|
|
The Honourable reputation of a Souldier (1585) is a moral guide for the soldier and it recalls his military experience.
The Censure of a Loyal Subject (1587) is a “Dialogue Form” like Aurelia, but he gives his attention to the Popular classes. The main character of this book is a tailor.
Whetstone had an aristocratic literary taste but his elegant and difficult prose alternates with realistic passages in particular when he tells a novella.
Whetstone’s education was humanist and classical. He had legal interests, too. Perhaps he was a member of a “Inns of Court”. He studied “Rethoric” and he tried to pursue “decorum” in his works.
He loved culture which was considered by Elizabethans the key to progress and the social raising of man and a source of virtue, too.
In Whetstone’s books moral justification is always present.
He was a Protestant and he was influenced by his religion. He wasn’t an aesthetic artists, his prose was elegant but principally moralizing. He was influenced by politics, too. His books reflect contemporary political events for example beheading of Mary Stuart and the various expeditions of Sir Francis Drake against Spain.
There are many elements in Whetstone’s books which make him man of his times. He considers politics and culture of the Elizabethan period; he reflects that kind of culture in his education and method of composition.
In his book there are amorous epistles, symbolism, proverbs, novellas and sonnets. He loved what was foreign and ancient; he studied Rhetoric and classical culture; considered Man as the centre of the Universe; loved travelling abroad and especially to Italy where he was in 1580; exalts the themes of his own Religion and censures the Catholic Ceremonies.
|
|
|