Tottel's Miscellany: Songs and Sonnets of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, Sir Thomas Wyatt and Others

by Henry Howard, Thomas Wyatt, Richard Tottel (compiler)

An eclectic and seminal collection of poetry from the Tudor period
 
Songs and Sonnets  (1557), the first printed anthology of English poetry, was immensely influential in Tudor England and inspired many major Elizabethan writers, including Shakespeare. Collected by pioneering publisher Richard Tottel, it brought poems of the aristocracy—verses of friendship, war, politics, death, and love—into common readership for the first time. The major poets of King Henry VIII's court, Sir Thomas Wyatt and Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, were first printed in the volume. Wyatt’s intimate poem about lost love that begins, "They flee from me, that sometime did me seek," and Surrey's passionate sonnet "Complaint of a lover rebuked" are joined here by a range of intriguingly anonymous poems from the Tudor era that are both moral and erotic, intimate and universal.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Genres: Poetry, Classics, Anthologies, 16th Century, Canon, Literature, British Literature

592 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1557

About the author

earl of Surrey, knight of the Garter, an English aristocrat, and one of the founders of Renaissance poetry in England

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_H...

Reviews

[Eliza]

Nononono. I didn't completely finish this, so I'm not going to rate it. However, from the sections I had to read for class, it was downright terrible.

No, thank you.

[Jennifer Irving · Rating 4 out of 5]

the og soft boys

[Aimee · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fascinating and important text that reveals the journey of courtly literature into the early modern print trade.

[Liam Guilar · Rating 5 out of 5]

The great great great grandmother of all Lyric Anthologies in English, with an apology to the reader for thinking short poems worthy of attention. Worth it to see what Tottel did to his poets..(and almost every editor since has tried to Tottel their poets). This Shearsman edition is beautiful, no clutter of footnotes, no glossary, just the poems.