Abstract
"One cannot understand Elizabethan drama without grasping the spirit of the Renaissance." Such a statement gives at least some authority to the manner of' presentation that has been adopted with this study of' the first Elizabethan tragedy, Gorboduc. It is always with hesitation, apology, and strained explanation that one proceeds on a work of social and biographical criticism. "For what matters," a student of objective criticism would say, "is what the poet says." But with drama this is all too naive. The dramatist must do more than satisfy his poetic personality. To be heard he must please an audience of living people, submit the medium of his work to human actors and the conventions and tastes or the stage of his day.