Hero And Leander Analysis

B. Relation to the Elizabethan Era

Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593) in an English poet who lived during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, he became famous after he adapted classical text, entitled Ovid’s Elegies (bound with John Davie’s Satyres and Epigrammes), he produced Hero and Leander that as published in 1598. Basically, Hero and Leander is a narrative poem and pick romantic as the theme of this poem. In a specific category, this poem is considered as an epyllion, that is, a "little epic": it is longer than a lyric or elegy, but concerned with love rather than with traditional epic subjects. As the unique style in this era, there are four distinct forms of poetry: lyric, elegy, tragedy and pastoral; so that we can see Marlowe took the similar form of the poem during the Elizabethan era.

Thematically, Elizabethan poetry focused upon romance, courtly love and erotic, though the most popular one was romantic while describing the characters in erotic words, as in the poem of Hero and Leander.

Beside the romantic theme, Marlowe also used myth especially Roman mythological in writing this literary work. How Marlowe describe the character with beauty even Gods spellbound with them. The narrative itself is one of iconic separated lovers, a tale full of Roman mythological references which would have been clear and meaningful to most of Marlowe 's readers. As historians say that during Queen Elizabeth I’s reign there were many discovery of works in literature which is influenced the writers at that time to explore and develop their idea. Marlowe uses which was a technique of the genre is adorning ‒ the narrative with literary and mythological allusions, and not only that, incorporating a complete secondary tale which was either borrowed or invented (as in the Mercury and Neptune episodes in Hero and Leander) (William,