The Maid's Revenge is an early Caroline era stage the play, the earliest extant tragedy by James Shirley. It was first published in 1639.
The Maid's Revenge was licensed for performance by Sir Henry Herbert, the Master of the Revels, on 9 February 1626. It was the second of Shirley's plays to be produced (after Love Tricks in 1625). The play was acted by Queen Henrietta's Men at the Cockpit Theatre, as were most of Shirley's plays in this era. The 1639 quarto was issued by the bookseller William Cooke, and was dedicated by Shirley to Henry Osborne, esq.
Shirley based his plot on the seventh story in the collection by John Reynolds called The Triumphs of God's Revenge Against the Crying and Execrable Sin of Murder.[1]
Critics have been divided on the merits of the play. Schelling, who judged it positively, described it as "a tragedy of much promise, full of swift action, capably plotted, and fluently and lucidly written."[2] The play was revived on the stage during the Restoration era.