John Clanvowe

John Clanvowe

Sir John Clanvowe (1341–1391) was an English poet. Clanvowe was born to a Herefordshire family, was a diplomat and soldier, and was a personal friend of Geoffrey Chaucer.[1] He was a 'Lollard knight' at the court of Richard II of England.[2]

In 1390 he was campaigning with Louis II, Duke of Bourbon against Tunis.[3] He was buried with Sir William Neville, in a joint tomb discovered in 1913 in Istanbul.[4][5] They were both deponents in Scrope v. Grosvenor.[6]

Works

He is first mentioned in the History of English Literature by F. S. Ellis in 1896. He is reputed to be the author of The Cuckoo and the Nightingale, which had previously been attributed to Chaucer. The Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature notes the absence of direct evidence linking Clanvowe with the work.[7]

In the poem, the nightingale praises love but the cuckoo mocks it for causing more trouble than joy. The poem is written as a literary dream vision and is an example of medieval debate poetry. A concerto inspired by the poem was composed by Georg Friedrich Handel.

The poem's MS title was The Book of Cupid, God of Love. It apparently influenced works by both John Milton and William Wordsworth.

Clanvowe also wrote The Two Ways, a penitential treatise.[8]

References

  1. ^ Thomas Garbaty, Medieval English Literature (1984).
  2. ^ David Aers, Culture and History, 1350-1600: Essays on English Communities, Identities, and Writing (1992), p. 9.
  3. ^ http://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=891
  4. ^ http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n11/davi02_.html
  5. ^ Düll, Siegrid; Luttrell, Anthony; Keen, Maurice Hugh. 'Faithful unto death : the tomb slab of Sir William Neville and Sir John Clanvowe, Constantinople 1391'. Antiquaries Journal, 71 (1993 for 1991), 174-90. ISSN 00035815.
  6. ^ Edith Rickert, Chaucer's World (1962), p. 147.
  7. ^ Robert T. Lambdin, Laura C. Lambdin, Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature (2000), pp. 104-5.
  8. ^ Lee Patterson, Chaucer and the Subject of History (1991), p. 38.

Further reading

  • V. J, Scattergood (1975), The Works of Sir John Clanvowe
  • David Wallace (editor), The Cambridge History of Medieval English Literature (2002), pp. 571–2.

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