Description: Daniel Wakelin uses new methods and theories in the history of reading to uncover fresh information about the design, ownership, and marginalia of books in a neglected period in English literary history. Transforming our understanding of how new trends influenced writers from Chaucer, through Lydgate and Caxton, to the early Tudor period, this is the first book to identify the origins of the humanist tradition in England in the 15th century.
Review Quotes: "Wakelin is clearly a gifted and original scholar. This is a substantial and original book, one that makes a valuable contributoin to the study of early English humanism."--A.S.G. Edwards, Speculum
"Wakelin restores interest in an unusual list of English writers and illuminates an important but little-known period in the history of humanism. He uncovers a pervasive, vernacular humanist activity in England that differs from both earlier and later Latinate-humanist engagements with antiquity.... This book posits continuity between medieval and Renaissance humanisms, and the nuanced local readings adjust what we mean by both 'humanism' and 'Renaissance.'"--A.E.B. Coldiron, Renaissance Quarterly