Curated category
17th-century English male writers
- James MabbeJames Mabbe was born in 1572, and for much of history he has been a figure glimpsed only in the margins of greater names.
- William ShakespeareWilliam Shakespeare signed his last will and testament on the 25th of March 1616, describing himself in it as being in "perfect health." Within a month he…
- John Davies of HerefordJohn Davies of Hereford wore his hometown like a badge. Born around 1565 in Hereford, he appended the city's name to his own specifically to separate himself…
- George Wyatt (writer)George Wyatt entered the world in January 1554 at Allington Castle. His bloodline carried heavy historical weight from his grandfather Sir Thomas Wyatt the…
- Ben JonsonBen Jonson killed a man in a field on the 22nd of September 1598 and walked away from the gallows by reciting a Bible verse.
- John MiltonJohn Milton sold the rights to one of the greatest poems in the English language for five pounds. On the 27th of April 1667, he handed Paradise Lost to the…
- John LockeJohn Locke composed his own obituary in Latin, and it begins with a command to a passerby. "Stay traveller: near this place lies JOHN LOCKE." The tablet, he…
- Leonard Digges (writer)Leonard Digges entered University College, Oxford in 1603. This was the same year his mother remarried Thomas Russell of Alderminster.
- Isaac NewtonSir Isaac Newton said his mother told him he was so small at birth that he could have fit inside a quart mug. He was born prematurely on Christmas Day, the…
- Michael DraytonMichael Drayton was born in Hartshill, near Nuneaton, Warwickshire, in early 1563, and he would spend the next seven decades producing a body of work that…
- University WitsThe University Wits were a group of late 16th-century English playwrights and pamphleteers whose university educations made them almost unemployable.
- Francis BaconFrancis Bacon dictated his last letter from a borrowed bed in Highgate, his fingers, he wrote, so disjointed with sickness that he could not steadily hold a…
- John Fletcher (playwright)John Fletcher was baptised on the 20th of December 1579 in Rye, Sussex, and for much of the seventeenth century his name stood alongside William…
- William CamdenWilliam Camden was born in London on the 2nd of May 1551, into a city that had barely begun to reckon with its own past.
- John DrydenJohn Dryden was attacked at around 8 pm on the 18th of December 1679, beaten by hired thugs in Rose Alley behind the Lamb and Flag pub in Covent Garden.
- Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of OxfordEdward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford was born on the 12th of April 1550 at Hedingham Castle in Essex, heir to the second-oldest earldom in England.
- Henry WottonHenry Wotton was born on the 30th of March 1568 at Bocton Hall in Kent. His father Thomas Wotton died in 1587 leaving Henry only a hundred marks a year.
- Nicholas Rowe (writer)Nicholas Rowe died on the 6th of December 1718, and within a year the King of England had sent his widow a pension. Not as condolence, exactly. As payment.
- John HemingesJohn Heminges entered the world on the 25th of November 1566. His name appeared in the register of St Peter de Witton Church in Droitwich, Worcestershire.