All forms of English literature were now in print, except for
plays. Many ladies read aloud to each other in reading circles and
to their households. Some wrote poetry and did translations.
Correctness of spelling was beginning to be developed. Printers
tended to standardize it. There was much reading of romances, jest
books, histories, plays, prayer collections, and encyclopedias, as
well as the Bible. In schools and gentry households, favorite
reading was Edmund Spenser's "Faerie Queen" about moral virtues
and the faults and errors which beset them, Erasmus' New
Testament, "Paraphrases", "Colloquies", and "Adages", Sir Thomas
North's edition of Plutarch's "Lives of the Noble Grecians and
Romans", Elyot's "The Book Named the Governor", and Hoby's
translation of "The Courtier". Gentlemen read books on the ideals
of gentlemanly conduct, such as "Institucion of a Gentleman"
(1555), and Laurence Humphrey's "The Nobles: or of Nobilites".
Francis Bacon's "Essays or Counsels Civil and Moral" were popular
for their wisdom. In them he commented on many subjects from
marriage to faction. He cautioned against unworthy authority, mass
opinion, custom, and ostentation of apparent wisdom. He urged the
use of words with their correct meaning.
At a more popular level were Caxton's "The Golden Legend",
Baldwin's "Mirror for Magistrates", Foxe's "Book of Martyrs" about
English protestant who suffered at the stake, sensational stories
and pamphlets, printed sermons (including those of Switzerland's
Calvin), chronicles, travel books, almanacs, herbals, and medical
works.
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