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How long did Christopher Marlowe’s playwriting career last?

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Marlowe or not Marlowe? — Christopher Marlowe Detail of a portrait thought to be of Christopher Marlowe, dated 1585, artist unknown; in the collection of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, England.

Christopher Marlowe’s playwriting career spanned little more than six years. Despite this short duration, he produced some of the most vital works of Elizabethan literature, establishing the use of dramatic blank verse in English drama.12