The early chronicle plays such as "The Famous Victories of Henry the Fifth" were, like the chronicles themselves, loosely structured, haphazard, episodic; battles and pageantry, spirits, dreams and curses, added to their appeal. The scholar H. B. Charlton gave some idea of their shortcomings when he spoke of "the wooden patriotism of "The Famous Victories", the crude and vulgar "Life and Death of Jack Straw", the flatness of "The Troublesome Reign of King John", and the clumsy and libellous "Edward I" ". Under the influence of Marlowe's "Tamburlaine", however, c. 1587, with its lofty poetry and its focus on a single unifying figure, of Shakespeare's "Contention" plays, c. 1589–90, and of the machiavels of revenge tragedy, chronicle-plays rapidly became more sophisticated in characterisation, structure, and style. Marlowe himself turned to English history as a result of the success of Shakespeare's "Contention". In "Edward II", c. 1591, he moved from the rhetoric and spectacle of "Tamburlaine" to "the interplay of human character", showing how chronicle material could be compressed and rearranged, and bare hints turned to dramatic effect.