Leicester’s Men and the Lost <i>Telomo</i> of 1583

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12745/et.20.1.2995

Keywords:

lost plays, Leicester's Men, Elizabeth I, Ajax, Telomo

Abstract

This article proposes a new identification for the lost play Telomo, performed at court by Leicester’s Men in 1583. Challenging previous hypotheses that the play might have been either about a character named Ptolemy or about one of the main character’s friends from the Spanish romance Palmerin d’Oliva, this article suggests that the play may have dramatized either episodes involving Ajax Telamonius or his father or, as appears more likely, the episode of ‘The Vnkindly Loue of Telamon to Castibula His Frends Wife’ from Brian Melbancke’s euphuistic romance Philotimus. The Warre betwixt Nature and Fortune (1583).

Author Biography

Domenico Lovascio, Università degli Studi di Genova

Domenico Lovascio (lovascio.domenico@gmail.com) is ricercatore in English literature in the department of Modern Languages and Cultures at the University of Genoa and was a Visiting Scholar at Sheffield Hallam University in 2016. In addition to his monograph on Julius Caesar in early modern English drama and the first English-Italian edition of Jonson’s Catiline, his articles have been published in ELR, BJJ, MRDE, EMLS, and N&Q. He has recently co-edited, with Lisa Hopkins, an issue of Textus on 'The Uses of Rome in English Renaissance Drama' and is editing The Housholders Philosophie for a projected new edition of Kyd’s works (gen. ed. Brian Vickers). He is also a contributor to the LPD.

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Published

2017-07-04

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Section

Articles