Introduction: The Renaissance and English Literature

The Renaissance brought about a new life and a new enthusiasm in the field of English
literature and culture which had far reaching consequences. Renaissance is derived from the
Italian word Renescentia meaning rebirth. The French historian Jules Michelet used
Renaissance for the first time. Italy was the cradle of Renaissance. It began in Italy in the
14th century, spread to England by 16th century, and ended in the mid – seventeenth century.

What is Renaissance? Beginning and Spread of European Renaissance:

Renaissance is a cultural movement that encompassed a resurgence of learning based on

1. Italian cities like Naples, Genoa, and Venice became centres of trade between Europe and
Middle East. Arab Scholars preserved the writings of the ancient Greeks in their libraries.
With trade ideas were exchanged. Many Italian scholars went to cities like Toledo, Cordova
and Baghdad and translated from Arabic into Latin the writings of the Greek masters and the
commentaries on them by Muslim scholars like Ibn-Rusd, Ibn-Sinha etc.

2. Italian humanists like Petrarch, Boccaccio, Colucio Salutati, Niccolo de Niccoli collected
passionately the woks of roman masters like Cicero, Livy, Seneca etc in order to preserve
their Roman heritage. Salutati invited the Greek scholars from Byzantium to Florence to
teach Greek.

3. The fall of Constantinople in 1453 to the Turks resulted in the flight of the Greek scholars
to Italy who established their schools and spread the learning of classical literature, art and
philosophy in Italy. In Italy, Renaissance started first in Florence because of the patronage of
the Medici family. It was a merchant family who made huge profit from their banking
business and invested a lot in the patronage of the artists like Leonardo Vinci, Botticelli,
Michaelangelo, Raphael , Brunelesci and Batista Alberti etc. In such a favourable condition
the spirit of learning and artistic activity flourished in Italy. And from Italy Renaissance
spread in other parts of Europe—England, France, Germany etc.

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Renaissance Outlook—Its impact on English Literature:

The Renaissance had a profound and transformative impact on English literature, marking a
shift from the medieval worldview to a more human-centred and inquiry-driven approach. It
was a time of renewed interest in the classical cultures of Greece and Rome, and this revival
inspired English writers to explore themes of humanism, individual dignity, worldly
experience, and artistic expression. The Renaissance spirit encouraged intellectual freedom
and creative energy, which led to a literary explosion in England during the 15th to 17th
centuries. Writers began to emphasize personal experience, secular concerns, and the
potential of human achievement. The concept of man as the centre of the universe, rather than
divine authority alone, shaped the tone and themes of much Renaissance literature.

The English Renaissance flourished due to several key reasons. The invention of the
printing press by Gutenberg in the 15th century helped disseminate classical and
contemporary works more widely than ever before. The fall of Constantinople in 1453
brought many Greek scholars and manuscripts to the West, especially to Italy, and from there
Renaissance ideas spread to England. England's own political stability, especially during the
reign of Elizabeth I, created a conducive environment for intellectual and artistic growth. The
rise of a wealthy merchant class and the growing importance of education also contributed to
the spread of Renaissance ideals. The flourishing of the Renaissance in England was also
aided by patronage systems, especially from the monarchy and nobility, who supported poets,
playwrights, and scholars.

In literature, this resulted in a flowering of poetic forms, dramatic structure, and prose
styles. The influence of classical models led writers like Edmund Spenser, Sir Philip Sidney,
and John Milton to strive for elegance and idealism. William Shakespeare, arguably the most
significant literary figure of the period, fused Renaissance humanism with dramatic
brilliance, portraying complex human emotions and philosophical depth in his plays. Themes
such as love, power, fate, and individualism were explored with unprecedented
sophistication. English literature became more expressive and imaginative, breaking away
from rigid religious and allegorical traditions of the medieval period.

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Thus, the Renaissance laid the foundations for modern English literature, turning it into a
powerful medium of individual expression and cultural introspection. Its emphasis on
classical learning, human potential, and aesthetic beauty continues to influence writers and
readers even today.

The Renaissance resulted in a huge churning in the intellectual life of England and in other
parts of Europe:

1. There was the spread of Renaissance Humanism. Humanists were those who taught and
wrote in ‘studia humanitatis’- grammar, poetry, rhetoric, history and moral philosophy. It was
a programme designed to condition men both culturally and intellectually. It sought to elevate
man to realise his potential in both practical and cultural matter.

2. There was a shift from theo-centric world-view to an anthropocentric world-view. Earlier

3. There was the spread of materialism and worldly pursuits became a legitimate endeavour.
4. Love of beauty and an aesthetic and secular view of life came into being. Beauty provided
a glimpse of a transcendental existence. Humanism was in fact an aesthetic movement.

5. There was the spread of New Learning provided by Oxford and Cambridge, the spread of a
new view of the cosmos after the Copernican revolution, and the discovery of new world
after the grand explorations of the world.

Impact of Renaissance on various genres of English literature:

Non-creative Literature:

Naturally enough, the first impact of the Renaissance in England was registered by the
universities, being the repositories of all learning. Some English scholars, becoming aware of
the revival of learning in Italy, went to that country to benefit by it and to examine personally
the manuscripts brought there by the fleeing Greek scholars of Constantinople. After
returning from Italy they organised the teaching of Greek in Oxford. They were such learned
and reputed scholars of Greek that Erasmus came all the way from Holland to learn Greek

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from them. The impact of the Renaissance was also seen in the work of the educationists of
the age. Sir Thomas Elyot (14907-1546) wrote the Governour (1531) which is a treatise on
moral philosophy modelled on Italian works and full of the spirit of Roman antiquity. Other
educationists were Sir John Cheke (1514-57), Sir Thomas Wilson (1525-81), and Sir Roger
Ascham (1515-68).

Prose:

The most important prose writers who exhibit well the influence of the Renaissance on
English prose are Erasmus, Sir Thomas More, Lyly, and Sidney. Erasmus was a Dutch who
came to Oxford to learn Greek. His chief work was The Praise of Folly which is the English
translation of his most important work written in England. Erasmus wrote this work in 1510
at the house of his friend Sir Thomas More who was executed at the bidding of Henry VIII
for his refusal to give up his allegiance to the Pope. More's famous prose romance Utopia
was, in the words of Legouis, "true prologue to the Renaissance." It was the first book written
by an Englishman which achieved European fame; but it was written in Latin (1516) and only
later (1555) was translated into English. The next work by an English man again to acquire
fame was Bacon's Novum Organum was also written originally in Latin.

More's Utopia is an imaginary island which is the habitat of an ideal republic. By the
picture of the ideal state is implied a kind of social criticism of contemporary England.
More's indebtedness to Plato's Republic is quite obvious. However, More seems also to be
indebted to the then recent discoveries of the explorers and navigators-like Columbus and
Vasco da Gama who were mostly of Spanish and Portuguese nationalities.

Bacon's The New Atlantis (1626), Samuel Butler's Erewhon (1872), W. H. Mallock's
The New Republic (1877) etc were other notable works.

Poetry:

Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503-42) and the Earl of Surrey (15177-47) were pioneers of the new
poetry in England. After Chaucer the spirit of English poetry had slumbered for about a
century. It was Wyatt and Surrey initiated the modern English poetry. Though they wrote
much earlier, it was only in 1557, a year before Elizabeth's coronation, that their work was
published in Tottel's Miscellany which is, according to G. H. Mair, "one of the landmarks of
English literature." Of the two, Wyatt had travelled extensively in Italy and France and had
come under the spell of Italian Renaissance. It must be remembered that the work of Wyatt

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and Surrey does not reflect the impact of the Rome of antiquity alone but also that of modern
Italy. So far as versification is concerned, Wyatt and Surrey imported into England various
new Italian metrical patterns. Moreover, they gave English poetry a new sense of grace,
dignity, delicacy, and harmony which was found lacking in the works of Chaucer and the
Chaucerians alike. Further, they were highly influenced by the love poetry of Petrarch and
they did their best to imitate it. Petrarch's love poetry is of the courtly kind, in which the
pining lover is shown as a "servant" of his mistress with his heart ached by her neglect and
his mood varying according to her absence or presence. There is much of idealism in this
kind of love poetry.

It goes to the credit of Wyatt to have introduced the sonnet into English literature, and
of Surrey to have first written blank verse. Both the sonnet and blank verse were later to be
practised by a vast number of the best English poets. As Tillyard puts it, Wyatt "let the
Renaissance into English verse" by importing Italian and French patterns of sentiment as well
as versification. He wrote in all thirty-two sonnets out of which seventeen are adaptations of
Petrarch. Surrey wrote about fifteen or sixteen sonnets and his work is characterised by
exquisite grace and tenderness which we find missing from that of Wyatt. Moreover, he is a
better craftsman and gives greater harmony to his poetry. Surrey employed blank verse in his
translation of the fourth book of The Aeneid, the work which was first translated into English
verse by Gavin Douglas a generation earlier, but in heroic couplets.

Drama:

The revival of ancient classical learning had its impact on English drama of the sixteenth
century. Previous to this impact there had been a pretty vigorous native tradition of drama,
particularly comedy. This tradition had its origin in the liturgical drama and had progressed
through the miracle and the mystery, and later the morality, to the interlude. John Heywood
had written quite a few vigorous interludes, but they were altogether different in tone, spirit,
and purpose from the Greek and Roman drama of antiquity. The first English regular tragedy
Gorboduc (written by Sackville and Norton, and first acted in 1562) and comedy Ralph
Roister Doister (written about 1550 by Nicholas Udall) were very much imitations of
classical tragedy and comedy. It is interesting to note that English dramatists came not under
the spell of the ancient Greek dramatists "(Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the tragedy
writers, and Aristophanes, the comedy writer) but the Roman dramatists (Seneca, the tragedy
writer, and Plautus and Terence the comedy writers). It was indeed unfortunate, as Greek

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drama was vastly superior to Roman drama. Ralph Roister Doister is modelled upon Plautus
and Terence. It is based on the stupid endeavours of the hero for winning the love of a
married woman. Later on, the "University Wits" struck a note of independence in their
dramatic work. They refused to copy Roman drama as slavishly as the writers of Gorboduc
and Roister Doister. In their imagination they were all fired by the new literature which
showed them new dimensions of human capability. They were humanists through and
through. All of them—Lyly, Greene, Peele, Nashe, Lodge, Marlowe, and Kyd—show in their
dramatic work impactof Renaissance learning, the enthusiasm of discovery and aspiration so
typical of the Elizabethan age. In this respect Marlowe stands in the fore-front of the
University Wits. He has rightly been called "the true child of the Renaissance".

Conclusion:

Thus, the Renaissance laid the foundations for modern English literature, turning it into a
powerful medium of individual expression and cultural introspection. Its emphasis on
classical learning, human potential, and aesthetic beauty continues to influence writers and
readers even today.