The Reputation of CliristopJier Marlotve. 373 



Tru. Well, Sir! I'm not angry; but I'll not be call'd Taiiicrlin by any 



is 



man. 



Doctor Faiistits was hardly less frequently referred to than Tam- 

 hurlaine by Marlowe's contemporaries, and it was almost equally 

 imitated. Whether Greene's Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay was 

 suggested by it is doubtful on grounds of chronology ; but it seems 

 clear that Faustus inspired important elements in the plot of Old 

 Fortunutus (1600) by Dekker, The Devil's Charter (1607) by 

 Barnes, Tlie Merry Devil of Edmonton, and many other stage 

 successes of the day. Imitation of noted passages abounds. The 

 filchings from Faustus and Taniburlaine in The Taming of a 

 Shrew (1594) are among the most glaring examples of Elizabethan 

 plagiarism. Greene's James IV contains several apparent borrow- 

 ings, as in the genealogy of Slipper (Act IV, sc. iii), and the lines: 



Mee thinkes I see her blushing steale a kisse, 

 Vniting both your soules by such a sweete, 

 And you, my King, suck Nectar from her lips.''' 



In the Looking Glass for London by Greene and Lodge parallels 

 to lines 400 ff. and 1439 f. have been pointed out;^° in the anony- 

 mous Caesa/s Revenge (1607), parallels to lines 295, 1287, and 

 1342." 



. The line, 'Was this the face that launched a thousand ships?' 

 evidently stuck in Shakespeare's memory. He parodies it in 

 Troilus and Cressida, II. ii. 81-83 : 



**Bullen's statement, 'From Cowley's Guardian it appears that Taiubnt- 

 laine was revived at the Bull about 1650,' is a slip. '650 was the date of 

 publication of the play, but the revival of Taniburlaine was evidently earlier 

 than Alarch, 1641, when the Guardian was acted, and consequently earlier 

 than the closing of the theatres. The allusion to Taniburlaine is retained 

 (in Act III, sc. vii) in the revised version of the Guardian published in 1661 

 as Cutter of Coknian-Strcct. Another disparaging reference occurs in 

 Cowley's Ode, Of Wit: 



' 'Tis not such Lines as almost crack the Stage 

 When Bajasct begins to rage. 

 Nor a tall Metaphor in the Bombast imy . . .' 



""Act IV, Scene v (ed. Collins, 11. 1728 ff.). Compare Doctor Faustus, 

 11. 1331 f. 

 ^'' R. A. Law, Modern Language Notes, May, 191 1. 

 " Charles Crawford, Malone Society Collections, I. 292 f. 



