This guy. Yeah, you've probably heard of him. He's pretty cool. There's a lot of controversy over whether or not he was, um, himself, or a group of writers working under the same name. Either way,...

Marlowe was a regular pirate. Well, not exactly. But he was a spy who got stabbed in the eye. And that's not even why he was famous. He was a bad-boy playwright whose favorite topic was the darker...

All Milton ever wanted was to be the best poet ever. Is that too much to ask?Now, we're not keeping score or anything, but the guy came pretty close to achieving his goal. His Paradise Lost is one...

John Donne loved language, women, and being an Anglican. Oh, and using very big words to talk about them. His opus focused on themes of love and devotion—both the physical and the spiritual kinds...

We're not going to lie. Ben Jonson is fun. Like Shakespeare, he wrote poems as well as plays. He is best known for his satires, but actually made his career creating masques. Masques were elaborate...

You know you're a celebrated poet when other poets carry your casket during your funeral. Oh, and they offer up pens and lines of verse along with their tears. Spenser lived and wrote during the ea...