor — 1 copy
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Greene, Robert
- Legal name
- Greene, Robert
- Birthdate
- 1558-07-11
- Date of death
- 1592-09-03
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- UK
- Birthplace
- Norwich, Norfolk, England
- Places of residence
- London, England
- Education
- University of Cambridge (BA | 1580 | St John's College)
University of Cambridge (MA | 1583 | St John's College)
University of Oxford (MA | 1588) - Occupations
- dramatist
poet - Relationships
- Shakespeare, William (rival)
- Awards and honors
- Falstaff (possible inspiration)
- Short biography
- Robert Greene (11 July 1558 – 3 September 1592) wrote Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay (LC 0126058)
Members
Reviews
Lists
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 70
- Also by
- 17
- Members
- 315
- Popularity
- #74,965
- Rating
- 3.7
- Reviews
- 15
- ISBNs
- 338
- Languages
- 18
Red-bearded Robert Greene (by turns profligate and penitent) seems to have been as dramatic a character in real life as any that he created for the early modern stage. Sometime after taking his BA and MA degrees at Cambridge in the early 1580’s, and before he attacked “the onely Shake-scene in a country” as “an upstart Crow, beautified with our feathers,” Greene penned Pandosto (which became the source for The Winter’s Tale) and Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, his best known -- and best -- play.
Beyond these Shakespeare connections, several traits make Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay an exciting choice for modern readers and actors. Chief among them is its central theme, the powerful but dangerous attraction of unnatural knowledge, represented both as new science and ancient magic.
Greene’s play brings “magic’s secret mysteries” to the stage with spectacle galore: notably a quartet of wizards’ duels (involving the two friars Bacon and Bungay, a brace of Oxford scholars, and a German magician Vandermast) as well as a fire-breathing dragon, a necromantic golden tree, and spirits carrying away the defeated sorcerers.
At the heart of the special effects are two extraordinary stage props. One unusual prop was Friar Bacon’s “glass perspective” – perhaps a prop telescope rather than the kind of mirror featured in Richard 2 – which allows the friar to reveal far-off actions to those who come to his cell and peer into his glass. Even more spectacular was the “brazen head” breathing “flames of fire” that was featured not only in Greene’s earlier Alphonsus of Aragon but in the subsequent Friar Bacon play as well (scene 11). Henslowe’s papers indicate that the properties of the Admiral’s Men included such an “owld Mahemetes head,” likely what is pictured on the title page of the 1630 edition of Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay. Bacon plans to animate this mechanical marvel so that it will reveal secret wisdom, perform the feat of encircling all of England with a wall of brass, and bring undying glory and fame to Bacon and his Oxford college of Brasenose.
Greene’s double plot play features rival lovers as well as dueling magicians, and Friar Bacon’s marvels are at the center of both rivalries. By play’s end the technological wonders are shattered, as knowledge, devotion and love assume their proper places.
What makes this play an appropriate and timely choice for a revival?
- This tale of magical technology is perfectly suited for the present generation who has grown up with Harry Potter and Bill Nye.
- Greene’s play comments pointedly on the vain dream of securing a nation’s borders with a wall, and on the attempt by a government to harness the intellectual capital of the nation’s greatest universities for its own political ends.
- It also dramatizes one of the most powerful men in the realm seeking to employ the latest technological advances of his day to further his own sexual conquest.
The play begins with Prince Edward and his minions leaving court responsibilities to ride to Oxford, seeking to recruit the famous magician Friar Bacon to charm Margaret, the Fair Maid of Fressingfield in Suffolk, to succumb to Prince Edward’s love-suit. Though Bacon has more important tasks than enchanting Margaret for the prince, he does establish his potency by summoning devils and unmasking fools in disguise. Bacon’s true quest has been to command another devil to craft a brazen head that the friar will command to rear a brass wall ringing all of England and protecting it from potential invasion. When the prince arrives in Oxford, having left his favorite Lacy, the Earl of Lincoln, to woo for him in his absence, he soon discovers via the Friar’s magic glass that Lacy woos the lovely Margaret for himself and that they are shortly to be married by the rival Friar Bungay.
When the irate prince confronts Lacy and Margaret in Suffolk, they swear their eternal love to one another and both plead for their own deaths in order to save their beloved. Suddenly chastened, the royal heir Prince Edward masters his passions and magnanimously gives the couple his blessing to wed, before he speeds with Lacy to Oxford again – this time to join his father King Henry III and meet the royal bride who has been arranged for him, Princess Eleanor of Castile.
In an international wizards’ contest in Oxford, prompted by the king to demonstrate national supremacy, England’s Friar Bungay (the nation’s second best magician) conjures the golden tree of the Hesperides and the dragon protecting it; then the German champion Vandermast (the best professor of magical arts from the continent) bests Bungay by summoning Hercules to destroy Bungay’s marvelous vision. Just in time Friar Bacon, England’s true champion, appears to paralyze Hercules and command him to carry the defeated Vandermast back to Hapsburg. Then Princess Eleanor and Prince Edward declare their love at first sight, and the love-troubles seem to have vanished as surely as Bungay’s mystical golden tree.
BACK TO THE LOVE-PLOT . . . the still fair maid Margaret, now left alone in Fressingfield, is wooed by two neighboring landowners, who as rivals for her love prepare to duel. Though she remains faithful to her Lord Lacy, she receives word that Lacy has abandoned her for a new love, the chief lady in waiting to Castilian Princess Eleanor. Margaret bears this heartbreaking news as patiently as Griselda and prepares to enter a nunnery, while Friar Bacon prepares for his greatest feat, the animation of the Brazenose, aided by his assistant the poor scholar Miles.
Soon Bacon’s servant Miles gets his just deserts, and the love plots wind their way to the anticipated happy endings, both domestically and internationally, accompanied by repentance and prophecy. After another magical episode with Bacon’s perspective glass, another violent duel, and another scene of iconographic destruction, mutual harmony and appropriate order comes to court, college and country alike -- not with a magical wall separating England from Europe but with a royal marriage uniting the two realms.
The final scorecard? the wall is not built, the nation’s intellectual supremacy is proven, technological dangers are averted, and sexual conquest gives place to mutual love – all happy endings for the early modern period, and for ours.
What does this play offer for today? Reflections on the threats represented by male sexual conquest, unbridled nationalism, the building of a massive impenetrable wall to protect the homeland from invasion, unchecked technological innovations, the state’s attempt to co-opt university and church alike for its own ends . . . and alternatives to all of these vain desires. Timely indeed.… (more)