Kinney shows how the Mass, the Divine Offices, and the liturgy underlie the themes and image clusters of Skelton’s poems and argues that liturgical music, especially the plainsong, informs all of Skelton’s meters. What emerges is the portrait of a consistent, determined, and imaginative poet in whose canon poetics is grounded in the marriage of teaching and preaching. The study sheds new light on the interrelationships of politics, poetry, and religion in Renaissance England.

Originally published in 1987.

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