As a topic of my drama class, we are supposed to write an essay on the historical background and the historical development of English Drama. From...

There
are a large number of antecedents to modern English drama. This answer focuses on European
sources from the Middle Ages onward. English drama owes a great to deal to the classical
antecedents. Roman drama drew heavily on the earlier Greek drama but also developed unique
styles of comedy and . The plots, many of the stock characters, and dramatic conventions such as
thewere later adapted by English playwrights.

In Medieval Europe,
Christianity provided a strong impetus for dramatic developments. The Miracle and Mystery plays,
which were often staged by traveling bands of players, adapted Biblical tales to their
contemporaries. One early example with staying power is Everyman. Mystery
plays were drawn from events in the life of Jesus Christ, hence their alternate name, Corpus
Christi plays. The York Cycle is among those that survive. Often supported by guilds, cycles
were linked to specific locations, such as York and Chester, and some were still being performed
when professional acting companies were established in the late-sixteenth century.

Elizabethan drama, notably that of William Shakespeare, is considered the golden age of
English drama. Other notable playwrights of the era were Christopher Marlow and Ben Johnson.
Along with comedies and tragedies, and history plays also became an established element of
playwrights repertoires. The formal structure of five acts continued as the standard in
seventeenth-century Jacobean drama, from the reign of James I.

Under the
Puritans, the theaters were considered decadent, and were closed in the 1650s€“1650s. With the
late-seventeenth-century Restoration of the monarchy, however, productions became more
excessive, and sexual intrigues were soon a regular aspect of dramas; older plays were also
revived. By the early-seventeenth century, plays based on vernacular English themes were
regularly produced; notable among them is John Gays Beggars
Opera.

The Enlightenment ushered in a focus on the individual,
embraced by Romanticism, but the emphasis on reason over emotion led to the development of . The
popularity of theater, actors became celebrities, such as Edmund Kean; they were often renowned
for their performances of Shakespeare, whose works were sometimes rewritten with happy
endings.

The late-nineteenth century is fully part of the modern age.
Significant social commentaries, often through , became established cornerstones of English
drama, while two major contributors were actually Irish: George Bernard Shaw and Oscar
Wilde.

For further information on the earlier antecedents in Greek and Roman
drama, including individual playwrights