Ben Jonson was an English playwright, poet and actor whose career made him one of the defining literary figures of the Jacobean age. After early work as a soldier and performer, he established himself with comedies such as Every Man in His Humour. His temperament and satire repeatedly drew him into trouble: he killed the actor Gabriel Spencer in a duel in 1598, escaped execution through benefit of clergy, and later faced official scrutiny over plays whose political or social targets offended powerful audiences.
Jonson’s major works include Volpone, Epicoene, The Alchemist and Bartholomew Fair, comedies distinguished by classical structure, urban observation and aggressive moral satire. He also became a leading writer of court masques under James VI and I, collaborating and quarrelling with the designer Inigo Jones. A royal pension helped establish his later reputation as an unofficial poet laureate, while the circle of younger writers who called themselves the “Sons of Ben” reflected his unusually strong influence on seventeenth-century English literary culture.
In Philip Gooden’s An Honourable Murderer, Nick Revill accepts a part in a masque organised by Ben Jonson at Somerset House, where the foreign delegation is lodged. The acting company is drawn into the ceremonies, while opponents of reconciliation look towards Walter Raleigh and other displaced Elizabethan courtiers for resistance. When a courtier falls to his death from a stage machine, an apparent rehearsal accident exposes a conspiracy surrounding the treaty.
