Hoccleve, Lydgate, and Their Patrons

Sponsoring Organization(s)

International Hoccleve Society; Lydgate Society

Organizer Name

Taylor Cowdery

Organizer Affiliation

Univ. of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

Presider Name

Taylor Cowdery

Paper Title 1

Naming Names: Creating an Audience in Hoccleve and Lydgate

Presenter 1 Name

R. D. Perry

Presenter 1 Affiliation

New Chaucer Society

Paper Title 2

Monuments, Memory, and Patronage in Lydgate's Guy of Warwick

Presenter 2 Name

Mimi Ensley

Presenter 2 Affiliation

Univ. of Notre Dame

Paper Title 3

Imperial and Literary Lineage in Lydgate's Troy Book

Presenter 3 Name

Leah Schwebel

Presenter 3 Affiliation

Texas State Univ.-San Marcos

Paper Title 4

Respondent

Presenter 4 Name

Robert J. Meyer-Lee

Presenter 4 Affiliation

Agnes Scott College

Start Date

11-5-2018 10:00 AM

Session Location

Fetzer 2020

Description

There’s much to tie Thomas Hoccleve and John Lydgate together: a shared language, political life under both Ricardian and Lancastrian rule, a purported love for “father” Chaucer, and—perhaps most important—a single network of patrons and benefactors. Their poetic accounts regarding the lived experience of this common ground, however, could not be more different. As Robert Meyer-Lee has observed, Lydgate is, in social and economic terms, “the kind of poet” that Hoccleve failed to become. Where Hoccleve repeatedly describes seeking and not finding steady patronage, Lydgate managed to do so with apparent ease; where Hoccleve’s works apart from the Regiment of Princes appear to have circulated only in modest numbers, Lydgate’s verse found great favor among a variety of audiences, including merchants, craftsmen, scholars, and the nobility. This panel reassesses Hoccleve and Lydgate’s shared literary moment by focusing, in particular, on their varied relationship to patronage. Sample questions that might be explored include the following: Does Lydgate view Prince Hal in the same way that Hoccleve does? How do Lydgate and Hoccleve select or manage their patrons, particularly in light of the dangerous currents of the Lancastrian court? Why, for example, is the Fall of Princes dedicated to Duke Humphrey (in the case of Lydgate) or the Series dedicated to a shifting set of patrons (in the case of Hoccleve)? And to what extent may Lydgate and Hoccleve be said to deploy what John Burrow has termed “petitionary poetics?”

Taylor H. Cowdery

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May 11th, 10:00 AM

Hoccleve, Lydgate, and Their Patrons

Fetzer 2020

There’s much to tie Thomas Hoccleve and John Lydgate together: a shared language, political life under both Ricardian and Lancastrian rule, a purported love for “father” Chaucer, and—perhaps most important—a single network of patrons and benefactors. Their poetic accounts regarding the lived experience of this common ground, however, could not be more different. As Robert Meyer-Lee has observed, Lydgate is, in social and economic terms, “the kind of poet” that Hoccleve failed to become. Where Hoccleve repeatedly describes seeking and not finding steady patronage, Lydgate managed to do so with apparent ease; where Hoccleve’s works apart from the Regiment of Princes appear to have circulated only in modest numbers, Lydgate’s verse found great favor among a variety of audiences, including merchants, craftsmen, scholars, and the nobility. This panel reassesses Hoccleve and Lydgate’s shared literary moment by focusing, in particular, on their varied relationship to patronage. Sample questions that might be explored include the following: Does Lydgate view Prince Hal in the same way that Hoccleve does? How do Lydgate and Hoccleve select or manage their patrons, particularly in light of the dangerous currents of the Lancastrian court? Why, for example, is the Fall of Princes dedicated to Duke Humphrey (in the case of Lydgate) or the Series dedicated to a shifting set of patrons (in the case of Hoccleve)? And to what extent may Lydgate and Hoccleve be said to deploy what John Burrow has termed “petitionary poetics?”

Taylor H. Cowdery