Additional Readings

Old English    Back to top

• Lord's Prayer:  In Old English; version from Corpus Christi College MS 140.  Includes an audio recording by Cathy Ball; see also Prof. Ball's page on The Lord's Prayer in English for other versions.  (Georgetown U.)  (Required)
• Caedmon's Hymn:  The text of the poem in Old English, with a modern translation; link to an audio file of the poem appears to be out of date.  (U. of Virginia)  (Required)
• "The Wanderer":  Edition of the Old English text and a "free translation" into modern English.  (Required)
• "The Seafarer":  Old English text and a choice of three translations.  (U. of Saskatchewan)  (Required)

Middle English (General)    Back to top

• The End of Europe's Middle Ages:  A series of online tutorials. Broad historical and cultural background for the late Middle Ages. (U. of Calgary)
  All of this site is worth reading; however, the following sections are especially useful for this course:
  • Economy  (Required)
  • Feudal Institutions  (Required)
  • New Monarchies  (Required)
  • The Church  (Required)
  • Literature  (Required)
  • Intellectual Life  (Required)
  • Visual Arts  (Optional)
  • Music  (Optional)
• Language and Linguistics (Harvard Chaucer Page): The best online guide to the pronunciation and grammar of Chaucerian Middle English. The following sections are most useful for this course:
  • The English Language in the Fourteenth Century  (Required)
  • Chaucer's Pronunciation, Grammar and Vocabulary  (Browse through this first, and then study it as we read.)

Chaucer (from the Harvard Chaucer Page)    Back to top

The "general note" on each of the tales and on the General Prologue is a good place to start your reading.  There are also useful critical articles on a number of the tales included on this site.

• The General Prologue
  • The General Prologue (general note)  (Required)
  • E. T. Donaldson, "Chaucer the Pilgrim"  (Required)
• The Knight
  • The Knight's Tale (general note)  (Required)
  • Charles Muscatine, "The Knight's Tale", from Chaucer and the French Tradition.  (Required)
  • David Aers, "Imagination, Order and Ideology: The Knight's Tale", from Chaucer, Langland, and the Creative Imagination.  (Required)
  • Susan Crane, "Medieval Romance and Feminine Difference in the Knight's Tale"  (Recommended)
• The Miller
  • The Miller's Tale (general note)  (Required)
• The Wife of Bath
  • The Wife of Bath's Prologue (general note)  (Required)
  • The Wife of Bath's Tale (general note)  (Required)
  • Mary Carruthers, "The Wife of Bath and the Painting of Lions"  (Recommended)
• The Merchant
  • The Merchant's Tale (general note)  (Required)
• The Franklin and the Marriage Group
  • The Franklin's Tale (general note)  (Required)
  • George Lyman Kittredge, "Chaucer's Discussion of Marriage"  (Required)
  • David Aers, "Chaucer:  Love, Sex and Marriage"  (Required)
• The Pardoner
  • The Pardoner's Prologue and Tale (general note)  (Required)
  • George Lyman Kittredge, "Chaucer's Pardoner"  (Required)
  • David Benson, "Chaucer's Pardoner: His Sexuality and Modern Critics,"  (Required)
  • Monica McAlpine, "The Pardoner's Homosexuality and How It Matters"  (Recommended)
  • Richard F. Green, "The Sexual Normality of Chaucer's Pardoner,"  (Recommended)
  • Lee Patterson, "Chaucerian Confession: Penitential Literature and the Pardoner"  (Recommended)
  • Derek Pearsall, "Chaucer's Pardoner: The Death of a Salesman"   (Recommended)
• The Prioress
  • The Prioress's Tale (general note)  (Required)
• The Nun's Priest
  • The Nun's Priest's Tale (general note)  (Required)

Middle English Pearl    Back to top

• Who was the Pearl Poet?  (The Pearl Poet, Paul Deane)  (Required)
• Lawrence Warner, "Decay, Dismemberment, and Bodily Continuity in Saint Erkenwald, Pearl, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight"  (U. of Pennsylvania)  (Optional)

Thomas More    Back to top

Background Readings

• The Sir Thomas More Circle:  Lecture notes from Bob Barrie.  Contextualizes More in the Tudor humanist community, with particular attention to Erasmus and More's other friends.  (Austin C.)  (Required)
• Introduction to Italian Humanism:  Bob Barrie's readable and useful overview of the humanist movement in Italy.  Very useful background for an understanding of Tudor humanism.  (Austin C.)  (Recommended)
• Englishmen and the Classical Renaissance:  Sir Thomas More:  An older (but still useful) account of More in the context of European humanism.  From Vol. 3 of the Cambridge History of English and American Literature [1907-21 ed.]  (Project Bartelby)  (Recommended)

Interpretation and Commentary

• Richard Marius, Utopia as Mirror for a Life and Times:  An overview and interpretation of the second book of the Utopia by a major More scholar.  Presents Utopia as an imaginary state designed to control a sinful human nature, and as "a touchstone against which we try various ideas about both our times and the book to see what then comes of it all."  (Early Modern Literary Studies)  (Required)
• The Dialogue in Book I of Utopia:  Chapter from R. I. Lakowski's dissertation on More's use of dialogue.  An excellent, thorough analysis of the first book of Utopia, including discussion of the prefatory letters, etc.  See also Lakowski's entire dissertation.  (Early Modern Literary Studies)  (Strongly recommended)

Lyric Poetry    Back to top

John Skelton  (Recommended)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• The Spin Doctor: John Skelton And "A Ballade Of The Scottyshe Kynge" (Thomas Swiss, Drake U.)  

• A ballade of the Scottysshe Kynge  (Thomas Swiss, Drake U.)  

• To Mistress Margaret Hussey  (modernized; fourth poem on page)  (Dead Poets Society)  

• A Prayer to the Father of Heaven  (modernized; last poem on page)  (Dead Poets Society)  

Sir Thomas Wyatt  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• I find no peace, and all my war is done    (U. of Toronto)
• They flee from me that sometime did me seek    (U. of Toronto)
• Whoso list to hunt, I know where is an hind  (U. of Toronto)
• Blame Not My Lute  (netpoets.com)
• Lyke vnto these vnmesurable mountaines  (U. of Michigan)
• With Serving Still  (Poets' Corner)
• "Some fowls there be that have so perfect sight" (Luminarium)
• Ye old mule that think yourself so fair  (U. of Toronto)
• The Courtier's Life [In court to serve]  (Luminarium)
• Of Dissembling Words [Throughout the world]  (Luminarium)

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Alas! so all Things now do Hold their Peace  (U. of Toronto)
• A Praise of His Love  (U. of Toronto)
• The Golden Gift that Nature did thee Give  (U. of Toronto)
• The Soote Season, that Bud and Bloom forth Brings  (U. of Toronto)
• The sun hath twice  (Poets' Corner)
• Translation of Petrarch's Sonnetto in Vita, 95  (Poets' Corner)
• The Frailty and Hurtfulness of Beauty  (U. of Toronto)
• So Cruel Prison  (U. of Toronto)
• The Things That Cause a Quiet Life  (U. of Toronto)
• Epitaph on Sir Thomas Wyatt [Wyatt resteth here]  (Luminarium)

Sir Philip Sidney  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Astrophel and Stella  (Renascence Editions)
  • Sonnet I (Louing in trueth, and fayne in verse my loue to show)
  • Sonnet VII (When Nature made her chief worke, Stellas eyes)
  • Sonnet IX (Queen Virtues Court, which some call Stellaes face)
  • Sonnet XIV (Alas, haue I not pain enough, my friend)
  • Sonnet XVIII (With what sharp checkes I in myself am shent)
  • Sonnet XLVII (What, haue I thus betray'd my libertie?)
  • Sonnet LIV (Because I breathe not loue to euery one)
  • Sonnet LXIX  (O ioy to high for my low stile to show!)
  • Sonnet LXXI  (Who will in fairest booke of Nature know)
  • Sonnet LXXIV (I neuer dranke of Aganippe well,)
  • Sonnet LXXXVI (Alas, whence came this change of lookes? )
  • Sonnet CI (Stella is sicke, and in that sicke-bed lies)
  • Sonnet CX (Leaue, me, O loue which reachest but to dust,) [not originally included in the cycle]
• Why Fear to Die? (Since Nature's works be good)

Fluke Greville, Baron Brooke  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• from Caelica
  • 1:  Love, the delight of all well-thinking minds  (Luminarium)
  • 3:  More than most fair  (Luminarium)
  • 7:  The World That All Contains (Poets' Corner)
  • 52:  Away with these self-louing Lads  (Sheffield Hallam U.)
  • 98 [Eternal Truth, almighty, infinite]  (Luminarium)
• Elegy on the Death of Sidney  (Slate Archives)

Mary (Sidney) Herbert, Countess of Pembroke  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• A Dialogue Between Two Shepherds ... in Praise of Astrea  (1602)  (Luminarium)

Edward Dyer  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• My mind to me a kingdom is  (U. of Toronto)

Marlowe, Ralegh, and Intertextuality    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Christopher Marlowe, "The Passionate Sheperd to His Love":  Text of the poem, with a link to Ralegh's answer.  (Harvard U.)  (Required)
• Sir Walter Ralegh, "The Nymph's Reply to the Shephard":  Text of Ralegh's reply to Marlowe's poem.  (Harvard U.)  (Required)
• Janice Greer, "The Poetry Contest: Sir Walter Ralegh, Christopher Marlowe and John Donne":  discusses Ralegh's ironic treatment of Marlowe's Renaissance tropes, and Donne's attempt to create "a wiser, more persuasive shepherd" in response to both poems.  Part of Hypertheory in Renaissance Studies, a student project from Virginia Tech.  (Required)
• Janet Alejandro, "Comparison of The Passionate Shepherd to His Love and The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd":  Student essay which discusses the contrasting uses of nature to represent beauty and mutability in the two poems.  (Virtual English)  (Required)
• Sir Walter Ralegh, "Fortune hathe taken away my love":  Text of Ralegh's poem to Queen Elizabeth I.  (Janice Greer)  (Recommended)
• Queen Elizabeth I, "Ah silly pugge wert thou so sore afraid":  Text of the reply to Ralegh's poem, attributed to Queen Elizabeth I.  (Janice Greer)  (Recommended)
• Janice Greer:  Variations in Manuscripts:  A very brief commentary on an exchange of poems between Ralegh and Queen Elizabeth I, and the difference that a particular variation in manuscript versions makes.  Part of Hypertheory in Renaissance Studies, a student project from Virginia Tech.  (Recommended)

Samuel Daniel  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Delia  (Renascence Editions)
  • Dedication to the Countess of Pembroke (prose)
  • Sonnet I (Vnto the boundles Ocean of thy beautie)
  • Sonnet VI (Faire is my loue, and cruell as sh'is faire)
  • Sonnet VII (O had she not beene faire and thus vnkinde)
  • Sonnet VIII (Thou poore hart sacrifiz'd vnto the fairest)
  • Sonnet XIX (If Beautie thus be clouded with a frowne)
  • Sonnet XXXIIII (VVhen Winter snowes vpon thy golden heares)

Edmund Spenser  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Amoretti

  • Sonnet VI (Be nought dismayd that her vnmoued mind)

  • Sonnet IX (Long-while I sought to what I might compare)

  • Sonnet XI (Dayly when I do seeke and sew for peace)

  • Sonnet XV (Ye tradefull Merchants that with weary toyle)

  • Sonnet XXII (This holy season fit to fast and pray)

  • Sonnet XXVII (Faire proud now tell me, why should faire be proud)

  • Sonnet LVI (Fayre ye be sure, but cruell and vnkind)

  • Sonnet LXIIII (Comming to kisse her lyps, (such grace I found))

  • Sonnet LXVIII (Most glorious Lord of lyfe that on this day)

  • Sonnet LXXV (One day I wrote her name vpon the strand)

  • Sonnet LXXIX (Men call you fayre, and you doe credit it)

Michael Drayton  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Idea
  • To the Reader
  • I (Like an advent'rous seafarer am I)
  • III (Taking my pen, with words to cast my woe)
  • VI (How many paltry, foolish, painted things)
  • VIII (There's nothing grieves me, but that Age should haste)
  • XIV (If he from Heav'n that filch'd that living fire)
  • XXIV (I hear some say, "This man is not in love.")
  • XXXIII (Whilst yet mine Eyes do surfeit with delight)
  • LXI (Since there's no help, come, let us kiss and part)

Sir John Davies  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• from Gullinge Sonnets
  • Dedicatory sonnet:  To His Good Friend, Sir Anthony Cooke  (Luminarium)
  • 6. "The sacred Muse that first made love divine"  (Luminarium)
  • 8. "My case is this, I love Zepheria bright"  (Luminarium)

William Shakespeare  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Sonnets

  • I. From fairest creatures we desire increase

  • XII. When I do count the clock that tells the time

  • XVIII. Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

  • XXX. When to the sessions of sweet silent thought

  • LV. Not marble, nor the gilded monuments

  • LXIV. When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced

  • LXXI. No longer mourn for me when I am dead

  • LXXIII. That time of year thou mayst in me behold

  • LXXXIII. I never saw that you did painting need

  • XCIX. The forward violet thus did I chide

  • CVII. Not mine own fears, nor the prophetic soul

  • CXVI. Let me not to the marriage of true minds

  • CXXIX. The expense of spirit in a waste of shame
  • CXXX. My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun
  • CXXXVIII. When my love swears that she is made of truth
  • CXLVI. Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth

Ben Jonson  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• Background:  Encarta:  Ben Jonson:  A good brief biography of Jonson.  (Microsoft Encarta)
• from Epigrams
  • To The Reader  (Luminarium)
  • To My Book  (Luminarium)
  • To My Bookseller  (Luminarium)
  • To All, To Whom I Write  (Luminarium)
  • On My First Daughter   (Poets' Corner)
  • On my First Son  (U. of Toronto)
  • To Francis Beaumont  (Luminarium)
  • On Poet-Ape  (Sonnet Central)
  • To Lucy, Countess of Bedford, with John Donne's Satires  (U. of Toronto)
  • Inviting a Friend to Supper  (Poets' Corner)
• from The Forrest
  • Song to Celia  (U. of Toronto)
• from Underwood
  • A Hymn on the Nativity of My Savior  (Kathman and Ross)
• To the Memory of My Beloved the Author, Mr. William Shakespeare  (U. of Toronto)
• Slow, slow, fresh fount  (Poets' Corner)

Thomas Campion  (required)    Back to Lyric Poetry    Back to top

• What if a Day, Or a Month, Or a Yeare?  (Luminarium)
• from A Booke of Ayres (1601)
  • My Sweetest Lesbia*  (Luminarium)
  • Though You Are Young And I Am Old*  (Luminarium)
  • When to Her Lute Corinna Sings*  (Luminarium)
  • Turn Back, You Wanton Flyer*  (Luminarium)
• The Third and Fourth Booke of Ayres (1617)
  • The Fourth Booke
    • There Is a Garden in Her Face  (Luminarium)

Christopher Marlowe    Back to top

• Background  (required)
  • The Magician, the Heretic, and the Playright:  Faustus, Marlowe, and the English Stage:  Part of the excellent Norton Topics Online:  Sixteenth Century page.  
  • Late Renaissance Thought and the New Universe:  Christopher Marlowe's Dr. Faustus:  Apparently lecture notes from a general education course in the math department at Dartmouth College.  Discusses the nature of the knowledge that Faustus seeks, and its place in intellectual history.  (Dartmouth C.)
• Textual Variants  (required)
  • Differences Between The A and B Texts of Doctor Faustus:  Brief commentary on the differences in tone and interpretation between the 1604 and 1616 editions of Dr. Faustus.  (Desmet, U. of Georgia)
  • Comparison of the A and B Texts of Dr. Faustus:  Side-by-side comparison of the closing scene from the play in the 1604 and 1616 printed editions of the play.  (Rebecca Bushnell, U. of Pennsylvania)