Prose of the Month (November 2010): The Hermit's Oration

This piece is not easy to obtain without buying an expensive book, so I like to think that I'm performing a service by making such a little gem of late Elizabethan prose available to followers of this blog. And it's the work of a politician! (Hard to believe, now that our politicians compete to display their low level of taste). In 1593, the Queen was entertained at Theobalds, the country house of Lord Burleigh (her Lord High Treasurer, the equivalent of Prime Minister today). One morning, she went forth to be met by an actor dressed as a hermit, who delivered a speech of welcome. It was written by Robert Cecil, Burleigh's son, who in the subsequent reign became Lord High Treasurer himself. I'll leave the political allusions in the Oration to historians, but say something about its style. The dominant literary style of the period was Euphuism, an extremely artificial style, producing bizarre (though often enjoyable) effects in novels. But in prose drama (and the Oration is a dramatic monologue) it was ultimately far more influential on the development of English prose. Lyly's court dramas (especially the intoxicating Endimion, or The Man in the Moone ((1591)), have the balance and sweetness of Euphuism without its formal excesses. The Hermit's Oration (Prose of the Month for November) displays these same qualities.