Who Ever Loved That Loved Not at First Sight?

Christopher Marlowe 1564 (Canterbury, Kent) – 1593 (Deptford, Kent)



It lies not in our power to love or hate,
For will in us is overruled by fate.
When two are stripped, long ere the course begin,
We wish that one should love, the other win;

And one especially do we affect
Of two gold ingots, like in each respect:
The reason no man knows; let it suffice
What we behold is censured by our eyes.
Where both deliberate, the love is slight:
Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on May 01, 2023

25 sec read
1,292

Quick analysis:

Scheme AABB CCXXDD
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 416
Words 84
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 4, 6

Christopher Marlowe

Christopher Marlowe, also known as Kit Marlowe, was an English playwright, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. Modern scholars count Marlowe among the most famous of the Elizabethan playwrights and based upon the "many imitations" of his play Tamburlaine consider him to have been the foremost dramatist in London in the years just before his mysterious early death. Some scholars also believe that he greatly influenced William Shakespeare, who was baptised in the same year as Marlowe and later became the pre-eminent Elizabethan playwright. Marlowe's plays are the first to use blank verse, which became the standard for the era, and are distinguished by their overreaching protagonists. Themes found within Marlowe's literary works have been noted as humanistic with realistic emotions, which some scholars find difficult to reconcile with Marlowe's "anti-intellectualism" and his catering to the taste of his Elizabethan audiences for generous displays of extreme physical violence, cruelty, and bloodshed. Events in Marlowe's life were sometimes as extreme as those found in his dramas. Reports of Marlowe’s death in 1593 were particularly infamous in his day and are contested by scholars today due to a lack of good documentation. Traditionally, the playwright’s death has been blamed on a long list of conjectures, including a barroom fight, church libel, homosexual intrigue, betrayal by another playwright, and espionage from the highest level: Elizabeth I of England’s Privy Council. An official coroner account of Marlowe's death was only revealed in 1925, but it did little to persuade all scholars that it told the whole story nor did it eliminate the uncertainties present in his biography. more…

All Christopher Marlowe poems | Christopher Marlowe Books

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