Every Man Out Of His Humour

Jonson's Every Man Out of His Humour is a comical satire about envy and aspiration among the ambitious middle classes, who seek happiness in fame and material fortune. This first critical edition of the play conveys early modern obsessions with wealth and self-display through historical contexts. The book offers an intriguing look at the course of urban comedy, and a wealth of information about social relationships and colloquial language at the end of the Elizabethan period.

Jonson's Every Man Out of His Humour is a comical satire about envy and aspiration among the ambitious middle classes, who seek happiness in fame and material fortune. This first critical edition of the play conveys early modern obsessions with wealth and self-display through historical contexts. The book offers an intriguing look at the course of urban comedy, and a wealth of information about social relationships and colloquial language at the end of the Elizabethan period.

In the late sixteenth century, English playwright Ben Jonson revitalized an ancient style of comedic theater known as "comedy of humours." Drawing on the theory that each person has a particular trait -- or "humour" -- that defines their personality and perspective, Every Man in His Humour explores what happens when people with diametrically opposed humours are forced to interact with each other.

This is the 1601 quarto version of Ben Jonson's play, set in Florence. The text is edited and modernised, and instead of endorsing the folio version as the superior play, the introduction seeks to understand this version on its own terms.

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Excerpt from Every Man Out of His Humour, 1600 The four collotype plates represent A2 recto (title-page) and B1 recto of the first edition from the British Museum copy, A1 recto (title-page) of the second edition from the Dyce copy, and A1 recto (title-page) of the third edition from the British Museum copy. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.