More's Richard III and Jonson's Richard Crookback and Sejanus

Abstract

The sum listed <£10 was substantial, suggesting either that the additions were extensive or that Jonson's play on King Richard III was nearly complete. 1 Yet no other unambiguous record of the play survives, and most catalogues list it simply as lost. However, the possibility that the play was not lost but was deliberately suppressed, as Jonson seems to have suppressed other early works, has also been raised. Various explanations have been offered for why Jonson may have chosen not to publish this play. Perhaps he rejected it as not wholly his; after all, Sejanus survives only in a rewritten version designed to eliminate the work of an anonymous collaborator. Or perhaps Jonson, dissatisfied with the work, withdrew it from posterity's judgment. Despite his early reputation as a competent