The age of Shakespeare was a great time in English history. The reign of Elizabeth (1558 - 1603) saw England emerge as the leading naval and commercial power of the Western world. Elizabeth I's England consolidated its position with the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588, and firmly established the Church of England (begun by her father, Henry VIII, after a dispute with the Pope). Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Sir Walter Raleigh sent colonists eastward in search …
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…merchant middle class was carving out a productive livelihood, and the economy was booming. In the 1580's, the writings of the University Wits (Marlowe, Greene, Lyly, Kyd, and Peele) defined the London theatre. Though grounded in medieval/Jacobean roots, these men produced new dramas and comedies using Marlowe's styling of blank verse. Shakespeare outdid them all; he combined the best traits of Elizabethan drama with classical sources, enriching the admixture with his imagination and wit.