This is the earliest original piece of long prose fiction in English. It has the distinction of being the first English 'novel', far surpassing in narrative sophistication such immediate predecessors as Elyot's Image of Governance or Borde's Scoggin's Jests. This edition, besides providing a modernising text of the novel, also identifies the pseudonymous author of Beware the Cat as William Baldwin, better known as editor and principal author of the enormously popular Mirror for Magistrates (1559). The development of early English prose fiction is thoroughly documented in two informative and wide-ranging appendices. William Baldwin's place in this tradition, as well as his innovative narrative art, is discussed in the introduction, which also provides biographical information on the author, historical background to his novel, and an insight into the political and religious turmoil of the middle years of the sixteenth century.
- ISBN10 0873281543
- ISBN13 9780873281546
- Publish Date 1 January 1995
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 18 November 2010
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Huntington Library Press,US
- Format Paperback (US Trade)
- Pages 160
- Language English