BIBLIOGRAPHIES

Fishman, Burton. “Recent Studies in Skelton.” English Literary Renaissance 1, No. 1 (Winter 1971): 89-96.

Annotated bibliography of the most important critical works published on Skelton before 1971.

Staub, Susan C. “Recent Studies in Skelton, 1970-1988.” English Literary Renaissance 20, No. 3 (Autumn 1990) 505-16.

Continues Burton Fishman's 1971 study; surveys the most important critical works on Skelton published between 1970 and 1988.

BIOGRAPHIES

Carpenter, Nan Cooke. John Skelton. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1967, 183 p.

General introduction to Skelton's life and works, including a detailed account of the poet's life and a critical survey of individual works.

Edwards, H. R. L. John Skelton: The Life and Times of an Early Tudor Poet. London: Jonathan Cape, 1949, 325 p.

Thorough overview of Skelton's life that remains one of the standard biographies of the poet.

Pollet, Maurice. John Skelton: Poet of Tudor England, translated by John Warrington. London: J. M. Dent, 1971, 302 p.

Detailed study of Skelton that places the poet in a more clearly defined geographical and social setting than previous biographies; includes details about his reconciliation with Cardinal Wolsey, the source of Magnificence, and the date of The Tunning of Elinor Rumming.

Walker, Greg. John Skelton and the Politics of the 1520s. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988, 228 p.

Attempts to “demyothologize” previous biographies of Skelton; discusses his life and career in the historical, political, and social context in which he lived.

CRITICISM

Atchity, Kenneth John. “Skelton's Collyn Clout: Visions of Perfectibility.” Philological Quarterly 52, No. 4 (October 1973): 715-27.

Draws attention to the Latin epigraphs set before and after Collyn Cloute in an effort to reconcile the tensions within the poem and illuminate its structure. According to Atchity, the work deals with the struggle between perfection and imperfection.

Berdan, John M. “Speke, Parrot: An Interpretation of Skelton's Satire.” Modern Language Notes 30, No. 5 (May 1915): 140-44.

Attempts to uncover some of the veiled references in the satirical poem.

Brownlow, F. W. “The Boke of Phyllyp Sparowe and the Liturgy.” English Literary Renaissance 9, No. 1 (Winter 1979): 5-20.

Points out that Phillip Sparrow, written as a pair of monologues, is set in a framework based on the pre-Reformation services for the dead, that the first part of the poem is based upon a liturgical service and the second is based upon a private devotion, and that the two parts together make the poem an act of adoration.

———. Introduction to The Book of the Laurel, by John Skelton, edited by edited by F. W. Brownlow. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1990. 258 p.

Discusses the poem's date, structure, form, and allegory.

Carlson, David, ed. The Latin Writings of John Skelton. Studies in Philology 88, No. 4 (Fall 1991): 125 p.

Entire journal issue devoted to Skelton's Latin works, with discussions of the author's humanism, his use of Latin, and his translations.

Dickey, Stephen. “Seven Come Eleven: Gambling for the Laurel in The Bowge of Courte.” Yearbook of English Studies 22 (1992): 238-54.

Argues that the numerous boastful self-references in Skelton's work are the result of the poet's sense of inferiority to other, greater, poets of his age.

Fish, Stanley Eugene. John Skelton's Poetry. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1965, 268 p.

Definitive study of Skelton's work, excluding Magnificence, that seeks to find the “shaping power” of the poetry that was overlooked by previous criticis. Fish claims that Seklton's poetry is a mixture of philosophy, theology, and propoganda that defies the usual critical categorizations.

Gillespie, Vincent. “Justification by Faith: Skelton's Replycacion.” In The Long Fifteenth Century: Essays for Douglas Gray, edited by Helen Cooper, Sally Mapstone, and Joerg O. Fichte, pp. 273-311. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997.

Argues that the most passionate and emphatic defense of Skelton's poetic calling and academic and intellectual philosophy is to be found in his last English poem, The Replycacion.

———. “Justification by Good Works: Skelton's Garland of Laurel.” Reading Medieval Studies 7 (1981): 19-31.

Maintains that The Garland of Laurel is a poem about Skelton's vocation as a poet. Gillespie also argues that Skelton uses a traditional invocation to the muses and makes it an extremely innovative device.

Harris, William O. Skelton's ‘Magnyfycence’ and the Cardinal Virtues Tradition. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1965.

Argues that the play dramatizes not the usual vice-virtue struggle for man's soul but a struggle for a king's soul, and that the struggle involves the full scope of the morality structure.

Herman, Peter C. “Leaky Ladies and Droopy Dames: The Grotesque Realism of Skelton's The Tunnynge of Elynour Rummynge.” In Rethinking the Henrician Era: Essays on Early Tudor Texts and Contexts, edited by Peter C. Herman. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994, pp. 145-67.

Offers a new interpretation of Skelton's unappreciated poem, in light of Mikhail Bahktin's theory of grotesque realism, and finds that the poem challenges traditional notions of female subservience.

Kelley, John C. “A Perfect Feast of Fools and Plenty: Carnival in John Skelton's Poem ‘The Tunning of Elinour Rumming’.” English Studies in Canada. 22, No. 2 (June 1996): 129-48.

Claims that the poem is not a description of debauchery, but a depiction of a celebratory event of folk culture free of moralistic overtones. According to Kelley, as the poem records the language and proceedings of carnival, it embodies the voices of women liberated from the strictures of ordinary reality.

King, Bruce. “Skelton's Phyllyp Sparowe.” Revue des Langues Vivantes 44, No. 2 (1978): 151-63.

Points out the religious imagery and eroticism in the poem and views it as a mock allegory.

Kinney, Arthur F. John Skelton, Priest as Poet: Seasons of Discovery. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1987, 236 p.

Study of Skelton that sees his primary vocation as a priest and not a poet, a fact which, the author argues, fundamentally informs much of his literary work.

Kinsman, Robert. “The ‘Buck’ and the ‘Fox’ in Skelton's ‘Why Come Ye Not to Courte?’” Philological Quarterly 39 (1950): 61-4.

Offers a political interpretation of Skelton's satire, showing that the “Buck” is the Third Duke of Buckingham and the “Fox” is Richard Fox, Bishop of Winchester.

———. “Phyllyp Sparowe: Titulus.” Studies in Philology 47 (1950): 473-84.

Examines the relation of Skelton's poem to the titulus, a medieval mourning poem.

———. “Skelton's ‘Uppon a Deedman's Hed’: New Light on the Origin of the Skeltonic.” Studies in Philology 50 (1953): 101-9.

Claims that the religious lyric “Uppon a Deedman's Hed” is the first poem that uses Skelton's trademark style, or Skeltonics.

———. “Skelton's Magnyfycence: The Strategy of the ‘Old Sayde Sawe’.” Studies in Philology 63 (1966): 99-125.

Examines the use of proverbs in Magnificence, in particular as they pertain to patterns of change.

Kozikowski, Stanley J. “Allegorical Meaning in Skelton's Bowge of Court.” Philological Quarterly 61, No. 3 (1982): 305-15.

Traces two clearly defined levels of meaning in the dream allegory of The Bowge of Courte.

McLane, Paul E. “Prince Lucifer and the Fitful ‘Lanternes of Lyght’: Wolsey and the Bishops in Skelton's Colyn Cloute.” Huntington Library Quarterly 43 (1980): 159-79.

Examines the poem in its historical context, focusing on Skelton's attack on the behavior of the bishops and arguing that the work offers an accurate portrayal of the English clergy of the day.

Newman, Robert D. “The Visual Nature of Skelton's ‘The Tunnyng of Elynour Rummyng’.” College Literature 12, No. 2 (Spring 1985): 135-40.

Claims that The Tunning of Elinour Rumming relies on a series of visual impressions rather than a developmental plot for its effect and compares Skelton's use of satire and grotesque realism to that used by Pieter Bruegel in his painting “The Peasant Dance.”

Psilos, Paul D. “‘Dulle’ Drede and the Limits of Prudential Knowledge in Skelton's Bowge of Courte.” The Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 6 (1976): 297-317.

Argues that the poem is more than a dream allegory or satire, claiming that the work, with its use of a self-exposing persona, anticipates picaresque satire.

Russell, Stephen. “Skelton's Bowge of Courte: A Nominalist Allegory.” Renaissance Papers (1980): 1-9.

Examines the influence of the philosophy of nominalism on The Bowge of Courte and finds that the poem is emblematic of the Renaissance undermining of allegory.

Salter, F. M. “Skelton's Speculum Principis.” Speculum 9, No. 1 (January 1934): 25-37.

First publication of Skelton's early treatise, with notes on the history and date of the manuscript and a discussion of the new light the work sheds on Skelton's biography.

Scattergood, John. “John Skelton's Lyrics: Tradition and Innovation.” Acta 12 (1988): 19-39.

Considers two collections of Skelton's lyrics, Agaynst a Comely Coystronwe and Dyvers Balettys and Dyties Solacyous, and argues that Skelton was a more traditional poet than is generally believed.

———. “Skelton's Garlande of Laurell and the Chaucerian Tradition.” In Chaucer Traditions: Studies in Honour of Derek Brewer, edited by Ruth Morse, Barry Windeatt, and Toshiyuki Takamiya, pp. 122-38. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.

Finds that The Garland of Laurel is Skelton's most deeply considered statement about poetry.

Skelton, Robin. “The Master Poet: John Skelton as Conscious Craftsman.” Mosaic 6 No. 3 (1973): 67-92.

Claims that Skelton demonstrates a self-consciousness and a poetic sense that are present only in other truly great poets of the English language.

Stevens, Mark. “John Skelton's Inflated Reputation as an Enricher of English Vocabulary.” The Language Quarterly 30, Nos.1-2 (Winter-Spring 1992): 20-27.

Disputes the claim that Skelton is responsible for originating a great number of English words.

Tucker, M. J. “The Ladies in Skelton's Garland of Laurel.” Renaissance Quarterly 22, No. 4 (Winter 1969): 333-45.

Attempts to identify the gentlewomen after whom Skelton modeled the eleven ladies in his most autobiographical poem.

Walker, Greg. “‘Ordered Confusion’?: The Crisis of Authority in Skelton's Speke, Parott.” Spenser Studies 10 (1992): 213-28.

Claims that the text of Speke, Parrot is carefully constructed despite its chaotic appearance.

West, Michael. “Skelton and the Renaissance Theme of Folly.” Philological Quarterly 50 (1971): 23-35.

Examines the theme of folly and Skelton's use of the fool in his work, arguing that his characters anticipate the “wise fools” of Shakespearean drama.

Wilson, Janet. “Skelton's Ware the Hauke and the ‘Circumstances’ of Sin.” Medium Aevum 58, No. 2 (1989): 243-57.

Argues that Skelton's satiric diatribe against the clergy incorporates a parody of the medieval confessional.

Winser, Leigh. “Skelton's Magnyfycence.” Renaissance Quarterly 23, No. 1 (1970): 14-25.

Speculates that the play was written before 1504 and possibly as early as 1497, and not 1515-16 as is generally supposed.

———. “The Bowge of Courte: Drama Doubling as Dream.” English Literary Renaissance 6 (1976): 3-39.

Contends that The Bowge of Courte is not merely a dream-poem but a drama intended for performance.

Additional coverage of Skelton's life and career is contained in the following sources published by the Gale Group: Dictionary of Literary Biography, Vol. 136; Poetry Criticism, Vol. 25.