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Breeching the boy in Marlowe's Edward II.(essay)(Critical essay)

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From: Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900
Date: 20060322
Author:Rutkoski, Marie

Though Christopher Marlowe's Edward II (c. 1592) has long received copious, imaginative, critical attention, the significance of one aspect of the play has been quite neglected. As if he had been sent to stand in an obscure corner, the boy Prince Edward is rarely mentioned, let alone featured, in Marlovian criticism. (1) This paper argues that understanding the boy's role in Edward II is integral to understanding the most troubling features of the play as a whole. Taking part in a recent critical conversation about the sodomitical nature of Edward II, I describe how Marlowe deftly ...

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