The Unfortunate Traveller

3979 Words16 Pages
‘Elizabethan prose fiction is thoroughly and (with the exception of Nashes’ Unfortunate Traveller) deservedly dead.’ John Carey What redeeming features can The Unfortunate Traveller, in your view, be said to have for the 21st Century reader. The Elizabethan era was the most influential period on early modern literature. It was the foundation of the genre of the novel, and the beginning of the themes and various modes of writing. The printing press had been established only a century earlier and already there were great works of fiction, playwrights, and pamphlets travelling around the world. I therefore disagree with the stimulus statement as there are many works of Elizabethan prose fiction which are popular to date, for example Thomas Deloney's ‘Thomas of Reading’ and ‘Jack of Newbury’ and John Lyly’s ‘Euphues’. In my essay I will assess the redeeming qualities of Thomas Nashe’s “The Unfortunate Traveller” to a 21st century reader and why it is a worthy piece of prose fiction. I will identify the nature of ‘the novel’ and how Nashes' “The Unfortunate Traveller” relates to this. I will also analyse the traditional aspects of the genre of the novel, such as the picaresque novel, the romance of chivalry, the tragedy, the historical and the comical features of Nashes’ work. I will discuss how Nashe uses various modes of writing throughout the prose to perhaps convey a moral meaning. Lastly I will comment on its place in literary history and the redeeming features which it contributes to a 21st century society. According to Ifor Evans the novel is “a narrative in prose, based on a story, in which the author may portray character, and the life of an age, and analyse sentiments and passions, and the reactions of men and women to their environment.” In other words, the novel is a work of long prose fiction in which there is an aspect of time, place and
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