poems, each consisting of three seven-line stanzas with-
out envoi, exist in ten manuscripts, never alone. On eight
occasions they follow Gower’s major English work, the
Confessio Amantis, and would seem, if the French prose
introduction and the Latin prose sidenotes are authorial,
to have been intended as a sort of a coda or conclusion
to the Confessio. Because the Traitié ends with a Latin
poem in which Gower speaks of his own impending
marriage, the sequence has sometimes been considered
a late work, possibly composed in 1398, though some
of its ballades may have actually been written earlier,
without relation to the marriage.
Latin Works
Gower’s independent extant Latin poetry amounts to
somewhat fewer than 13,000 lines, mostly in unrhymed
elegiac couplets. By far his most signifi cant Latin poem
is the Vox Clamantis, the tide of which derives from the
“vox clamantis in deserto” (“a voice of one crying in the
desert”) of John 1:23. Spanning 10,265 lines, it is known
in ten manuscripts, of which four are contemporary
with the author and probably show signs of personal
revision. Although dating is uncertain, the Vo x seems
motivated by the social unrest resulting in the Peasants’
Revolt of 1381.
The Vo x resembles classical models in form, being
arranged in seven books. This structural neoclassicism
is supported by Gower’s incorporation of many lines
borrowed intact from Roman authors, primarily Ovid,
and such medieval authorities as Alexander Neckham
(in particular his De vita monachorum) and Peter Riga
(author of the Aurora, a versifi ed Bible).
The contents of the Vo x may be summarized briefl y
as follows. Book 1 (“Visio”) relates a horrifi c dream of
the author, who witnesses the destruction of “New Troy”
by anthropomorphic animals. In fear for his life the
dreamer fl ees, fi rst on foot and then by ship; after storms
and attacks by monsters the ship eventually regains port,
on the island of “Brute,” from which the journey began.
The dream is usually read as a thinly disguised allegory
of major fi gures and events in the Peasants’ Revolt.
Book 2 describes human misery, condemns Fortune and
her misperceived power, and concludes by reaffi rming
the Christian view of the order of things and urging its
readers to hold fast to their Christian faith.
In the next three books the degeneracies of the Three
Estates are enumerated (somewhat in the manner of the
Mirour), beginning with the clergy (books 3 and 4), then
treating the knights and peasants (5). Book 6 addresses
the failures of the “ministers of law”; it concludes with
extensive advice to the king, as chief guardian of the na-
tion and its legal tradition. Finally, in book 7, the statue
of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream from the second chapter
of Daniel (one of Gower’s favorite metaphors) is used
to focus discussion on the sinfullness of man and his
precarious mortal circumstances. The Vo x ends with a
pointed (and poignant) appeal to the English to follow
the advice of the dream and make their country a place
of peace and decency.
Of next importance after the Vo x is the Cronica Trip-
ertita, written in leonine hexameters (hexameter lines
with internal rhyme). It treats the failed government of
Richard II, brought down by treachery and weakness,
and celebrates the new order to come under his succes-
sor, Henry IV. Besides these two longer poems Gower’s
Latin poetry includes about twenty short pieces on po-
litical, moral, and personal themes, and the Latin verses
interposed throughout the Confessio Amantis.English Works
Gower’s ME verse consists of two poems, the Confessio
Amantis, his best-known and most admired work, and
“To King Henry IV, In Praise of Peace.” Comprising
some 33,000 lines, the Confessio was frequently cop-
ied (over 40 manuscripts survive) and later was among
the earliest books printed in England, with blackletter
editions by Caxton (1483) and Berthelette (1532 and
1554). The text exists in a variety of versions, the exact
relationship of which is presently under fresh study. The
best manuscript of the poem seems to be Bodl. Fairfax
3, on which the best scholarly edition (Macaulay’s) is
based.
With the Confessio Gower helps establish his na-
tive language as a medium for poetry while displaying
extraordinary erudition and reaching new levels of
fi ction making and characterization in English poetry.
The poem consists of a prologue and eight books, all in
tetrameter couplets except for some twelve rime royal
stanzas in book 8 and occasional Latin verses highlight-
ing the themes of the poem. The framing fi ction is, as
the title indicates, the confession of a lover (“Amans”)
to Genius, the priest of Venus. Each of the books is
concerned with one of the seven cardinal sins and its
branches, except book 7, which rehearses the education
given Prince Alexander by Aristotle. In the process
of the lover’s confession Amans and Genius grow as
characters, becoming multidimensional by the end; in
addition many stories are told, primarily by Genius,
who uses them to illustrate his moral points to Amans.
While the sources of the Confessio Amantis are un-
derstandably too numerous to list completely, its broad
outline suggests major debts to the Roman de la Rose,
manuals of the penitential tradition, such as the Somme
le roi, Lucretius’s De rerum natura, and Boethius’s
Consolation of Philosophy. To these may be added a
thorough acquaintance with the works of Ovid, Statius,
the Aeneid, the Ovide moralisé, the Legenda aurea, and
Brunetto Latini’s Trésor.GOWER, JOHN