"Mahomet and His Heaven (1601) has not fulfilled its author’s dying ambitions. In the 1640s, living a “melancholy and retired” life, drinking “nothing but ale”, William Percy made several manuscript copies of his play, apparently still hoping for a first public performance. Today, such an event is more unlikely than ever. All visual representations of the Prophet cause offence; a work whose concluding Act shows an infatuated Muhammad bending to clean the shoes of a contemptuous woman would provoke anger on an exceptional scale."