Timeline
Title
Country/Nationality
Ben Jonson
Benjamin Jonson was an English playwright and poet. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence upon English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours; he is best known for the satirical plays Every Man in His Humour (1598), Volpone, or The Fox (c. 1606), The Alchemist (1610) and Bartholomew Fair (1614) and for his lyric and epigrammatic poetry. "He is generally regarded as the second most important English dramatist, after William Shakespeare, during the reign of James I."
Jonson was a classically educated, well-read and cultured man of the English Renaissance with an appetite for controversy (personal and political, artistic and intellectual) whose cultural influence was of unparalleled breadth upon the playwrights and the poets of the Jacobean era (1603–1625) and of the Caroline era (1625–1642).
His ancestors spelled the family name with a letter "t" (Johstone or Johnstoun). While the spelling had eventually changed to the more common "Johnson", the playwright's own particular preference became "Jonson".
Books by Ben Jonson
The Alchemist
The Alchemist is a comedy by English playwright Ben Jonson. First performed in 1610 by the King's Men, it is generally considered Jonson's best and most characteristic comedy; Samuel Taylor Coleridge believed that it had one of the three most perfect...
The Devil is an Ass
In a world where greed and corruption rule, one man is determined to outwit the devil himself. Ben Jonson's The Devil is an Ass is a satirical comedy that follows the exploits of Pug, a junior devil who is sent to Earth to possess a wealthy man name...
Forest
The Forest is a short collection of Ben Jonson's poetry. This collection of fifteen poems first appeared in the 1616 first folio of his collected works. (Summary by Sheldon Greaves)
To Celia
LibriVox volunteers bring you 12 recordings of To Celia by Ben Jonson. This was the Weekly Poetry project for March 6th, 2011.Benjamin Jonson was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor. A contemporary of William Shakespeare, he is best know...
Simplex Munditiis
LibriVox volunteers bring you 20 recordings of Simplex Munditiis by Ben Jonson. This was the Weekly Poetry project for February 26, 2012.Ben Jonson was an English poet and playwright. He had a huge influence on both the theatre of his day and that wh...
Volpone, or, The Fox
Volpone is a comedy by Ben Jonson first produced in 1606, drawing on elements of city comedy and beast fable. A merciless satire of greed and lust, it remains Jonson's most-performed play, and it is among the finest Jacobean Era comedies. Volpone is...
Every Man In His Humour
Knowell, an old man - rumor says Shakespeare originally played this part - tries to spy upon the doings of his potentially wayward son. Meanwhile, Kitely, a merchant, worries so much about being cuckolded by his wife that perhaps it has to happen. Al...
Every Man Out of His Humour
Every Man Out of His Humour followed Jonson's play Every Man In His Humour. "This play as a fabric of plot is a very slight affair; but as a satirical picture of the manners of the time, proceeding by means of vivid caricature, couched in witty and b...
Cynthia's Revels, or The Fountain of Self-Love
"Cynthia's Revels," the second "comical satire," was acted in 1600, and, as a play, is even more lengthy, elaborate, and impossible than "Every Man Out of His Humour." Here personal satire seems to have absorbed everything, and while much of the cari...