"How well our barbarous and sex-crazed times relate to the horrors and refined cruelties of Thomas Middleton's extraordinary Jacobean masterpiece...A drama that makes grim, poetic fun of lust-filled aristocrats and lesser folk up to plenty of bad, some of them steaming hot for sex, adultery, murder and revenge."

Nicholas de Jongh, Evening Standard, 05.06.08

"There's a sardonic and even sadistic glee in his poetry and...a lot of dark, dangerous laughter to be found in the play."

Benedict Nightingale, The Times, 06.06.08

"Middleton certainly had a sardonic eye for twisted and compromised morals...His poetry is a vibrant mix of the ornate and the blunt. His so-called tragedy boldly veers into morbid farce, sparking explosive laughter."

Kate Bassett, Independent on Sunday, 08.06.08

"The Elizabethan and Jacobean revenge tragedies had more nasty killings and a higher body count than almost anything written by today's young pretenders, as well as a similarly steamy interest in perverse sex, too."

Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph, 06.06.08

"[Middleton] is black-blooded, foul-mouthed, casual, uncaring - a pioneer of our common tongue, Ossuary English."

Ian Shuttleworth, Financial Times, 10.06.08