8 The Life and Career of Thomas Kyd

Mr. Mohaiminul Islam Islam

About the Module:

The module tries to explain the life and career of Thomas Kyd as well as his contributions to the English literature. The content also looks at how Kyd is interested in exploring the Roman story. It also explicates how he addresses correlates to contemporary political concerns and in calling our attention to moments where this kind of parallelism breaks down. The study also addresses how Kyd becomes a very important writer in his time. Moreover, it explicates his The Spanish Tragedy. Along with that, it also tries to explain his translated works. In addition, the study concentrates on the comments of other famous writers in order to critically judge the activities of Thomas Kyd.

Introduction:

The etymological point of view, the Elizabethan Period was received the tremendous impetus from the Renaissance, the reformation and the exploration of the new world. Moreover, the period finds the best expression of thought, feelings and vigorous action in the development of drama which culminating in Shakespeare, Jonson and University Wits. Not only the Elizabethan Age made dramas, it also produced some excellent prose works. Some scholars say, it is essentially an age of poetry, but both poetry and drama were permeated by Italian influence, which was overlooked in English literature from Chaucer to the Restoration. The literature of this age is called the literature of the Renaissance and of unprecedented glory in all fields of national life and literary achievements. It is also often called the Golden Age in the national as well as the literary history of England (Jain, 2000, p. 63). Further, this age was inspired classical ideas, international expansion and naval triumph. It was also a time of rapid development in English commerce, maritime power, and nationalist feeling – the defeat of  the Spanish Armada occurred in 1588 (Abrams, 2009, p. 217).

In the Elizabethan era, plays and playwrights were highly popular. Still today, there are many plays, have been performed in the theatre. The most famous Elizabethan playwright was William Shakespeare, who has been credited with many famous Elizabethan plays. The other famous Elizabethan playwrights were Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593), Thomas Nashe (1567-1601), Robert Greene (1558-1592), Thomas Lodge (1558-1625), George Peele (1556-1596), John Lyly (1553-1606), Francis Beaumont (1584-1616), John Fletcher (1579-1625), Thomas Middleton (1580-1627), Thomas Kyd (1558-1594), and so on. Their most famous plays were The Jew of Malta (1590), Edward II (1594), Henry IV (1592), Friar Bacon and Frair Bangay (1594), Titus Andronicus (1594), Romeo and Juliet (1595), The Spanish Tragedy (1592) and so on. Furthermore, before Elizabethan Era, the play was divided into two forms, one was a tragedy, another one was a comedy, but, in the Elizabethan period, the play was divided into three forms, they were tragedy, comedy and tragicomedy. However, the paper is not all about the Elizabethan Age but it is about the particular playwright of Elizabethan Era, known as Thomas Kyd.

Thomas Kyd: 

Thomas Kyd was born on 6th November 1558. Though there is no record of the day, it was baptized in the church of St Mary Woolnoth, Lombard Street, London. He was the son of Francis Kydd and Anna Kyd. Francis Kydd was a scrivener and later one he became a  warden of the Scriveners’ Company. In 1565, the young Kyd enrolled at the Marchant Tailor’s School, in which, Richard Mulcaster was a headmaster. Along with him, there are many fellow students, namely Edmund Spencer, Thomas Lodge and so on. At the school, Thomas Kyd received a well-rounded education. Not only that, he developed many ideas from his headmaster, apart from Latin and Greek. There are many programs, including physical education, music, drama and good manner he developed. Moreover, he didn’t proceed to either of the universities. Probably, after he left his school, he may be followed his father’s professional footsteps because there are two letters written by Kyd, whose writing style was similar to his father’s profession. But, Nashe explicates him as a “shifting companion that ran through every art and throve by none” (http://www.luminarium.org/renlit/kydbio.htm). He also showed that he has a  pretty extensive range of reading in Latin. That’s why the author on whom he pulls in most freely is Seneca, only there are many reminiscences, and occasionally mistranslations of other sources. Nashe contemptuously said that English Seneca read by candlelight yields many good sentences,” no doubt exaggerating his indebtedness to Thomas Newton’s translation. John Lyly had a more marked influence on his manner than any of his contemporaries (http://www.luminarium.org/renlit/kydbio.htm).

Life of Thomas Kyd:

Although the details of the great Renaissance playwright Thomas Kyd’s life are obscure. But it is known that after he  left  his  school,  he  shared  a  room  with  another  great playwright, Christopher Marlowe. Not as poetic as Marlowe, Kyd’s brilliance came from his understanding of the necessities of the stage and his instinctive grasp of the tragic figure. In the 1580s, he became an important playwright of the era, but there are very rare people who know about his activity that’s why Francis Meres said Kyd was among “our best for tragedy” (O’Connor, 2017). Moreover, Thomas Heywood elsewhere called him “Famous Kyd”. At the same point, Ben Jonson called him the “sporting Kyd,” and it is thought that by 1589 he had written a lost Hamlet – sometimes referred to as the Ur-Hamlet–which was likely the model for Shakespeare’s tragedy (http://www.imagi-nation.com/moonstruck/clsc25.html). Ur- Hamlet is the story of Hamlet. It is Shakespeare, who used for his famous play. It is just like a Shakespeare’s play. It explicates the revenge theme. Moreover, it may be more accurate to say that Shakespeare’s play explores the revenge theme just as Kyd’s play did. In addition, we can say that Shakespeare was obviously very impressed with Kyd, as his influence can be seen in the evolution of his own dramatic writings. But there are many Scholars, who now inclined to believe that the play did in fact exist and that Shakespeare probably made use of it for his masterpiece, but most are agreed that there is no firm evidence for associating this play with Kyd (http://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/english-literature- 1500-1799-biographies/thomas-kyd). However, at the last moment of life, Kyd was involved in political activities. That’s why he was plagued by the repercussions of his involvement in what appears to have been subversive political activities together with his friends and sometime roommate, Christopher Marlowe. In the meantime, he was imprisoned and  tortured, as was Marlowe. Marlowe was assassinated in Deptford in suspicious circumstances. On the other hand, Kyd was released from prison, but he had continued his life to live in poverty and died young.

The Career of Thomas Kyd:

Kyd probably began his career as a popular playwright about 1583 and produced his most significant work, The Spanish Tragedy. He had written this popular Elizabethan revenge tragedy between 1582 and 1592. Although somewhat crude both dramatically and poetically, this extremely popular play did much to determine the greatest disasters of the later Elizabethan and Jacobean periods. It is the earliest example, in English, of the revenge play, or tragedy of blood, which was later modernized and elaborated by such dramatists as Shakespeare, George Chapman, John Webster, and so on.

Moreover, he appears to have had more or less acquainted with French, Italian, Spanish, and Latin and is hacking work in translating and in pamphleteering. Such as he translated-Torquato  Tasso’s  Padre  di  Famiglia  (1583),  published  as The  Householder’s  Philosophy (1588), is the only non-dramatic work now generally attributed to Kyd; and Robert Garnier’s Cornelia published as the same name in 1594. Moreover, there are many plays attributed in whole or in part to Kyd, include The Tragedy of Soliman and Perseda, King Leir, Arden of Faversham and Edward III. In summation, a sport related to The Spanish Tragedy called The First Part of Hieronimo may be a bad quarto or a memorial reconstruction of a play by Kyd. It may be an inferior writer’s burlesque of The Spanish Tragedy inspired by that play’s popularity. Thomas Kyd is more generally accepted to have been the source of a Hamlet, the forerunner of the Shakespearean play (Ur-Hamlet). Furthermore, there are some poems had been written by Kyd which exists in the writings of others, but it appears that most of his work is lost or unidentified. However, the success of Kyd’s writings extended to Europe, Germany and Netherlands. There are many versions of The   Spanish   Tragedy and   his Hamlet,   which were   popular    in    Germany    and   the Netherlands for generations.

There are many scholars who pointed out that The Spanish Tragedy at least had a part in the outburst of popular tragedy around 1590. It has been conjectured that he afterwards capitalized on the popularity of this play by writing what might be called the first piece, though the extant First Part of Jeronimo (printed in 1605) is probably by another hand. The Tragedy of Soliman and Perseda is usually attributed to him on the basis of style and of the fact that it holds the same plot as the play produced by Hieronimo in The Spanish Tragedy (Baskerville, 1934, p.421). Moreover, the scholars  claim  that  he  wrote Arden  of Feversham because it is discussed in connection with that play. Thomas Kyd is also credited with an early edition of Hamlet (Ur-Hamlet), but it was lost. Many scholars say it is handfuls of tragical speeches, which is mention in the work of Thomas Nashe’s preface to Greene’s Menaphon. Thomas Nashe’s satire in the same connection on the scrivener born who leaves his trade to write tragedies pillaged from Seneca is usually accepted as inspired by the success of Kyd’s plays (http://classic-literature.co.uk/thomas-kyd-biography/).

However, Thomas Kyd was connected with the inner circle around the Countess of Pembroke, who was concerned about getting a literary tragedy, and he translated by Robert Garnier, called the “French Seneca,” the tragedy of Cornelia, printed in 1594, the only extant play to bear Kyd’s name on the title-page (Baskerville, 1934, p. 421). In 1593, he was arrested on suspicion of having posted libels on foreigners. He was found in possession of papers considered heretical or atheistic. He was released on his testimony that the papers had  been left among his effects by Marlowe in 1591, when the two of them, in the service of an unidentified lord, had used the same room. But after one year in 1594, Thomas Kyd was passed away.

The Members of University Wits: 

The second period of the Elizabethan Era was dominated by University Wits. It was a group of Oxford and Cambridge University scholars. John Lyly, Thomas Kyd, George Peele, Thomas Lodge, Robert Greene, Christopher Marlowe, and Thomas Nashe were the members of this group. The term University Wits was not used in their lifetime, but a 19th-century journalist and author, George Sainsbury coined this term. Moreover, he argues that “the rising sap of dramatic creativity in the 1580s showed itself in two separate branches of the national tree” (Sager, 2012). George Sampson says-

“During the sixteenth century, the drama, now settled into a regular entertainment, seemed at first to be developing along divergent lines, which we may loosely describe as courtly drama acted by young gallants and choir children in halls and noble houses, and popular drama acted by common players of interludes in the yards of inns and later at the Theatre, the first London playhouse, erected in 1570. The literary men from Oxford and Cambridge took the drama as their special province.” Jain, 2000, p. 122

In the Elizabeth Era, all the doubts appear to vanish from English history. The admittance of the popular sovereign was like sunrise after a long night. According to Milton, “a noble and puissant nation, raising herself like a strong man after sleep and shaking her invincible lock (Ipgrave, 2016). However, among the members of University Wits, Thomas Kyd was a very important member because his contribution to drama is great both intrinsically and historically. According to George Sampson, “Kyd was the first English dramatist to discover the bearing of the episode and of dramatic movement upon the character. In other words, he is the first English playwright, who writes dramatically” (Jain, 2000, p.123).

The Works of Thomas Kyd: 

“A careful examination of the extent and nature of the classical attainments displayed in Kyd’s works tends to support the view that they are the fruit of a clever schoolboy’s reading, reinforced by later private study, rather than of a methodical university training” (Boas, 1901,p.XVII). He is well-known with a fairly wide range of Latin authors. He had also Seneca’s dramas at his fingers’ ends. That’s why, Frederick S. Boas says “The fickleness of Fortune is the Leitmotif that runs through the writings of Thomas Kyd, and the goddess has taken a characteristic revenge upon her traducer by making him a victim of her most cruel caprice” (Boas, 1901, p. XIII). However, he became one of the most prominent Elizabethan dramatists after Shakespeare. Although, Thomas Kyd was almost forgotten that time, later, in Apologie for Actors Thomas Heywood was connected his name to The Spanish Tragedy. Meanwhile, there are many translated works of Kyd had come out to the readers. He translated- Torquato Tasso’s Padre di Famiglia (1583), published as The Householder’s Philosophy (1588), and Robert Garnier’s Cornelia published with the same name in 1594. Not only that, there are many plays attributed in whole or in part to Kyd, include The Tragedy of Soliman and Perseda, King Leir, Arden of Faversham and Edward III.

Major and Minor Themes of the Works:

Thomas Kyd had his own purposes for writing texts. The scholars have found many important things in his writings. He adapted the horrors, the theme of revenge, the trappings of ghosts and chorus, the long speeches, and the rhetoric of Senecan drama. He represented that whatever life has given to the play is not an argument or idea so much as psychological reality, but these are characters that develop naturally out of the action of the play. He tried to bring together in one play, perhaps not with perfect success, a variety of styles ranging from the sententiousness of his Senecan models to the lyric love combat between two characters- Bel-Imperia and Horatio and the anguished cries of a very worried father. Furthermore, he shows long soliloquy of his character in his writing.

Furthermore, He was also characterized Bohemian in his writings. He likes Bohemian life in the Grub Street of his day. Nevertheless, at the time of Kyd, the whole Kingdom divided into two parts. On the one hand, the north was largely Catholic and on the other hand, the Southern counties were as strongly Protestants. And the country was communalized by political propaganda. Meanwhile, Thomas Kyd tries to represent the present situation of politics in his writings because it may concern the people about the situation of politics in England. He believed it was an age of dreams, of adventure, of unbounded enthusiasm. That’s why; the new literature creates a new heaven to match men’s eyes. Therefore, dreams and deeds increase side by side and the dream is always greater than the deed.

Characteristic Features of the Works:

The play consistently employs dramatic irony, a situation in which one or more characters acts without full knowledge of the facts, but those facts are known by the audience (Thomas Kyd Writing Styles in The Spanish Tragedy). The most important characteristic feature of Thomas Kyd’s works was romantic elements which were overt in his attitude and represented the spirit of the Renaissance. The comparative religious tolerance was also one of the best characteristic features of his writings. His sense of dramatic propriety helped rescue blank verse from monotony for use in genuine dramatic expressions. For example, the line was raved by Hieronimo in The Spanish Tragedy, which is “O eyes, no eyes, but fountains fraught with tears; O life, no life, but lively form of death” (The Spanish Tragedy, Act III, Scene II). His plays also show the self-conscious about underscoring ways that the fit between classical Rome and the Elizabethan present remains problematic.

The Spanish Tragedy:

Whatever is written in Thomas Kyd’s other works; The Spanish Tragedy is an enduring achievement. The subtitle of The Spanish Tragedy is Hieronimo is Mad Again is an Elizabethan tragedy written between 1582 and 1592. It is highly popular and influential in its time. It established a new genre in English theatre, the revenge play or revenge tragedy. The plot of the drama contains several violent murders and includes as one of its characters a personification of revenge. This drama was often referred to the parody in the works written by other Elizabethan playwrights, including William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, and Christopher Marlowe. Along with that, the play was the subject of numerous allusions, especially by way of stage parody and satire, and finally made its way to Germany.

However, Kyd’s work also shows long soliloquy of his character. Further, it also looks at the injustice with people in the Elizabethan Era where people were seeking justice. Such as:

O eyes, no eyes, but fountains fraught with tears; O life, no life, but lively form of death; O world, no world, but mass of public wrongs, Confused and filled with murder and misdeeds! O sacred heavens! If this unhallowed deed, If this inhuman and barbarous attempt, If this incomparable murder thus Of mine, but now no more my son, Shall unrevealed and unavenged pass, How should we term your dealings to be just, If you unjustly deal with those that in your justice trust?”

The Spanish Tragedy, Act III, Scene II

The speaker of the above lines is Hieronimo. He is the protagonist of the story. He is alone on the stage while this passage has occurred. This is his first soliloquy since he discovered his dead son. In it, he creates the central question of the play. He asks how the world is being just when there is so much injustice. It is basically the question of how bad things can happen to good people. Moreover, the above lines also explicate how the language certainly conveys a serious tone, and builds up emotional momentum as Hieronimo condemns first his eyes, then life, then the world, then the heavens themselves, moving from body part to deity in a crescendo of despair. Furthermore, Kyd uses highly elaborate rhetorical style, using alliteration, anaphora and parallel structure, especially in the first five lines of the speech. But when critics attack Kyd’s rhetorical style as being overblown, this is the passage they usually mention. And when later playwrights wanted to mock Kyd’s play, this is the passage they often used (http://www.sparknotes.com/drama/spanishtragedy/quotes.html).

Not only that, Kyd also explicates the love plot. He shows love as an antithesis, parallelism, balance and an oxymoron. For example:

“Let dangers go, they war shall be with me, But such a war as breaks no bond of peace. Speak thou fair words, I’ll cross them with fair words; Send thou sweet looks, I’ll meet them with sweet looks; Write loving lines, I’ll answer loving lines; Give me a kiss, I’ll counter check thy kiss: Be this our warring peace, or peaceful war.”

The Spanish Tragedy, Act II, Scene II

The speaker of the above passage is Bel-Imperia. She is a main female character in the story. In the above passage, she speaks to Horatio, telling him about how she intends to love him on a formal level. This passage also shows how Kyd creates love as an antithesis, parallelism, balance and an oxymoron. Here the oxymoron is a paradox, which is created by putting two words adjacent to each other whose meanings appears in a conflicting way, but further reflection makes some kind of sensation. Such as, in the passage, the word “warring peace” is an oxymoron because war and peace are usually conceived of as polar opposites. But, the love can be conceived of as uniting the two, by combining the interchange and back and forth movement and war with the bliss and concord of peace. Moreover, the statement shows a sympathetic side of the character Bel-Imperia. But, earlier, she was obsessed with thoughts of revenge for her slain lover Andrea and for Horatio. Now, her mind seems light, quick, and playful. In the play, the romantic plot has been traced and strongly coloured by the influence of Senecan tragedy. Finally the study includes the statement of Professor Murray in his book “Thomas Kyd and The Spanish Tragedy” that it “tells us almost nothing about Kyd, but does provide ‘cultural contexts’ for the play (Senecan drama and Roman comedy) together with some analysis of the play’s structure” (Mulryne, 1971, p.659).

The Householder’s Philosophy:

The Householder’s Philosophy is originally published in the Italian language. It was first written by an excellent Italian orator and poet Signior Torquato Tasso. The original title of this drama is Padre di Famiglia (1583). In 1588, Thomas Kyd translated this book and published as The Householder’s Philosophy. In the nineteenth century, it was again translated by T. K. Whereunto. It is annexed a dairy book for all good housewives. However, The Householder’s Philosophy gives an opportunity for the displaying of some odds and ends of classical knowledge. It is also perfectly and profitably described, the true economics and  form of housekeeping. The drama dedicated to all good Housewives dwelling within the County of South-Hampshire. Further, the translator Bartholomew Dowe wishes into them all here in this life, health, wealth, and prosperity: and hereafter in the life to come joyfully and endless felicity.

Ur-Hamlet:

The most important text in the history of English drama is Ur-Hamlet. It is unclear about authorship, but many critics are saying that a little part of this drama has been written by Thomas Kyd. But, Thomas Nashe ascribes Ur-Hamlet to Kyd (Jack, 1905, p. 729). Further, the scholars are now inclined to believe that the play did in fact exist and that Shakespeare probably made use of it for his masterpiece, but most are agreed that there is no firm evidence for associating this play with Thomas Kyd (Thomas Kyd Facts-Biographies, 2017). Nevertheless, it was first performed on the stage of England in between 1588s-89s. It is the story of Hamlet that Shakespeare used in his famous play. It is just like Shakespeare’s play. It explores the revenge theme. Possibly, it is more accurate to say that Shakespeare’s play explores the revenge theme just as Kyd did in his work.

Cornelia:

Thomas Kyd’s closet drama Cornelia was published in 1594. This play creates the debates about the place of classical republicanism within the political mentality of late Elizabethan England. The argument is concerned with the literary critics. Curtis Perry says “the literary critics tend to use as evidence since the nature of the relationship between the stories people tell one another and their political thought can be difficult in practice to pin down” (Perry, 2006, p. 535-36). The play set during the Roman civil wars. It was against the backdrop of Caesar’s victories and the end of the republic. It is one of numerous early modern narratives dealing with the ascension and decline of the Roman Republic. Obviously, the story of the play presents to be relevant to the Elizabethan. But it is in itself not necessary. It is the English writers or their audience to see their own political milieus as a Republican.

The Tragedy of Soliman and Perseda: 

“The Tragedy of Soliman and Perseda is a rarely-performed play, attributed to Thomas Kyd because it appears as Hieronimo’s revenging meta-drama in Act IV of The Spanish Tragedy. As blood-soaked tragedy, it is certainly worthy of so great a writer, though ultimately Kyd’s authorship can never be proved” (Quarmby, 2009). The story of this drama is about love and revenge. In the play, Perseda is a beautiful Rhodes Islander who is besotted with her young Knight, Erastus. The young knight proves himself a triumph in a tournament staged by the Island’s Governor, having exchanged jewelled favours with his beloved. But, unfortunately, the knight loses Perseda’s gift, a precious necklace. As a result, it leads to the death of Ferdinando, and Erastus escapes from there for not to get punished. Later, Erastus proves his valour and honour and is befriended by the hot-tempered Emperor. Furthermore, Soliman elected to occupy Rhodes in the process capturing Perseda. The reason behind such kind of trap is Soliman falls hopelessly in love with Perseda. But, later, Perseda and Erastus are reunited. That’s why; Soliman is forced to see the two young infidels, not as a friend and consort, but as embarrassing enemies. Finally, Soliman kills Erastus and unwarily fighting with disguised Perseda.

Conclusion: 

In the final part of the module, it will be of course noted down that Thomas Kyd will be remembered for his contributions to the English Literature. The scholars find in his writings the best expression of feelings, thought and vigorous action in order to develop the genre of drama. He is still today considered the best dramatist for his The Spanish Tragedy. Although“Kyd’s works mostly contains much interesting material, such as the ways in which Navarre’s reconversion to Catholicism influenced the reception of texts and images, and the use made across different genres of the woodcut of St George and the dragon in asserting connections between France and England” (Gunby, 2003, p.956). It may direct the reader’s attention towards the neglected area of the history and literary study, but it is necessary for current critics to find out the national identity. Further, the translated work of Kyd is, for the most part, a very close translation of original texts, but the choices he makes to shape his received materials make it clear that he is interested both in the story’s application to contemporary English concerns and in testing the limits of the analogy between his Roman story and his English present (Perry, 2006, p.537). That’s why Curtis Perry says in his “The Uneasy Republicanism of Thomas Kyd’s Cornelia” that:

“I want to argue, in other words, that Kyd’s Cornelia is simultaneously an example of Republican political thought—in that it uses this Roman story about the loss of republican liberties to comment on Elizabethan constitutional concerns—and a play that is self-conscious about underscoring ways that the fit between classical Rome and the Elizabethan present remains problematic.”

Perry, 2006, p.537 Hence, it is important to realize that Thomas Kyd was interested in exploring the Roman story. He also addressed correlates to contemporary political concerns and in calling our attention to moments where this kind of parallelism breaks down (Perry, 2006, p.537).

Furthermore, the study also clearly shows that William Shakespeare was very impressed with Thomas Kyd. His influence can be seen in the development of his own dramatic writing, Hamlet. Not only Shakespeare but also Thomas Nashe, Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Heywood, George Sampson is very impressed with his works.

Summary of the Module:

This paper has given a little explanation of Elizabethan Age and its characteristic features of the writings. The main focus of the paper is to represent the life and career of Thomas Kyd, which will help the students and readers to understand the basic things of the Elizabethan drama and the political situation of England. Later it shows how the other writers represent the situation of the people. For a better understanding of Elizabethan age and the writings, the paper has explained Thomas Kyd and his writings. It will also very helpful for the students and readers, those who want to understand the fact of the renaissance of people in England.

Finally, the paper has concluded to make a critical comment on Kyd’s interesting point of view for his materialistic ideas in his writings which will widen the ideas of the students and readers.

Reference

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• Jain, Dr. B. B. Ugc Net/Jrf/Set English Paper II & III. India: Upkar Prakashan. 2000. Boas, Frederick S. The Works of Thomas Kyd. Oxford: The Clarendon Press. 1901.
• Ipgrave, Julia. Adam in Seventeenth Century Political Writing in England and New England. Routledge. 2016.
• Kyd, Thomas. The Spanish Tragedy. edt. J. Schick. Renascence Editions. 2007. Online.
• Perry, Curtis. “The Uneasy Republicanism of Thomas Kyd’s Cornelia.” Criticism, vol. 48, no. 4, 2006, pp. 535–555.
•  Gunby, David. “Beyond ‘The Spanish Tragedy’: A Study of the Works of Thomas Kyd by
•  Thomas Kyd.” The Modern Language Review, vol. 98, no. 4, 2003, pp. 956–957.
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