Poets and Power from Chaucer to Wyatt

by Robert J. Meyer-Lee

• ISBN13: 9780521117067
• ISBN10: 0521117062
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-07-30
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

In the early fifteenth century, English poets responded to a changed climate of patronage, instituted by Henry IV and successor monarchs, by inventing a new tradition of public and elite poetry. Following Chaucer and others, Hoccleve and Lydgate brought to English verse a style and subject matter writing about their King, nation, and themselves, and their innovations influenced a continuous line of poets running through and beyond Wyatt. A crucial aspect of this tradition is its development of ideas and practices associated with the role of poet laureate. Robert J. Meyer-Lee examines the nature and significance of this tradition as it developed from the fourteenth century to Tudor times, tracing its evolution from one author to the next. This study illuminates the relationships between poets and political power and makes plain the tremendous impact this verse has had on the shape of English literary culture.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Notes on citations

Introduction: laureates and beggars

Backgrounds

Laureate poetics

The First Lancastrian Poets

the invention of the English laureate

beggar laureate

From Lancaster to Early Tudor

Lydgateanism

The trace of Lydgate

Epilogue: Sir Thomas Wyatt: anti-laureate

Notes

Works cited

Index

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