We have, in a disjointed manner, no doubt, presented Greene's life under the heads of the sources from which our information is gained, rather than in regular chronological sequence, in order that due discrimination may be used in constructing the finished scheme of his life's activities. To the imaginative reader there is material enough and to spare, but to the exact scientist there is a bare modicum. Without rash assumptions it seems safe to imagine that Greene's father, like Rabbi Bilessi and Gorinius, was well-to-do; that with the exception of the duration of his domestic life, Greene's married life is substantially represented by the story of Isabel and Francesco; that as a playwright Greene experienced the vicissitudes suggested in _Never too Late_ and _A Groatsworth of Wit_; and that his death is substantially represented by Harvey in _Four Letters_. Attempting a bare outline of Greene's life one would feel safe in assuming that he was born not earlier than 1558; that he took his bachelor's degree at St John's College, Cambridge, in 1578; thereafter toured the continent, probably after the 3rd of October 1580, at which date the first part of _Mamillia_ was registered; that returning he took his M.A. at Clare Hall in 1583, and immediately began the composition of love pamphlets and comedies, the latter being now lost; that he married not later than 1585, lived with his wife until after the birth of a child, in 1586 deserted her, and went to London never to return. There undertaking the composition of serious plays, the first extant play is produced in 1587 or 1588, he is incorporated Master of Arts at Oxford in July 1588, and continues "that high and loose course of living which poets generally follow" (Anthony Wood), writing love pamphlets until about 1590, and then, in obedience to a promise repeatedly made by himself, pressing forward the exposure of the devices used by cozeners and conny-catchers, until his untimely death on 3rd September 1592.
During the last twelve years of a short but varied and active life Greene was more or less prominently before the public eye. For much of this time he was easily the most widely read of English writers. His literary activities were scattered over a broad range of topics and styles. In his work there are represented the wit, the romance, the bombast, the Euphuism, the Arcadianism, and no less the new naturalism of his time. He expressed himself in novellas, in pamphlets, in controversial broadsides, in comedies, in serious plays, and in Italianate verse. He was in fact the first _litterateur_[3] of England, and his prose fiction represents what Herford has called "for English-speaking contemporaries the most considerable body of English narrative which the language yet contained." Twenty-seven romances and prose tracts were published during Greene's lifetime, excluding _The Defence of Conny-catching_, which cannot with certainty be ascribed to him; and nine tracts and plays, including the doubtful _George-a-Greene_, were published after his death.