John Lydgate’s Fall of Princes: Narrative Tragedy in Its Literary and Political Contexts

The Benedictine monk John Lydgate was the most admired poet of the fifteenth century. He received commissions from some of the most powerful men in the land (including Henry V); he is spoken of with constant admiration; manuscripts of his work are abundant; many of his poems were put into print by England’s earliest printers, ensuring that his influence extended well into the sixteenth century. The Fall of Princes, probably the longest poem in the language, is arguably Lydgate’s masterwork; yet, until now, it has received only cursory critical attention. This book offers the first extended discussion of the poem.

The Fall of Princes accumulates accounts of nearly 500 figures from mythology and history (biblical, classical, and medieval) who have fallen from their positions of fame and power into obscurity, adversity, or poverty. In presenting these tragedies Lydgate probes the causes of the reversal of their fortunes; how far can the caprice of a blind Lady Fortune be blamed? How far are the protagonists themselves responsible for their undoing? Most pressingly of all, why is it that bad things happen to seemingly innocent people? In drawing its conclusions about the downfalls of powerful men and women, Lydgate’s poem operates within the popular medieval genre of ＂advice to princes＂ literature.

This book locates Lydgate’s work within its contexts, exploring the nature of his relationship with the uneasy Lancastrian dynasty during the minority of Henry VI as well as his response to contemporary conflicts between ecclesiastical and secular authority. In particular, this book closely analyses Lydgate’s manipulations of his French source text, allowing readers to see in detail for the first time what it is that Lydgate was setting out to achieve. Finally, the book identifies the readership of Lydgate’s poem in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, discussing its influence on the evolution of narrative tragedy in English.

Nigel Mortimer Nigel Mortimer took his undergraduate degree (in English Language and Literature) and doctorate from Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford; he won the Violet Vaughan Morgan prize for English Literature as an undergraduate in 1987 and was an academic scholar in English Literature as both an undergraduate and graduate student. He has taught Old and Middle English at undergraduate level in Oxford and is currently an assistant master at Eton College.