History/identity:
John Davies is a poet and lawyer during the reigns of Elizabeth and James who, like Spenser, lived for a significant period of time in Ireland; he is appointed Solicitor General 1603 and then […]

(summary of Rivkah Zim, “Writing Behind Bars: Literary Contexts and the Authority of Carceral Experience,” Huntington Library Quarterly 72.2 (2009): 291-311)

Zim argues that, often, “carceral experience gives […]

Unlike the complaint against Fortune, this poem is located in a specific place, a specific time, and a specific prison, The Fleet. But it begins, as many medieval poems do, by setting the season: unlike the many […]

An allegorical text and short dialogue, The Complaint of a Prisoner against Fortune  features a prisoner railing against Fortune, who responds briefly and then disappears from the poem. In the first 28 lines, the […]