In this long essay I attempt an in-dept analysis of the issues resposible for the downfall of King Edward II. I have done
this from many angle, from the historical, neo-historicist, psycho-analytical and Neo-Marxist point of view: " Drawing upon the
chronicles available during his period Marlowe presented, as it is conventionally taken for, a tragedy of
history. Indeed, in the wake of the growing popularity of history as teacher, the dramatist might have thought it tempting to satisfy the popular demand by catering to them a story directly taken from the chronicles, which the contemporary audiences must have been familiar with. The recognition of history as something having the controlling, regulating and shaping power had, in fact, been the English people’s gradual realization of their position as individuals, as classes and finally as a nation.*construc of gender, masculine dominance, strangely in the country controlled by a woman* In this the drama can be seen in relation to the vogue of courtesy books like the Mirror of the Magistrate: Edward II can be primarily regarded as a precautionary tale as to how the monarchs should rule and how the subjects should reciprocate. These questions of ‘should’ and ‘should not’ lead us to consider some of the unpleasant facts of English history__ division, demarcation, separation, isolation, and of course, obliteration__ facts which are endemic of a culture that seeks to define its identity and preserve its stability by observing stratifications of class and gender. The present paper seeks to put forward the thesis that the tragedy of history arises out of the king’s (Edward II) failure to subscribe to the dominant ideology of the culture, and the culture Marlowe represents here is essentially Elizabethan..."