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Le Voyageur malchanceux
The Unfortunate Traueller: or, The Life of Jacke Wilton is a picaresque novel by Thomas Nashe first published in 1594 but set during the reign of Henry VIII of England.
Jack Wilton adventures through the European continent and finds himself swept up in the currents of sixteenth-century history. Episodic in nature, the narrative jumps from place to place and danger to danger.
Jack begins his tale among fellow Englishmen at a military encampment, where he swindles his superiors out of alcohol and money, framing others as traitors. Commenting by the way on the grotesque sweating sickness, Jack arrives in Munster, Germany, to observe the massacre of John Leyden's Anabaptist faction by the Emperor and the Duke of Saxony; this brutal episode enables Nashe to reflect on religious hypocrisy, a theme to which he frequently returns.
Following the massacre of the Anabaptists at Munster, Jack Wilton has a number of personal encounters with historical figures of the sixteenth century, many of them important for their literary contributions.
Passing into Italy, the land where the remainder of the narrative unfolds, Jack and Surrey exchange identities. The two engage in acts of deceit and trickery with pimps, prostitutes, and counterfeiters. Forced to dig themselves out of a succession of plots, the disguised Jack and Surrey assume much of the duplicitous behaviour that Italians were stereotypically known for in Renaissance England.
Departing from Venice, Surrey and Jack arrive in Florence, the city where Geraldine was born. Surrey is overcome with poetry and speaks a sonnet in honor of her fair room, a moment in which Nashe can slyly mock the overbearing, lovesick verse of contemporary imitators of Petrarch. The copia of Surrey's verse then gives way to a tournament in which the Earl competes for his beloved's fair name, and Nashe offers gratuitous descriptions of the competitors' armor and horses in a manner that recalls printed accounts of early modern masques and other festive spectacles. The most worthy competitor, Surrey emerges from the tournament victorious, but is suddenly called back into England for business matters.
Jack and Diamante then travel to Rome, which Jack admires for its classical ruins (he is less impressed by its religious relics). By this point in time, Jack clearly sticks out as a foreigner and a tourist, "imitat[ing] four or five sundry nations in my attire at once." [5] After praising the marvelous wonders of artificially-engineered gardens and lamenting the gruesome, simultaneous realities of the plague, the protagonist stumbles into one of the most memorable episodes of the narrative. Esdras of Granado and his lackey Bartol the Italian break into the house where he and Diamante are lodging, and Esdras rapes the virtuous matron Heraclide, who commits suicide after an eloquent oration. Jack witnesses the episode "through a cranny of my upper chamber unsealed,"[6] and some critics believe this act of voyeurism makes Jack complicit in the act of rape.[7]
Heraclide's husband accuses Jack of the rape, but another English character known as the "Banished Earl" stays Jack's execution. This comes at a slight cost, however; banned from his beloved home country, the Earl rattles off a catalogue of reasons to avoid travel at all costs. In Italy, one only learns "the art of atheism, the art of epicurizing, the art of whoring, the art of poisoning, the art of sodomitry."[8] France gains one only a knowledge of wine and the "French disease," syphilis. In Spain, one only acquires strange clothing. The Dutch excel only in their drinking. Such an admonitory catalogue follows the precepts found in the writings of the Elizabethan education theorist Roger Ascham, who warned his fellow Englishmen about the dangers of Italy and its books.[9]
In spite of the Banished English Earl's suggestions, Jack remains in Italy in search of his beloved Diamante. In so doing, he becomes entangled with and entrapped by Zadok the Jew and Zachary, the Papal Physician, who plan to use Jack as a specimen at the anatomical college. Freed from the brutal pair by the wiles of Juliana, the Pope's courtesan, Jack reunites with Diamante and robs Juliana of her goods, while Zachary flees and Zadok faces a grotesque combination of torture and execution.
The final episode of The Unfortunate Traveller returns to the character of Esdras, who figures now as a victim. At Bologna, Jack and Diamante observe the public execution of Cutwolf, the brother of Esdras's lackey Bartol. Standing before the crowd, Cutwolf delivers a speech recounting his vile actions. Seeking vengeance for his brother's murder, Cutwolf tracked down the villain Esdras, confronted him, and forced him to blaspheme against God and against salvation before discharging a pistol into his mouth, thereby damning his soul eternally in death. Self-righteously, he declares in his own defense before the crowd that "This is the fault that hath called me h...
Jack Wilton adventures through the European continent and finds himself swept up in the currents of sixteenth-century history. Episodic in nature, the narrative jumps from place to place and danger to danger.
Jack begins his tale among fellow Englishmen at a military encampment, where he swindles his superiors out of alcohol and money, framing others as traitors. Commenting by the way on the grotesque sweating sickness, Jack arrives in Munster, Germany, to observe the massacre of John Leyden's Anabaptist faction by the Emperor and the Duke of Saxony; this brutal episode enables Nashe to reflect on religious hypocrisy, a theme to which he frequently returns.
Following the massacre of the Anabaptists at Munster, Jack Wilton has a number of personal encounters with historical figures of the sixteenth century, many of them important for their literary contributions.
Passing into Italy, the land where the remainder of the narrative unfolds, Jack and Surrey exchange identities. The two engage in acts of deceit and trickery with pimps, prostitutes, and counterfeiters. Forced to dig themselves out of a succession of plots, the disguised Jack and Surrey assume much of the duplicitous behaviour that Italians were stereotypically known for in Renaissance England.
Departing from Venice, Surrey and Jack arrive in Florence, the city where Geraldine was born. Surrey is overcome with poetry and speaks a sonnet in honor of her fair room, a moment in which Nashe can slyly mock the overbearing, lovesick verse of contemporary imitators of Petrarch. The copia of Surrey's verse then gives way to a tournament in which the Earl competes for his beloved's fair name, and Nashe offers gratuitous descriptions of the competitors' armor and horses in a manner that recalls printed accounts of early modern masques and other festive spectacles. The most worthy competitor, Surrey emerges from the tournament victorious, but is suddenly called back into England for business matters.
Jack and Diamante then travel to Rome, which Jack admires for its classical ruins (he is less impressed by its religious relics). By this point in time, Jack clearly sticks out as a foreigner and a tourist, "imitat[ing] four or five sundry nations in my attire at once." [5] After praising the marvelous wonders of artificially-engineered gardens and lamenting the gruesome, simultaneous realities of the plague, the protagonist stumbles into one of the most memorable episodes of the narrative. Esdras of Granado and his lackey Bartol the Italian break into the house where he and Diamante are lodging, and Esdras rapes the virtuous matron Heraclide, who commits suicide after an eloquent oration. Jack witnesses the episode "through a cranny of my upper chamber unsealed,"[6] and some critics believe this act of voyeurism makes Jack complicit in the act of rape.[7]
Heraclide's husband accuses Jack of the rape, but another English character known as the "Banished Earl" stays Jack's execution. This comes at a slight cost, however; banned from his beloved home country, the Earl rattles off a catalogue of reasons to avoid travel at all costs. In Italy, one only learns "the art of atheism, the art of epicurizing, the art of whoring, the art of poisoning, the art of sodomitry."[8] France gains one only a knowledge of wine and the "French disease," syphilis. In Spain, one only acquires strange clothing. The Dutch excel only in their drinking. Such an admonitory catalogue follows the precepts found in the writings of the Elizabethan education theorist Roger Ascham, who warned his fellow Englishmen about the dangers of Italy and its books.[9]
In spite of the Banished English Earl's suggestions, Jack remains in Italy in search of his beloved Diamante. In so doing, he becomes entangled with and entrapped by Zadok the Jew and Zachary, the Papal Physician, who plan to use Jack as a specimen at the anatomical college. Freed from the brutal pair by the wiles of Juliana, the Pope's courtesan, Jack reunites with Diamante and robs Juliana of her goods, while Zachary flees and Zadok faces a grotesque combination of torture and execution.
The final episode of The Unfortunate Traveller returns to the character of Esdras, who figures now as a victim. At Bologna, Jack and Diamante observe the public execution of Cutwolf, the brother of Esdras's lackey Bartol. Standing before the crowd, Cutwolf delivers a speech recounting his vile actions. Seeking vengeance for his brother's murder, Cutwolf tracked down the villain Esdras, confronted him, and forced him to blaspheme against God and against salvation before discharging a pistol into his mouth, thereby damning his soul eternally in death. Self-righteously, he declares in his own defense before the crowd that "This is the fault that hath called me h...
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First published January 1, 1594
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About the author
Thomas Nashe
206 books41 followersThomas Nashe (November 1567 – c. 1601) was an English Elizabethan pamphleteer, playwright, poet and satirist.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 52 reviews
October 5, 2019
This narrative published in 1594 is sometimes listed as the first English novel, but it is surely not a "novel" in any formal sense of the word. An odd book, extremely loose in construction, it begins as a collection of prankish anecdotes, shifts into a picaresque account of continental travel (studded with the occasional casual satire and stylistic parody), and ends as a grim Italianate narrative fraught with rape, murder and revenge.
But the style, oh the style! Nashe is a master of English prose--the sort of rambling, periodic prose, discursive and musical, that expired long before the beginning of the eighteenth century. The book is often difficult to read (the vocabulary is at time obscure and daunting), but the stylistic beauties of Nashe's prose make the journey worthwhile.
Speaking of revenge: if you read nothing else in this book, read the gallows speech toward the end in which Cutwolf tells us how he avenged the murder of his brother. Anyone who has even a vestigial belief in eternal damnation will find this account horrible indeed. (Cutwolf is everything Hamlet is not...and vice versa.)
Here's just a little taste of Nashe's unique prose, in which a gentleman poet speaks to his former servant about his love for lady-in-waiting Geraldine:
Ah quoth he, my little Page, full little canst thou perceiue howe farre Metamorphozed I am from my selfe, since I last saw thee. There is a little God called Loue, that will not bee worshipt of anie leaden braines, one that proclaimes himselfe sole King and Emperour of pearcing eyes, and cheefe Soueraigne of soft hearts, hee it is that exercising his Empire in my eyes, hath exorsized and cleane coniured me from my content.
Thou knowst statelie Geyaldine, too stately I feare for mee to doe homage to her statue or shrine, she it is that is come out of Italic to bewitch all the wise men of England, vppon Queene Katherine Dowager she waites, that hath a dowrie of beautie sufficient to make hir wooed of the greatest Kinges in Christendome. Her high exalted sunne beames haue set the Phenix neast of my breast on fire, and I my selfe haue brought Arabian spiceries of sweet passions and praises, to furnish out the f unerall flame of my follie. Those who were condemned to be smothered to death by shacking downe into the softe bottome of an high built bedde of Roses, neuer dide so sweet a death as I shoulde die, if hir Rose coloured disdaine were my deathes-man.
February 8, 2021
A rather peculiar travelogue from 1593 (albeit set in the reign of Henry VIII), with a somewhat Black Adder-ish narrator conniving his way across Europe. While short it is also a bit of a slog, and perhaps best suited as a "special-interest" read than for general consumption.
If you are interested in English proto-novels or end of 16th century writing, then go for it. If you're interested in what inspired Shakespeare to create Falstaff, you need only read the beginning where Jack Wilton tricks the army camp cider maker into giving away free drinks. Falstaff is apparently the combination of these two characters. If your interest is random Latin quotes, (eg. Ovid, Vita verecunda est, musa iocusa mea est, My lyfe is chast though wanton be my verse), rampant name dropping, (Thomas Moore, Cornelius Agrippa, every Roman orator and Greek character from a play), and neologisms that never caught on, you might enjoy the whole story.
Thomas Nashe firmly believed that "the Saxon monosyllables that swarm in the English tongue are a scandal to it", and so he made up extravagant compound words. As Edmund Gosse puts it in the introductory essay: "It is extraordinary that a man can make so many picturesqe, striking, and apparently apposite remarks, and yet leave us so frequently in doubt as to his meaning."
An example: "Why shoulde I goe gadding and fisgigging after firking flantado Amphibologies, wit is wit, and good will is good will."
Why indeed, Nashe, why indeed...
The narrative is disjointed, and the narrator even more so. There is intrigue, a comedic jousting competition, gruesome battles, even more gruesome torture and execution, and rape. (Not committed by the narrator, who prefers to stick to the intrigue part.) But there is also long unprompted religious monologuing:
and impromptu love poetry:
I had the book at a three star level of enjoyment until the extravagant antisemitism and general xenophobia towards the end made me knock one star off.
I shall let Thomas Nashe bid you adieu:
If you are interested in English proto-novels or end of 16th century writing, then go for it. If you're interested in what inspired Shakespeare to create Falstaff, you need only read the beginning where Jack Wilton tricks the army camp cider maker into giving away free drinks. Falstaff is apparently the combination of these two characters. If your interest is random Latin quotes, (eg. Ovid, Vita verecunda est, musa iocusa mea est, My lyfe is chast though wanton be my verse), rampant name dropping, (Thomas Moore, Cornelius Agrippa, every Roman orator and Greek character from a play), and neologisms that never caught on, you might enjoy the whole story.
Thomas Nashe firmly believed that "the Saxon monosyllables that swarm in the English tongue are a scandal to it", and so he made up extravagant compound words. As Edmund Gosse puts it in the introductory essay: "It is extraordinary that a man can make so many picturesqe, striking, and apparently apposite remarks, and yet leave us so frequently in doubt as to his meaning."
An example: "Why shoulde I goe gadding and fisgigging after firking flantado Amphibologies, wit is wit, and good will is good will."
Why indeed, Nashe, why indeed...
The narrative is disjointed, and the narrator even more so. There is intrigue, a comedic jousting competition, gruesome battles, even more gruesome torture and execution, and rape. (Not committed by the narrator, who prefers to stick to the intrigue part.) But there is also long unprompted religious monologuing:
When Christ sayd, the kingdome of heauen must suffer violence, hee meant not the violence of tedious inuective sermons without wit, but the violence of faith, the violence of good works, the violence of patient suffering.
and impromptu love poetry:
From prose he would leap into verse, and with these or such lyke rimes assault her
If I must die,
O let me choose my death,
Sucke out my soule with kisses cruell maide
I had the book at a three star level of enjoyment until the extravagant antisemitism and general xenophobia towards the end made me knock one star off.
I shall let Thomas Nashe bid you adieu:
...perswade thy selfe that euen as garlike hath three properties, to make a man winke, drinke, and stinke, so wee wyll winke on thy imperpections, drinke to thy fauorites, & all thy foes shall stinke before us. So be it Farewell.
February 11, 2021
reading this is like reading in a foreign language with someone doing a bad karaoke next door and doing a with a rubiks cube with ur feet. never again
July 30, 2023
“I fell into it...as in an earth-quake the ground should open, and a blinde man come feeling pad pad ouer the open Gulph with his staffe, should tumble on a sodaine into hell.”
Nashe can turn a phrase with the best of them, but I won’t pretend The Vnfortvnate Traueller is all good reading. It’s patchy, to put it mildly. The author seems to have thrown in anything and everything that might attract his target audience. Not being an Elizabethan squire, this doesn’t include me.
It’s a bit of a travelogue and European grand tour; it pokes fun at foreigners and their ridiculous manners; it acknowledges the reader’s classical education and is not frightened of Latin; it introduces a number of contemporary celebrities; it adds in a generous slice of religious argument and sermonizing; there is broad comedy and some complex displays of wit; the languages varies from euphuistic to lowlife vernacular; there are some bloody battles and grisly execution scenes; high romance and bawdy goings on; a few poems...in fact whatever takes your fancy, squire.
For a modern reader, it’s a curate’s egg. Parts of it are excellent...others dull or requiring exegesis. But the book is sufficiently short to progress through it agreeably enough. Even the religious stuff comes to a happy end...
“The next daie they had solempne disputations...Luther had the louder voyce, Carolostadius went beyond him in beating and bounsing with his fists...They vttered nothing to make a man laugh, therefore I will leaue them.”
Nashe can turn a phrase with the best of them, but I won’t pretend The Vnfortvnate Traueller is all good reading. It’s patchy, to put it mildly. The author seems to have thrown in anything and everything that might attract his target audience. Not being an Elizabethan squire, this doesn’t include me.
It’s a bit of a travelogue and European grand tour; it pokes fun at foreigners and their ridiculous manners; it acknowledges the reader’s classical education and is not frightened of Latin; it introduces a number of contemporary celebrities; it adds in a generous slice of religious argument and sermonizing; there is broad comedy and some complex displays of wit; the languages varies from euphuistic to lowlife vernacular; there are some bloody battles and grisly execution scenes; high romance and bawdy goings on; a few poems...in fact whatever takes your fancy, squire.
For a modern reader, it’s a curate’s egg. Parts of it are excellent...others dull or requiring exegesis. But the book is sufficiently short to progress through it agreeably enough. Even the religious stuff comes to a happy end...
“The next daie they had solempne disputations...Luther had the louder voyce, Carolostadius went beyond him in beating and bounsing with his fists...They vttered nothing to make a man laugh, therefore I will leaue them.”
July 31, 2016
According to Walter Raleigh, both Shakespeare & Nashe are "in the double command of the springs of terror and humour." Terror and humour - that's what I was expecting from a picaresque novel published in 1594. The main difficulty of this text is not the archaic language, but the stylish long sentences of Nashe, which combine high poetic oration with colloquial language (and sometimes slang). For me, it was fun to read, because this Jack Wilton (an 18-years old rogue wandering through chaotic 16th century Europe) had a certain wit and talent to satirize. What about terror? Yes, there is descripton of corpses in a battle field, a plauge epidemic, a cruel scene of rape, conspiracy, murder and two very detailed torture scenes. It is not many pages long, but still disturbing.
In the end, I am not sure if we can call this a novel. It is a strange and interesting blend of fact & fiction, narration & chronicle. Maybe, someone can find in it a very early precursor of Hunter S. Thompson's "gonzo journalism".
In the end, I am not sure if we can call this a novel. It is a strange and interesting blend of fact & fiction, narration & chronicle. Maybe, someone can find in it a very early precursor of Hunter S. Thompson's "gonzo journalism".
October 11, 2008
This is one of the most fucked-up books I've read recently. I haven't read torture scenes this lovingly depicted since "Naked Lunch." And this was June 27, 1593! The antisemitism of pretty idiotic, but this was the 1500's after all.
April 22, 2010
Read for a class about early modern English literature. Professor felt it represented post-modern literature avant la lettre, I argued it represented pre-modern literature, before genre conventions and even the basics of the novel had been firmed up. Hilarity ensued. We later stared on stage together in a local production of Shakespeare's 'Much Ado About Nothing'.
August 31, 2012
Ugh, early modern prose is not my favorite thing, and this early version of a picaresque novel is chaotic and tedious at the same time. I was most interested during the detailed descriptions of violence, not because I love reading graphic torture scenes, but because it was at those moments that the narrative slowed down enough for the reader to engage.
May 22, 2021
Nashe's [The Unfortunate Traveller] reads like pulp fiction, unfortunately for Nashe it was written at a time when there was no market for it. Thomas Nashe (1567-1601) was an Elizabethan playwright, poet and satirist who had made his name as a pamphleteer. His previous publication was Christ Tears over Jerusalem published 1593 in which he imagined that Jesus Christ is looking down on Jerusalem and weeping to see the moral corruption that will lead to his crucifixion: a moral text which comes across as a fiery sermon to the unchristian. The Unfortunate Traveller by contrast has no moral compass, but is written in the style of a picaresque novel and delights in the escapades of a rogue: Jack Wilton, who barrels around Europe, in his attempts to get rich quick and enjoy himself as much as possible along the way.
This is a radical work that hardly bears any relation to anything I have read previously in English Renaissance literature. It is radical in the sense of the readers at which it was aimed and one wonders if those readers existed at the time, because it did not sell particularly well. Nashe had already shown that he was a writer whose colourful language and striking metaphors could enliven many a dull text, but in The Unfortunate Traveller he not only throws the kitchen sink into his work, but he makes it subversive. It is rapacious, grotesque, voyeuristic and transgresses almost every known genre of popular fiction of its time. It could be compared to the carnivalistic writing of Rabelais, but by anchoring his story in an historical setting Nashe adds realism and cruelty to the mix.
The story is episodic in nature and starts with Jack Wilton loosely connected to the entourage around Henry VIII campaign in France. His merry pranks and swindles and the onset of the sweating sickness result in him leaving the campaign as quickly as he could and he arrives in Munster to witness the merciless massacre of John Leiden's Anabaptist faction. He meets Henry Howard Earl of Surrey the famous poet and courtier and they become travelling companions. They exchange identities in order that the Earl of Surrey can travel incognito and in Rotterdam they hobnob with Erasmus and Sir Thomas Moore. Henry Howard is searching for his beloved Geraldine and they travel to Italy meeting Cornelius Agrippa on the way. Various plots and subterfuge result in the two companions being imprisoned for fraud and they are only saved from execution by the intervention of the famous satirist Pietro Aretino. Jack watches Henry Howard compete and win a jousting tournament before leaving with Diamante a beautiful courtesan. In Rome Jack barricades himself in an upstairs room and watches through a gap in the floorboards the protracted and violent rape of Heraclide by the bandit Esdras. Jack is accused of the rape but escapes to search for Diamante who he finds enslaved by the Jew Zadok. He gleefully watches the horrific execution of the Jew. Jack and Diamante travel to Bologna where the violent Cutwolf catches up with Esdras and shoots him in the mouth. Jack watches yet another brutal execution of the proud Cutwolf before fleeing back to the English encampment and reflecting on the dangers of travelling.
The novel starts with Jack and his clever swindles rather in the style of Robert Greene's conny catching, but soon takes a darker turn with the descriptions of the sweating sickness. The horrific massacre of the Anabaptists and the execution of John Leiden starts the trail of violence that will eventually lead to rape and murder. Along the way we are entertained by a sort of throwback story of Knights jousting in a tournament with Nashe supplying voluminous satirical descriptions of the knights attire. He also finds time to attach a couple of sonnets supposedly written in the style of Henry Howard. The reader is never far away from the next violent incident, but the rape of Heraclide is monstrous and we are in the realms of violent pornography. The executions that follow are gruesome and it is the feel of being a voyeur through Jacks eyes that makes these scenes so evocative.
Nashe knew he was writing something different, something new and in his dedication to the Earl of Southampton he describes his work as being in a clean different vein. He goes on to address the Dapper Monsieur Pages of the Court asking them to enjoy the wit and hear Jack Wilton tell his own tales. Perhaps the satire and the realistic descriptions of the violent events did not appeal and the work was largely forgotten until the late nineteenth century. It was rediscovered and is probably as popular now as it ever was. It can be read free on the internet in glorious modern English courtesy of Nina Green at the oxford-shakespeare.com website. Perhaps not great literature but let Nashe have the last word:
All the conclusive epilogue I will make is this, that if herein I have pleased any, it shall animate me to more pains in this kind. Otherwise, I will swear upon an English chronicle never to be outlandish chronicler more while I live. Farewell, as many as wish me well. June 27, 1593.
A five star read if only for its daring to be something different.
[Terrors of the Night] is more typical of the work of a pamphleteer and while first trying to frighten the reader with the idea that spirits, fairies and other unknown beings inhabit the air all around us, it then goes on to say something about dreams. In Nashe's view dreams are the waste material circulating around our minds when we are asleep and are not significant in forecasting our future.
Perhaps Terrors of the Night could be brought on by reading his [The unfortunate Traveller] just before bedtime.
This is a radical work that hardly bears any relation to anything I have read previously in English Renaissance literature. It is radical in the sense of the readers at which it was aimed and one wonders if those readers existed at the time, because it did not sell particularly well. Nashe had already shown that he was a writer whose colourful language and striking metaphors could enliven many a dull text, but in The Unfortunate Traveller he not only throws the kitchen sink into his work, but he makes it subversive. It is rapacious, grotesque, voyeuristic and transgresses almost every known genre of popular fiction of its time. It could be compared to the carnivalistic writing of Rabelais, but by anchoring his story in an historical setting Nashe adds realism and cruelty to the mix.
The story is episodic in nature and starts with Jack Wilton loosely connected to the entourage around Henry VIII campaign in France. His merry pranks and swindles and the onset of the sweating sickness result in him leaving the campaign as quickly as he could and he arrives in Munster to witness the merciless massacre of John Leiden's Anabaptist faction. He meets Henry Howard Earl of Surrey the famous poet and courtier and they become travelling companions. They exchange identities in order that the Earl of Surrey can travel incognito and in Rotterdam they hobnob with Erasmus and Sir Thomas Moore. Henry Howard is searching for his beloved Geraldine and they travel to Italy meeting Cornelius Agrippa on the way. Various plots and subterfuge result in the two companions being imprisoned for fraud and they are only saved from execution by the intervention of the famous satirist Pietro Aretino. Jack watches Henry Howard compete and win a jousting tournament before leaving with Diamante a beautiful courtesan. In Rome Jack barricades himself in an upstairs room and watches through a gap in the floorboards the protracted and violent rape of Heraclide by the bandit Esdras. Jack is accused of the rape but escapes to search for Diamante who he finds enslaved by the Jew Zadok. He gleefully watches the horrific execution of the Jew. Jack and Diamante travel to Bologna where the violent Cutwolf catches up with Esdras and shoots him in the mouth. Jack watches yet another brutal execution of the proud Cutwolf before fleeing back to the English encampment and reflecting on the dangers of travelling.
The novel starts with Jack and his clever swindles rather in the style of Robert Greene's conny catching, but soon takes a darker turn with the descriptions of the sweating sickness. The horrific massacre of the Anabaptists and the execution of John Leiden starts the trail of violence that will eventually lead to rape and murder. Along the way we are entertained by a sort of throwback story of Knights jousting in a tournament with Nashe supplying voluminous satirical descriptions of the knights attire. He also finds time to attach a couple of sonnets supposedly written in the style of Henry Howard. The reader is never far away from the next violent incident, but the rape of Heraclide is monstrous and we are in the realms of violent pornography. The executions that follow are gruesome and it is the feel of being a voyeur through Jacks eyes that makes these scenes so evocative.
Nashe knew he was writing something different, something new and in his dedication to the Earl of Southampton he describes his work as being in a clean different vein. He goes on to address the Dapper Monsieur Pages of the Court asking them to enjoy the wit and hear Jack Wilton tell his own tales. Perhaps the satire and the realistic descriptions of the violent events did not appeal and the work was largely forgotten until the late nineteenth century. It was rediscovered and is probably as popular now as it ever was. It can be read free on the internet in glorious modern English courtesy of Nina Green at the oxford-shakespeare.com website. Perhaps not great literature but let Nashe have the last word:
All the conclusive epilogue I will make is this, that if herein I have pleased any, it shall animate me to more pains in this kind. Otherwise, I will swear upon an English chronicle never to be outlandish chronicler more while I live. Farewell, as many as wish me well. June 27, 1593.
A five star read if only for its daring to be something different.
[Terrors of the Night] is more typical of the work of a pamphleteer and while first trying to frighten the reader with the idea that spirits, fairies and other unknown beings inhabit the air all around us, it then goes on to say something about dreams. In Nashe's view dreams are the waste material circulating around our minds when we are asleep and are not significant in forecasting our future.
Perhaps Terrors of the Night could be brought on by reading his [The unfortunate Traveller] just before bedtime.
December 15, 2008
Though short, this is a real eye opener as to life in those times. Violent, harsh, cruel, filthy, disgusting... and all told in loving detail by a man who travels about Europe. The language is a bit tough, I would suggest trying to read this with a group because reading it on your own is hard. The old english is almost phonetic in it's spelling and at times you almost have to read it aloud in order to figure out what it being said. Still, as difficult as it can be (especially if it's been 15 or so years since you've read anything from that era) it's well worth the read just to see what life really was like back then.
March 31, 2015
A proto-novel, certainly not quite a novel as we know it. Rather, this is more like a travelogue of one "Jack Wilton". Servant to an English earl who always seems to find (or to create) trouble. Kind of jumps all over the place (at least all over continental Europe), and the "story" doesn't have a common thread, other than the presence of Jack Wilton.
Short, but the older English makes for slow going. Also rather gory, but the stiff old writing makes the gore not seem as gory. If that makes sense.
Short, but the older English makes for slow going. Also rather gory, but the stiff old writing makes the gore not seem as gory. If that makes sense.
September 5, 2008
This is the highlight of the Rogues' Bookshelf compiled about 80 years ago. It is the misadventures of Jack Wilton, a true and original rogue who traveled through England and the continent, meeting all sorts of interesting characters and getting into all kinds of mischief. The language can be a challenge, since it was written by Thomas Nashe in the 16th century, but it is a fun read nonetheless.
September 14, 2013
Well, that escalated quickly.
September 8, 2024
Read this a long time ago, on my nook. It is a story of Jack Wilton and it is called a picaresque style novel. Its like an adventure story. A bit too long in my opinion.
June 9, 2021
Cam la vremea când spaima lumii şi prăpădul franţuzilor, Henric al VlII-lea (singurul subiect demn de cronici), îşi înainta stindardul împotriva celor două sute cincizeci de tuhuri din Tumey şi Turwin şi avea pe împăratul şi toată nobilimea Flandrei, Olandei, şi Brabantului ca însoţitori năimiţi, urmându-l cu toate forţele, eu, Jack Wilton (cel puţin un gentilom), mă aflam un fel de adaos sau paj pe lângă curtea engleză, unde mă bucuram de trecere, după cum pot ţine mărturie o samă de creditori pe care i-am tras pe sfoară, Coelum petimus stultitia, care din noi nu mai păcătuieşte.
Să afle dară cei care au plătit cât se cuvine ca să-mi răsfoiască istoria, că am urmat curtea sau tabăra de luptă, ori tabăra şi curtea, când Turwin şi-a pierdut fetia şi a deschis porţile pentru mai mulţi decât a făcut-o Jane T i osse. (Ia staţi puţin să mai trag o duşcă înainte de a merge mai departe); iar eu tronam de unul singur peste baierci şi borfaşi, prinţ peste oamenii mărunţi, stăpân; al merindelor sau al nutreţului şi fâneţelor, şi ca să nu mai lungesc vorba, căpetenia atotputernică peste verze şi scrumbii afumate. Paulo majora canamus. Ei, şi acum, la treabă. Oare de ce şiretlicuri şi chiteli credeţi că s-ar putea sluji un tânăr iscusit la anii mei? Aţi zice că este îndeajuns dacă ar măslui zarurile, dacă l-ar duce pe stăpân la sapă de lemn şi ar da jurământul pantofului cu multă dibăcie. Dar astea, trebuie să mărturisesc, ar fi semne de maniere alese, şi temeiuri pe măsură ca să pornesc cu povestitul. Ei, dar, Aliquid latet quod non patet aşadar ar trebui să apuc o altă cale; pildele adeveresc, daţi ascultare la ce o să vă istorisesc. Cel care este deprins cu ale taberelor, pricepe cum că într-una se află mai multe regimente şi totuşi nu mai multe decât ar încăpea pe podul Londrei. Iar în regimentele acelea se află multe companii; dar, vorba ceea, multă companie, multă ticăloşie, cum ai zice, multă curtoazie, multă viclenie.
Să afle dară cei care au plătit cât se cuvine ca să-mi răsfoiască istoria, că am urmat curtea sau tabăra de luptă, ori tabăra şi curtea, când Turwin şi-a pierdut fetia şi a deschis porţile pentru mai mulţi decât a făcut-o Jane T i osse. (Ia staţi puţin să mai trag o duşcă înainte de a merge mai departe); iar eu tronam de unul singur peste baierci şi borfaşi, prinţ peste oamenii mărunţi, stăpân; al merindelor sau al nutreţului şi fâneţelor, şi ca să nu mai lungesc vorba, căpetenia atotputernică peste verze şi scrumbii afumate. Paulo majora canamus. Ei, şi acum, la treabă. Oare de ce şiretlicuri şi chiteli credeţi că s-ar putea sluji un tânăr iscusit la anii mei? Aţi zice că este îndeajuns dacă ar măslui zarurile, dacă l-ar duce pe stăpân la sapă de lemn şi ar da jurământul pantofului cu multă dibăcie. Dar astea, trebuie să mărturisesc, ar fi semne de maniere alese, şi temeiuri pe măsură ca să pornesc cu povestitul. Ei, dar, Aliquid latet quod non patet aşadar ar trebui să apuc o altă cale; pildele adeveresc, daţi ascultare la ce o să vă istorisesc. Cel care este deprins cu ale taberelor, pricepe cum că într-una se află mai multe regimente şi totuşi nu mai multe decât ar încăpea pe podul Londrei. Iar în regimentele acelea se află multe companii; dar, vorba ceea, multă companie, multă ticăloşie, cum ai zice, multă curtoazie, multă viclenie.
August 25, 2022
Picaresque vous avez dit ? Ça y ressemble fort, même si ce n'est pas tout à fait ça…
Nous sommes donc en présence de Jack Wilton, narrateur autodiégétique, pour nous servir, qui nous raconte l'histoire de sa vie. Tout commence pendant la guerre de Cent Ans, où Wilton s'amuse à jouer quelques tours bien pendables à ses compagnons anglais (comme envoyer l'un d'eux espionner les Français, qui démasquent vite le naïf). Puis il s'enfuit vers Münster, en Allemagne, où a lieu une insurrection anabaptiste conduite par un certain John Leiden. La révolte est réprimée et il se met au service du comte de Surrey. Ce dernier se dirige vers l'Italie pour rejoindre Géraldine, sa bien-aimée. Wilton se sépare du comte et avec sa maîtresse, Diamante, se fait passer un moment pour lui. Il loge à Rome pendant une épidémie de peste. Son hôtesse et son mari sont tués par un bandit, Esdras de Granado et son complice Bardol. Jack est arrêté et séparé de sa maîtresse. Esdras a tué Bardol et ils ont été démasqués. Jack est sauvé, retrouve Diamante mais il est dénoncé pour vol par le nouveau maître de Diamante est vendu à un Juif puis sauvé par Juliana, maîtresse du pape, qui fait croire que le Juif voulait empoisonner le pape. On tente d'empoisonner Juliana, Diamante révèle tout et la sauve. Elle sauve aussi Jack que Juliana tenta d'empoisonner (elle avala le poisson par erreur). Diamante et Jack se marient et on apprend que le frère de Bardol s'est vengé en tuant Esdras.
La mort est peut-être le principal sujet du livre (ou encore le crime) : la précarité est partout, une épidémie peut vous tomber sur la tête, les criminels pullulent, la loi est draconienne.
Mais il y a aussi de la courtoisie, incarnée par le comte de Surrey. Wilton nous décrit même un tournoi, étrange héritage du roman courtois.
Nous sommes donc en présence de Jack Wilton, narrateur autodiégétique, pour nous servir, qui nous raconte l'histoire de sa vie. Tout commence pendant la guerre de Cent Ans, où Wilton s'amuse à jouer quelques tours bien pendables à ses compagnons anglais (comme envoyer l'un d'eux espionner les Français, qui démasquent vite le naïf). Puis il s'enfuit vers Münster, en Allemagne, où a lieu une insurrection anabaptiste conduite par un certain John Leiden. La révolte est réprimée et il se met au service du comte de Surrey. Ce dernier se dirige vers l'Italie pour rejoindre Géraldine, sa bien-aimée. Wilton se sépare du comte et avec sa maîtresse, Diamante, se fait passer un moment pour lui. Il loge à Rome pendant une épidémie de peste. Son hôtesse et son mari sont tués par un bandit, Esdras de Granado et son complice Bardol. Jack est arrêté et séparé de sa maîtresse. Esdras a tué Bardol et ils ont été démasqués. Jack est sauvé, retrouve Diamante mais il est dénoncé pour vol par le nouveau maître de Diamante est vendu à un Juif puis sauvé par Juliana, maîtresse du pape, qui fait croire que le Juif voulait empoisonner le pape. On tente d'empoisonner Juliana, Diamante révèle tout et la sauve. Elle sauve aussi Jack que Juliana tenta d'empoisonner (elle avala le poisson par erreur). Diamante et Jack se marient et on apprend que le frère de Bardol s'est vengé en tuant Esdras.
La mort est peut-être le principal sujet du livre (ou encore le crime) : la précarité est partout, une épidémie peut vous tomber sur la tête, les criminels pullulent, la loi est draconienne.
Mais il y a aussi de la courtoisie, incarnée par le comte de Surrey. Wilton nous décrit même un tournoi, étrange héritage du roman courtois.
July 3, 2019
The Unfortunate Traveller by Thomas Nash was published in 1594, making this book one of the earliest entries on the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die list. In Gosse's introduction he ascribes significance to this book as one of the earliest markers on the road that lead to the modern novel.
If you read the preceding two sentences of this review, congratulations, you can (and should) stop there in your Nash studies. You can send your thanks below for saving you further trouble. Seriously, I have never encountered anything as inaccessible as this book. It's like reading a novel in Spanish when you stopped taking Spanish in the 6th grade. Even Gosse, in his introduction, acknowledges that the story flags midway through and is difficult to follow. I would say that's a gross understatement.
Here's a totally random sample from the book (note there are absolutely zero typos in the below):
If that leaves you wanting more, then by all means, this book is for you. Otherwise, run.
If you read the preceding two sentences of this review, congratulations, you can (and should) stop there in your Nash studies. You can send your thanks below for saving you further trouble. Seriously, I have never encountered anything as inaccessible as this book. It's like reading a novel in Spanish when you stopped taking Spanish in the 6th grade. Even Gosse, in his introduction, acknowledges that the story flags midway through and is difficult to follow. I would say that's a gross understatement.
Here's a totally random sample from the book (note there are absolutely zero typos in the below):
Standing before the supposed king, he was askt what he was, and wherefore he came. To the which in a glorious bragging humour he aunswered, that hee was a gentleman, a captaine commander, a chiefe leacjer, that came away from the king of England vppon discontentment. Questioned particular of the cause of his discontentment, hee had not a word to blesse himself with, yet faine he would haue patcht out a poltfoote tale, but (God he knows) it had not one true legge to stand on.
If that leaves you wanting more, then by all means, this book is for you. Otherwise, run.
October 20, 2022
For literary scholars only.
I don't know how this book got into the memory of my ebook, probably I was intrigued by the title, I'd seen in some selection like the "top 1000 books of all the times". The small size of the work contributes to reading, so I've done the choice...
The beginning was quite in the spirit of a picaresque novel - a first-person narrative about the ridiculous and stupid antics of a young page. But starting from the 2nd third of the novel, the humor ended and such a hodgepodge of moralizing, revelry, theological nonsense, historical mix, savagery and meaningless description has begun.
In general, +0.5 points for the historical aspect of the work and +0.5 for it's significance for English-language literature.
In comparison to an ancient example of a picaresque novel like "Metamorphoses" by Apuleius, or the same aged novel as "Don Quixote", or the ideological heir of this genre like "The Good Soldier Švejk", this novel, to put it mildly, not very readable.
I don't know how this book got into the memory of my ebook, probably I was intrigued by the title, I'd seen in some selection like the "top 1000 books of all the times". The small size of the work contributes to reading, so I've done the choice...
The beginning was quite in the spirit of a picaresque novel - a first-person narrative about the ridiculous and stupid antics of a young page. But starting from the 2nd third of the novel, the humor ended and such a hodgepodge of moralizing, revelry, theological nonsense, historical mix, savagery and meaningless description has begun.
In general, +0.5 points for the historical aspect of the work and +0.5 for it's significance for English-language literature.
In comparison to an ancient example of a picaresque novel like "Metamorphoses" by Apuleius, or the same aged novel as "Don Quixote", or the ideological heir of this genre like "The Good Soldier Švejk", this novel, to put it mildly, not very readable.
March 11, 2024
Dit boek van Thomas Nashe is voor het eerst uitgegeven in 1594. Het is een ingewikkeld en verontrustend verhaal over Jack Wilton die als rekruut in het leger diverse spannende avonturen beleeft. Peter Boxall beschrijft het boek als misschien wel de briljantste elizabethaanse roman. En daarmee dus verdiend in de 1001.
Dat gezegd hebbende moet ik het daar ook bij laten. Dit veel belovende boek is in het Engels voor deze lezer niet prettig lezen. Te moeilijk en daardoor niet leuk genoeg om vol te houden. Ik kon geen Nederlandse vertaling vinden op het internet. Ik denk dat het in het Nederlands vertaald een heerlijk boek zou kunnen zijn. Wie weet ooit.... Voor nu belandt het boek op mijn DNF lijst.
Dat gezegd hebbende moet ik het daar ook bij laten. Dit veel belovende boek is in het Engels voor deze lezer niet prettig lezen. Te moeilijk en daardoor niet leuk genoeg om vol te houden. Ik kon geen Nederlandse vertaling vinden op het internet. Ik denk dat het in het Nederlands vertaald een heerlijk boek zou kunnen zijn. Wie weet ooit.... Voor nu belandt het boek op mijn DNF lijst.
December 19, 2021
This is a hard book to rate because it's such a difficult read, but once I got into it, I found that Jack our "unfortunate traveller" has some amazing adventures and meets some of the big personalities of his day (which was in the reign of Henry VIII, some 50 years before the book was written).
I found a PDF that had been altered into modern spellings and that helped a lot, although there was no switching of archaic words for modern ones. Additional paragraph breaks would have made it more accessible.
I found a PDF that had been altered into modern spellings and that helped a lot, although there was no switching of archaic words for modern ones. Additional paragraph breaks would have made it more accessible.
Read
October 6, 2019Alas I have not read this book so I have no idea why I have been asked to give a review.
All I can say having looked at other peoples reviews is that it does interest me now enough to make me think I do want to read it.
Perhaps sometime in the future If I read it I will be able to rate it with stars !
All I can say having looked at other peoples reviews is that it does interest me now enough to make me think I do want to read it.
Perhaps sometime in the future If I read it I will be able to rate it with stars !
August 8, 2022
I can appreciate what Thomas Nashe has done here, but I couldn't understand heads or tails of it. I'm guessing this would have been a good story for the people that were reading it in the 14th Century. Too far removed for me to be able to grasp what was going on. The language was too close to Old English to be a comfort.
abandoned
September 17, 2019Even though a very short book, the minuscule, cramped print and old English spelling was too much for me. I got to around page 20 without having picked out the story, so decided to abandon.
January 17, 2020
*checks off on list*
July 4, 2021
Slow start, picks up toward the end.
July 20, 2023
A holy requiem to their soules that thinke to wooe a woman with riddles.
March 25, 2024
Quite a difficult read and not always rewarding, but a few horrific scenes and worth the effort
September 20, 2024
Difficult to gain a reading rhythm with this. Written in Olde English which was off putting at times. Scenes of violence and the narrative does jump around.
May 21, 2025
booooooring
October 23, 2025
Amazing. Too good
Displaying 1 - 30 of 52 reviews