Early 17th Century: John Webster

John Webster (c. 1578 - c. 1634) was an English Jacobean dramatist, a late contemporary of William Shakespeare. His tragedies The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi are often regarded as masterpieces of the early 17th-century English stage" (wikipedia). You will want to familiarize yourself with The Duchess of Malfi.

• Biography
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• Essays on John Webster
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• Works (etexts)
  • The Duchess of Malfi
    • Overview, Summary, Plot, Characters
    • etext

• HEARKE, now every thing is still—
  The Screech-Owle, and the whistler shrill,
  Call upon our Dame, aloud,
  And bid her quickly don her shrowd :
  Much you had of Land and rent,
  Your length in clay's now competent.
  A long war disturb'd your minde,
  Here your perfect peace is sign'd—
  Of what is 't fooles make such vaine keeping ?
  Sin their conception, their birth, weeping :
  Their life, a generall mist of error,
  Their death, a hideous storme of terror—
  Strew your haire, with powders sweete :
  Don clean linnen, bathe your feete,
  And (the foule fiend more to checke)
  A crucifixe let blesse your necke,
  'Tis now full tide, 'tweene night, and day,
  End your groane, and come away. (from The Duchess of Malfi)

• More Webster Quotes