In this essay, Ribner traces the roots of the Renaissance chronicle plays back to medieval morality plays and the classical tradition of Senecan drama.

In this essay, Matheson explores the issue of Shakespeare's source materials, using the death scene in Richard II as an example.

In this essay, Forker focuses on the pastoral elements in Shakespeare's histories, suggesting that the pastoral functions to raise the issue of natural order and that in his chronicle plays Shakespeare used the contrast between the epic and pastoral genres to develop the contrast between order and chaos.

In this essay, Schelling focuses on the chronicle plays of the later 1590s and the new elements these works introduced to the genre.

In this essay, Curran reviews the story told in Shakespeare's King Lear as it appears in several chronicle plays, comparing Shakespeare's more poetic treatment of historical events and figures with those of more factual chronicle dramas.

In this essay, Kurtz examines the role of female characters in such plays as Sir Thomas More, Henry IV, Part 1, Henry VI, and Woodstock.

In this essay, Tennenhouse traces changes in Shakespeare's plays concurrent with the movement from Elizabethan to Jacobean politics.

In this essay, Champion uses the example of the anonymous play The Raigne of King Edward III to argue that the chronicle play resonated in different ways with different strata of the audience.

In this essay, Parks takes issue with the traditional notion that Edward II functioned to bring about the transition between the chronicle play and more modern history plays.

In this essay, Saccio provides a background for the historical events addressed in Shakespeare's history plays—events that also comprise the subject matter of several other chronicle plays of the period.

In the following the introduction to a collection of early English chronicle plays, Armstrong details the importance of John Bale's Kynge Johan as one of the first chronicle plays, then discusses later works in the genre, including Edward III, Woodstock, John Ford's Perkin Warbeck, and Robert Davenport's King John and Matilda.