Full Description
Jack of Newbury is an incisive yet remarkably entertaining work of narrative prose—and one that was extremely popular when it was published in the 1590s. The title character, an apprentice weaver, marries his former master's wife, expands her cloth business into an enormous enterprise, refuses Henry VIII's offer of a knighthood, and confronts Cardinal Wolsey; meanwhile, his servants find themselves in a range of comic situations. While amusing, Jack of Newbury also carries a serious and subversive political message: as Peter C. Herman puts it in his introduction to the volume, "the truly valuable subjects" in Deloney's narrative "are not the nobility, but the merchant class." The range of contextual materials included with this edition help to set it in the broader context of its economic and political as well as literary culture.
Contents
Introduction
Jack of Newbury
In Context
Thomas Deloney, "The Queen's Visiting of the Camp at Tilbury with Her Entertainment There" (1588)
from "An Exhortation Concerning Good Order and Obedience to Rulers and Magistrates," Certain Sermons or Homilies (1547)
from "An Homily against Disobedience and Willful Rebellion" (1570)
from Pedro Mexía, The Forest, Or Collection of Histories No Less Profitable than Pleasant and Necessary, Done Out of French into English by Thomas Fortescue (1571)
from Holinshed's Chronicles (1577, revised 1587) [on the reaction to the "Amicable Grant"]
from William Harrison, The Description of England, in Holinshed's Chronicles (1587)
The Norfolk Libel (1595)
Letter from the Lord Mayor of London to Lord Burghley Concerning Thomas Deloney (1596)
Depositions of Bartholomew Steere and His Associates (1596)
A Portfolio: Images of Weaving and Cloth-Making
Further Reading
