Satire or Nothingness?: An Assessment of 'The Unfortunate Traveller' Amelia Coen College

“If asked what Nashe ‘says’, we should have to reply, ‘nothing’.” (C.S. Lewis)

In his book of criticism English Literature in the Sixteenth Century Excluding Drama, C.S. Lewis asserts that Nashe tells no story, expresses no thought and maintains no attitude within his works. In this quote under inspection, C.S Lewis is consequently arguing that Nashe has no clear intention behind his writing, commenting upon nothing through his writing. The Unfortunate Traveller, which Nashe completed writing on 27thJune 1593 but wasn’t published until 1594, is generally considered to be the earliest example of an English language picaresque novel. The novel is set during the reign of Henry VIII and follows the protagonist, Jack Wilton, on his travels through the European continent, providing the reader with a journalistic repertoire of a single, personal voice depicting the dangerous state of European history.

As Nashe’s work was notoriously scandalous[1]within Elizabethan England, we can question the validity of Lewis’s statement; it is clear within the novel that Nashe is in fact presenting a form of satire. Throughout the novel Nashe notably satirises the Roman Catholic church, which England had recently severed its ties with due to...