usually on terms set by the patron. In historical periods
such as classical antiquity or the High Middle Ages, in
which there was little or no recognition of intellectual
labor and no direct contact between the artist and poten-
tial buyers of the work of art, such exchanges monetarily
supported artists, while secondarily enhancing a com-
munity’s cultural development. Art of this time was
typically shaped by the desires, spoken or unspoken, of
patrons rather than the desires of the artists. Literary
patronage was even more directed, where patrons would
commission works to further their political views or
enhance their status in society and the court.
There are obvious limitations and constrictions cre-
ated when patronage becomes involved with the act of
writing. The writer, by accepting the patronage, becomes
a part of the patron’s “family,” which provides the sup-
port the artist seeks but also demands the allegiance of
the artist to the patron. The patron’s dominance over the
writer, created by the underlying economic dependence
of the writer to the patron, creates the ideal climate for
the furthering of the patron’s own politics. These views
thus infl uence the subject matter, forms, and genres of
the works created. In the case of English literature, this
becomes patently clear in observing the vying between
Protestant and Catholic sympathies expressed in Tudor
writing.
The arrival of the printing press (1474) reduced the
demand for literary patronage and altered the basic
nature of commissioned literature. The production of
literature now had the potential to be profi table for the
author and to reach a wider audience. This facilitated
the creation of two separate literatures, popular litera-
ture for the common people and commissioned litera-
ture for the elite. There was now opportunity for
opinions and ideas of dissent, not only those of the
wealthy patrons. One of the paradoxes of literary pro-
duction within Tudor COURT CULTURE was that many
writers, particularly those in the court circle, such as
Sir THOMAS WYATT and HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SUR-
REY, did not want to have their works published and
preferred a restricted manuscript circulation.
See also SCOP.
FURTHER READING
Holzknecht, Karl Julius. Literary Patronage in the Middle Ages.
- Reprint, New York: The Collegiate Press, 1966.
Lefevere, André. “The System: Patronage.” In Translation,
Rewriting, and the Manipulation of Literary Fame. London:
Routledge, 1992, 11–25.
Alessandra Petrina and Adam BuresPEARL ANONYMOUS (late 14th century) Pearl is
the fi rst of four exceptional poems in MIDDLE ENGLISH
that have survived in one single manuscript, housed at
the British library, MS Cotton Nero A.x. It is followed
by CLEANNESS, Patience, and SIR GAWAIN AND THE GREEN
KNIGHT. These poems all appear to be written by the
same author, who is not identifi ed and whose name
has simply become either the PEARL-POET or the GAWAIN-
POET.
The poem is divided into 20 parts, with fi ve STANZAs
per part. In the fi rst part, the fi rst-person narrator of
the poem mourns the loss of a “perle wythouten spot”
(l. 12) in a garden. We are told that the unblemished,
valuable jewel was perfectly formed: “so rounde, so
reken in uche araye, / So small, so smothe her sides
were” (ll. 5–6). The narrator also describes the garden
and its fl ora as he searches for the pearl. The speaker
falls asleep in part 2, and the remainder of the poem
proceeds as a DREAM VISION. Soon after falling asleep,
the narrator fi nds himself in a second garden, a celes-
tial one, where even the gravel is made of “precious
perles of orient” (l. 82).
In part 3, the narrator sees a young woman dressed
in blinding white and decorated with pearls standing
across a stream under a “crystal clyffe” (l. 159). The
narrator recognizes her; indeed, the longer he looks at
her, he “knew hyr more and more” (l. 168). Transfi xed,
the dreamer wants to stay with the maiden. The
description of the maiden continues in part 4, where
she is described in similar terms to the lost pearl in
part 1 as “so smothe, so smal, so seme slyght” (l. 190).
Soon this similarity is explained: This maiden is the
dreamer’s lost pearl; she is closer to him than “aunte or
nece” (l. 233), which nearly all scholars have inter-
preted as meaning that the maiden is the speaker’s
daughter. It is here that it becomes clear that the poem
is about the narrator’s grief and bereavement at the
death of a child. The woman removes her crown of
“grete tresore” (l. 237) and bows to the narrator, who is
overcome with joy at seeing his pearl.312 PEARL