By turns turbulent and weighty, scatalogical and refined, boisterous and delicate, Ben Jonson's works have always excited strong reactions among his readers and his playgoing audiences, just as his personality strongly impressed or offended his contemporaries. Jonson's life displays some of the same apparent contradictions as his work. He was a branded felon and for much of his life a recusant, whose career was punctuated by trouble with the officials of the church and state. Yet he rose to be a favored court poet, a companion of some of the most prominent men and women in the country, and a champion of royal authority. He was the greatest playwright of his age (with one notable exception) and one of the greatest English dramatists of all time; yet he seems to have distrusted the theater as a vehicle for the ethical program that informs his art.

Despite the contradictory...