Unusually for a Restoration dramatist, John Crowne’s life was dominated by his father’s dream of land in North America. In fact, it is not an exaggeration to say that the life of this man of many dramatic genres – he wrote comedies, tragedies, histories, Shakespeare and Racine adaptations and even a pastoral court masque – was in many ways more distinctive than his work, which Robert D. Hume has described as “second-rate Dryden”.
William Crowne, resident of St Martin’s-in-the-Fields parish and Rouge Dragon Pursuivant of Arms to Charles I, survived the Civil War with diplomatic aplomb by marrying into a family of Shropshire Parliamentarians and discharging a number of offices in that county during Cromwell’s …
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Citation: Roberts, David. "John Crowne". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 07 April 2009 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=1084, accessed 26 November 2024.]