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Unit 1: Development of Prose Writing through the Literary Ages

of prose in the fourteenth century, though it cannot be said that hev accomplished much in the Notes
development of a practicable art of prose style. The distinction between prose and verse is not
clearly maintained by him, and of prose dignified by thought and wisdom, he had no conception.
Good English prose has generally appealed primarily to the reason, but Rolle’s appeal is almost
altogether to emotion. When his prose is normal it is least distinguished. It is only when his heart
is kindled by the fire of love that a kind of vatic enthusiasm colors and exalts his expression, and
at the same time lifts it into regions where only those equally inspired can follow him.
One further experiment in the writing of artistic prose in this period must be noted. This is
Thomas Usk’s Testament of Love, made about 1387, and formerly often attributed to Chaucer. The
treatise is in fact based upon Chaucer’s translation of Boethius, and is an attempt to give a testament,
or witness, of the divine love in relation to a symbolic Margaret, the pearl beyond all price, who
stands for various ideas, the Church, the grace of God, and others. The author of the treatise
endeavored to write mystically, but being without genuine mystical fervor, he succeeded merely
in furnishing an instructive illustration of what must happen when an uninspired writer tries to
write an inspired style. Usk comments in some detail on his own theories of style. Many men, he
says, so much swallow the deliciousness of gests and of rime by quaint knitting colors, that they
take little heed of the goodness or bad-ness of the thought. But such craft of enditing, he continues,
will not be of my acquaintance. He puts his trust in “ rude wordes and boystous.” Many delight
in French and Latin, but Englishmen will do better to write in English, for “the understanding of
Englishmen wol not strecche to the privy termes in Frenche, what-so-ever we bosten of straunge
langage.” He frequently speaks of his ‘lewdness,’ and his desire to write plainly in order to be
easily understood. The reader of his Testament soon realizes, however, that this is all false modesty
and affectation of simplicity, for the style of the work is highly artificial and ambitious. Although
there is some use of alliteration, of rime, of puns, of violent antitheses, and of ingenious figures,
Usk depends mainly for his stylistic effects upon an obscure and tortuous form of expression,
derived apparently by taking the crudities of word-order and of unidiomatic phrasing found in
Chaucer’s Boece (and due there merely to Chaucer’s difficulty in rendering the text of his original)
and making these inadequacies of the Boece the marks of his own distinction of style. That Usk was
striving after a literary prose style is apparent. He deserves some credit for rejecting the dithyrambic
style of Rolle, but his own style, though different, is little better. His theme he felt to be lofty, but
without a genuine or deep desire to express himself truly and lacking a model to follow, he
invented a literary prose which saved itself from being merely colloquial and natural by being un-
idiomatic and unintelligible.
Self-Assessment
1. Choose the correct options:
(i) The period of discovery in the history of Engish Literary Prose begins with the latter half
of the ............... .
(a) 13th century (b) 14th century
(c) 15th century (d) None of these
(ii) The Tale of Melibeus was narrated by ............... .
(a) Chaucer (b) Spencer
(c) Dryden (d) None of these
(iii) Caroline Age belongs to the reign of ............... .
(a) James I (b) Charles II
(c) Charles I (d) None of these

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