MSt in English Studies (2007-8); 1550-1780
Prose Fiction – Dr Helen Moore
Preparatory Reading
You will find it helpful to make a start on some preliminary reading for the Prose Fiction course. The primary
texts we will be studying are listed below, as are some introductory studies. Most of the primary texts are
available in modern editions, although some (indicated below with §) are likely to be found only in libraries.
Primary Texts (in order of study topics)
(1) Experimentation and innovation
§ John Lyly, Euphues: the anatomy of wit and Euphues and his England ed. Leah Scragg (Manchester, 2003);
this is as yet only available in hardback – for the moment read Euphues: the anatomy of wit which is available in
Paul Salzman, An Anthology of Elizabethan Prose Fiction (Oxford, 1987)
§ The standard edition is R. Warwick Bond, The Complete Works of John Lyly (Oxford, 1973); an older edition
of Euphues, ed. Morris William Croll and Harry Clemons (London, 1916) is still useful for its notes.
William Baldwin, Beware the Cat, ed. William A. Ringler Jr and Michael Flachmann (San Marino, 1988)
George Gascoigne, The Adventures of Master F.J. (available in Paul Salzman, An Anthology of Elizabethan
Prose Fiction (Oxford, 1987)); also contained in § George Gascoigne, A hundreth sundrie flowers, ed. G.W.
Pigman III (Oxford, 2000)
Thomas Nashe, The Unfortunate Traveller (available in Salzman, or with other Nashe works in the Penguin
edition edited by J.B. Steane (1972))
(2) Fiction and Fabulation
§ Thomas Underdowne, translation of Heliodorus’ The Aethiopian Historie, which exists in various older
editions such as the Tudor Translations series
Robert Greene, Pandosto (available in Salzman)
Aphra Behn, Oroonoko (for example in Penguin, ed. Janet Todd, or the Norton edition, ed. Joanna Lipking)
(3) The Urban World
§ Thomas Deloney, Thomas of Reading in The Novels of Thomas Deloney, ed. Merritt E. Lawliss (Bloomington,
1961)
Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders (e.g. the Norton edition ed. Edward Kelly)
(4) Fiction as Instruction
§ George Pettie, A Petite Pallace of Pettie his Pleasure ed. Herbert Weilder Hartman (Oxford, 1938)
John Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress
(5) and (6) The Moral Landscape of Fiction: ‘virtue rewarded’
Sir Philip Sidney, The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia (available in Penguin, ed. Maurice Evans, 1977)
Samuel Richardson, Pamela (e.g. the Oxford World’s Classics edition ed. Tom Keymer, 2001)
Studies
Paul Salzman, English Prose Fiction 1558-1700: A Critical History (Oxford, 1985)
Michael McKeon, The Origins of the English Novel 1600-1740 (Baltimore, 1987)
Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel (now greatly disputed, but still worth reading)