Editing English drama (section)

==Medieval period==
{{Main|Medieval theatre}}
By the [[medieval]] period, the [[Mummers Play|mummers' plays]] had developed, a form of early street theatre associated with the [[Morris dance]], concentrating on themes such as [[Saint George]] and the [[European dragon|Dragon]] and [[Robin Hood]].  These were [[Folklore|folk tale]]s re-telling old stories, and the actors travelled from town to town performing these for their audiences in return for money and hospitality.

===English mystery plays===
{{Main|Mystery play}}
[[File:ChesterMysteryPlay 300dpi.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Nineteenth-century engraving of a performance from the Chester [[mystery play]] [[play cycle|cycle]].]]
Mystery plays and [[miracle plays]] (sometimes distinguished as two different forms,<ref>'Properly speaking, Mysteries deal with Gospel events only. Miracle Plays, on the other hand, are concerned with incidents derived from the legends of the saints of the Church.' {{cite book|last=Ward|first=Augustus William|title=History of English dramatic literature|url=https://archive.org/details/ahistoryenglish03wardgoog|publisher=Macmillan|location=London, England|year=1875 }}</ref> although the terms are often used interchangeably) are among the earliest formally developed [[Play (theatre)|plays]] in [[medieval]] [[Europe]]. Medieval mystery plays focused on the representation of [[Bible]] stories in [[Church (building)|churches]] as [[tableau vivant|tableaux]] with accompanying [[antiphon]]al song. They developed from the 10th to the 16th century, reaching the height of their popularity in the 15th century before being rendered obsolete by the rise of professional theatre. The name derives from ''[[Sacred Mysteries|mystery]]''  used in its sense of ''[[miracle]]'',<ref>{{cite book|title=[[Oxford English Dictionary]]|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford, England|date=December 2009|chapter=mystery, n<sup>1</sup> 9}}</ref> but an occasionally quoted derivation is from ''misterium'', meaning ''[[craft]]'', a play performed by the [[craft guilds]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Gassner|first=John|author2=Quinn, Edward|title=The Reader's Encyclopedia of World Drama|publisher=Methuen|location=London|year=1969|pages=203–204|chapter=England: middle ages|oclc=249158675}}</ref>

There are four complete or nearly complete extant English biblical collections of plays from the late [[medieval period]]; although these collections are sometimes referred to as "cycles," it is now believed that this term may attribute to these collections more coherence than they in fact possess. The most complete is the ''[[York Mystery Plays|York cycle]]'' of forty-eight pageants. They were performed in the city of [[York]], from the middle of the fourteenth century until 1569. There are also the ''[[Wakefield Cycle|Towneley plays]]'' of thirty-two pageants, once thought to have been a true 'cycle' of plays and most likely performed around the [[Corpus Christi (feast)|Feast of Corpus Christi]] probably in the town of [[Wakefield]], England during the late [[Middle Ages]] until 1576. The ''[[Ludus Coventriae]]'' (also called the [[N Town plays]]" or ''Hegge cycle''), now generally agreed to be a redacted compilation of at least three older, unrelated plays, and the ''[[Chester Mystery Plays|Chester cycle]]'' of twenty-four pageants, now generally agreed to be an Elizabethan reconstruction of older medieval traditions. Also extant are two pageants from a New Testament [[Coventry Mystery Plays|cycle acted at Coventry]] and one pageant each from Norwich and Newcastle upon Tyne. Additionally, a fifteenth-century play of the life of [[Mary Magdalene]], ''[[The Brome Abraham and Isaac]]'' and a sixteenth-century play of the ''Conversion of [[Paul of Tarsus|Saint Paul]]'' exist, all hailing from [[East Anglia]]. Besides the [[Middle English]] drama, there are three surviving plays in [[Cornish language|Cornish]] known as the [[Ordinalia]].

These biblical plays differ widely in content. Most contain episodes such as the ''Fall of Lucifer'', the ''Creation and Fall of Man'', ''Cain and Abel'', ''Noah and the Flood'', ''Abraham and Isaac'', the ''Nativity'', the ''Raising of Lazarus'', the ''Passion'', and the ''Resurrection''. Other pageants included the story of ''Moses'', the ''Procession of the Prophets'', ''Christ's Baptism'', the ''Temptation in the Wilderness'', and the ''Assumption and Coronation of the Virgin''. In given cycles, the plays came to be sponsored by the newly emerging Medieval [[craft guild]]s. The York [[mercery|mercers]], for example, sponsored the ''Doomsday'' pageant. Other guilds presented scenes appropriate to their trade: the building of the [[Noah's Ark|Ark]] from the carpenters' guild; the [[Feeding the multitude|five loaves and fishes]] miracle from the bakers; and the [[visit of the Magi]], with their offerings of gold, frankincense and myrrh, from the goldsmiths.<ref>{{cite book|last=Oxenford|first=Lyn|title=Playing Period Plays |year=1958|publisher=Coach House Press|location=Chicago, IL|isbn=0853435499|page=3}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Mikics|first=David |title=A New Handbook of Literary Terms |url=https://archive.org/details/newhandbookliter00miki|url-access=limited|year=2007|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven, CT|isbn=9780300106367|page=[https://archive.org/details/newhandbookliter00miki/page/n210 194]}}</ref> The guild associations are not, however, to be understood as the method of production for all towns. While the Chester pageants are associated with guilds, there is no indication that the N-Town plays are either associated with guilds or performed on [[pageant wagon]]s. Perhaps the most famous of the mystery plays, at least to modern readers and audiences, are those of Wakefield. Unfortunately, we cannot know whether the plays of the Towneley manuscript are actually the plays performed at Wakefield but a reference in the ''Second Shepherds' Play'' to [[Horbury|Horbery]] Shrogys ([https://web.archive.org/web/20020830231810/http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-old?data=%2Flv1%2FArchive%2Fmideng-parsed&division=div&id=AnoTown&images=images%2Fmodeng&part=13&tag=public The Towneley plays] line 454) is strongly suggestive

===Morality plays===
The [[morality play]] is a [[genre]] of [[Middle Ages|Medieval]] and [[Tudor period|early Tudor]] theatrical entertainment. In their own time, these plays were known as "interludes", a broader term given to dramas with or without a [[Morality|moral]] theme.<ref>Richardson and Johnston (1991, 97-98).</ref> Morality plays are a type of [[allegory]] in which the [[protagonist]] is met by [[personification]]s of various [[morality|moral]] attributes who try to prompt him to choose a Godly life over one of evil. The plays were most popular in [[Europe]] during the 15th and 16th centuries. Having grown out of the religiously based [[mystery play]]s of the Middle Ages, they represented a shift towards a more secular base for European theatre.

''The Somonyng of Everyman'' (''The Summoning of Everyman''), usually referred to simply as ''[[Everyman (15th-century play)|Everyman]]'', is a late 15th-century English [[morality play]]. Like [[John Bunyan]]'s 1678 [[Christianity|Christian]] novel ''[[Pilgrim's Progress]]'', ''Everyman'' examines the question of [[Christian salvation]] by use of allegorical characters, and what Man must do to attain it. The premise is that the good and evil deeds of one's life will be tallied by God after death, as in a ledger book. The play is the allegorical accounting of the life of Everyman, who represents all mankind. In the course of the action, Everyman tries to convince other characters to accompany him in the hope of improving his account. All the characters are also allegorical, each personifying an abstract idea such as Fellowship, [material] Goods, and Knowledge. The conflict between good and evil is dramatized by the interactions between characters.