WHYTHORNE, THOMAS (1528 - 1598)
The autobiography of Thomas Whythorne. [[EDITED BY JAMES M. OSBORN]

At the Claredon Press, Oxford. 1962. First edition. Hardcover. Blue cloth binding gilt lettered on spine. With pictorial dustjacket unclipped.
xv + 328 pp. 13,75 x 22,25 x 4,75 cm. 672 gr. With frontis portrait. Illustrated with black and white plates.

Although Thomas Whythorne published in 1571 the earliest extant book of English madrigals, little more than his name was known, even to musicologists, until the recent discovery of his manuscript autobiography. Whytehorne's life story, written about 1576, opens a new window into Tudor England, allowing us to boserve life in the country houses (where Whytehorne served as music tutor) and other scenes such as the common room of Trinity College, Cambridge and the teeming London of Queen Elizabeth.

Besides its importance to historians of music, literature, and social customs, the manuscript reveals a colourful new personality - attractive to women, respectedby statesmen - a gifted musician and prolific poet.The first English autobiography, in a modern sense, Thomas Whythorne's Book of Songs and Sonnets promises to make him the most intimately known Elizabethan man of arts or letters.

A clean, solid, sharp Near Fine copy. Dustjacket is intact apart from slight creasing and wear along edges with light grubbiness and slight tanning to rear panel.

BOOKNUMBER: 18990