ABSTRACT
In the epilogue to Arden of Faversham, the murder of Arden, a wealthy landowner from Faversham in Kent, by his wife, Alice, her lover, Mosby, and their accomplices is called a ‘naked tragedy’. Equally disturbing are some of the notes struck in the resolution of the play: the execution of the wholly innocent Bradshaw and the only marginally involved Susan, for example, and the escape of the guilty Clarke. The play is a domestic tragedy: that is, rather than dealing with the downfalls of kings and nobility, as tragedy typically does, it is concerned with the misfortunes and misdeeds of the middle ranks of society. But the generic classification of ‘tragedy’ tells only half the story, for Arden of Faversham has as much in common with ‘history’ plays as it does with tragedy. Whilst the sources of Arden of Faversham in contemporary chronicles are beyond doubt, the question of the play’s authorship remains unresolved.
