§11. The last period. VII. Tourneur and Webster. Vol. 6. The Drama to 1642, Part Two. The Cambridge History of English and American Literature: An Encyclopedia in Eighteen Volumes. 1907

The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21).
Volume VI. The Drama to 1642, Part Two.

VII. Tourneur and Webster.

§ 11. The last period.

From the tragedies we pass to the closing period of Webster’s activity (1618? to his death). The plays which would seem to belong to this period are five: The Guise (mentioned in the dedication to The Devils Law-case), and A Late Murther of the Sonne upon the Mother (in partnership with Ford, 1624) both, unfortunately, lost; The Devils Law-case, published in 1623; Appius and Virginia, in 1654; and A Cure for a Cuckold, in 1661. None of the three which survive approaches the level of the two tragedies. All, however, contain occasional flashes of the genius which created The White Divel and The Dutchesse Of Malfy, though rather of its poetic, than its dramatic, quality. Save in Appius, which owes much to the Roman tragedies of Shakespeare, Webster is now working under quite other, and less inspiring, influences. With him, as with other dramatists of the period, the star of Fletcher is in the ascendant.