The Dutch Courtesan by John Marston - They sell their bodies; do not better persons sell their souls?

MALHEUREUX This lust is a most deadly sin, sure. FREEVILL Nay, ‘tis a most lively sin, sure. (I.1, 9) Now there is an efficient statement of a theme of John Marston’s A Dutch Courtesan (performed c. 1604, published 1605). It is the most sexually explicit Elizabethan or Jacobean play I have come across, explicit in its talk, of course, it is all talk, what do you think was happening on the English stage. And this was again first performed for a high-paying audience by a boys company. That is also has more flatulence jokes than – or let’s say as many – as any period play I know tells us what about the six-penny audience compared to the famous vulgar one-penny groundlings in the Shakespeare audience. The play is also full of tags in Latin. Perhaps that was flattering. Free Will is getting married to a quite nice young woman, so he is giving up his fiery, beautiful Dutch prostitute, Franceshina. His friend Unhappy spends the first scene, as we see above, lecturing Freevill about his…