Dramatist. Nabbes was active during the last decade of the English Renaissance, before the Civil War shut down London's theatres in 1642, and his gently refined plays glance back at earlier stage traditions. He experimented with city comedy ("Covent Garden" and "Tottenham Court", both 1633), Jonsonian comedy ("The Bride", 1638), history play ("Hannibal and Scipio", 1635), verse tragedy ("The Unfortunate Mother", 1640), and royal court masques (including "The Spring's Glory", 1638). With "Microcosmus" (1637) he revived the Tudor morality play, in a sense bringing early English drama full-circle. Nabbes was born in Worcestershire and studied at Oxford University, which he left without a degree. Around 1630 he settled in London as a playwright, though with middling success. He did well with comedy, and his lightweight touch and scholarly interests made him ideal for writing masques, a genre that did not long survive him; but tragedy was beyond his scope. His last play, "The Unfortunate Mother", was rejected by the theatre company it was intended for, and he had to make do with the consoling verses from friends added to its 1640 published edition. For centuries there was uncertainty about Nabbes' fate and burial. In a 1628 poem he expressed hope that one day he would be worthy of entombment at Worcester Cathedral in his native Worcestershire, while an 18th Century theatre historian insisted he was interred at London's Temple Church. There were no records for him in either place. In the mid-1900s it was finally discovered that Nabbes was buried on April 6, 1641, in his parish churchyard of St. Giles in the Fields. His two young children, Bridget and William, joined him there over the next two years.