The Insatiate Countess - Authorship

Authorship

Modern scholarship generally regards the play as a composite work. The play's text shows a range of commonalities with Barkstead's two non-dramatic narrative poems, Myrrha (published 1607) and Hiren (1611). Critics have not agreed on the nature of Marston's connection. Some have argued that Marston started the play, but left it unfinished when he encountered his second bout of legal troubles in 1607 and 1608, and that Barkstead and Machin later completed the script. Others have suggested that Marston's contribution is concentrated in the comic subplot.

Little is known of Barkstead, and even less of Machin. Barkstead (or Barksted, Barksteed, Backstead, etc.) was an actor with several companies, including the Lady Elizabeth's Men and Prince Charles's Men, in the 1607–16 period, as well as a poet. Machin collaborated with Gervase Markham on The Dumb Knight (1608), and probably was the "L. M." who contributed eclogues to Barkstead's Myrrha.

In his analysis of the play's text, modern editor Giorgio Melchiori sees Act I, the beginning of Act II, and portions of Act V scene i as the remains of Marston's original authorship, though reworked by Barkstead and Machin, while the rest of Act II and Acts III and IV constitute little Marston and mostly Barkstead/Machin. The final scene, V,ii, is a makeshift ending tacked on by an "unscrupulous hack", to turn a defective play text into publishable form.

Conversely, David Lake has argued against Marston's presence, and Martin Wiggins assigns the play to Barkstead and Machin in his 1988 edition.