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The cycle is the work of many authors, some sourced from the York Cycle. However, the most significant contribution has been attributed to an anonymous author known as the "Wakefield Master." It is believed that his additions include Noah, The First Shepherds' Play, The Second Shepherds' Play, Herod the Great and The Buffeting of Christ.
The plays are one of four virtually complete surviving English mystery play cycles, along with the Chester Mystery Plays, the Towneley/Wakefield plays and the N-Town plays. Two long, composite, and late mystery pageants have survived from the Coventry cycle and there are records and fragments from other similar productions that took place ...
The majority of these plays come from France and Germany and are similar in tone and form, emphasizing sex and bodily excretions. [11] The best-known playwright of farces is Hans Sachs (1494–1576), who wrote 198 dramatic works. In England, The Second Shepherds' Play of the Wakefield Cycle is the best-known early farce.
Despite this, a play cycle was performed in 1568 and the cathedral paid for the stage and beer as in 1562. They were performed in 1572 despite a protest by a minister. [6] One edition of the plays begins with "The Banes which are reade beefore the beginninge of the playes of Chester, 4 June 1600". Each play ends with "Finis.
The plays were performed by a combination of clerics and amateurs and were written in highly elaborate stanza forms; they were often marked by extravagant sets and special effects, but could also be stark and intimate. There was a wide variety of theatrical and poetic styles, even in a single cycle of plays.
4.7 Literature. Toggle the table of contents. ... Download as PDF; Printable version; ... Literature cycle – Play cycle – Sonnet cycle
The Second Shepherds' Play (also known as The Second Shepherds' Pageant) is a famous medieval mystery play which is contained in the manuscript HM1, the unique manuscript of the Wakefield Cycle. These plays are also referred to as the Towneley Plays, on account of the manuscript residing at Towneley Hall.
The name Hegge Plays only briefly caught on, and the most common way to refer to these plays now is The N-Town Plays, after the reference in the last stanza of the opening proclamation that the play was to be played at "N-Town"; when the plays toured from town to town, "N" (meaning nomen, the Latin for name) would be replaced by the name of the ...