Humanism and Fiction in the English Renaissance

FAIN: FA-11588-76

Arthur F. Kinney
University of Massachusetts, Amherst (Amherst, MA 01003-9242)

To correct misinformation about the genesis of the English novel. Grantee will demonstrate that English fiction is primarily a form indigenous to England. These novelists drew their matter from humanist documents taught at University and their manner from rhetorical treatises. Grantee will argue that the forms and ideas undertaken by humanist fiction writers between 1570 and 1600 gave to the Elizabethan novel certain basic themes and structural conventions still in use today.