GOWER, JOHN, an early English writer, was born in the first half of the 14th century. Whether be was older or younger than Chaucer is doubtful ; certain it is that they were friends, probably from their college days. The profession which Gower followed is as uncertain as his birth-year. It appears that he studied law, but the story of his having been some time chief-jostle° of the Common Pleas wants proof.
He was attached to the Duke of Gloucester, Richard Il.'s uncle, and appears, like Chaucer, to have taken part in censuring the vices and follies of the ecelesiaatica of those times. In the latter part of Gower's life it seems nearly certain that a coolness existed between him and Chaucer, and Tyrrwhit thinks he has discovered some trace of it in certain expressions of Chaucer, and in the fact that in the second edition of his poems Gower omitted some verses in praise of his friend. As however this second edition did not appear till after the accession of Henry IV., it is probable that Chaucer, who only survived that event about a year, never felt the blow thus aimed against him.
Gower's works are-1. 'Speculum Meditantis,' a collection in French verse of precepts and examples of chastity. 2. ' Vox Clamantis,' a Latin poem, in seven books, on the insurrection of the Commons under Richard H. 3. 'Confessio Amantis,' which is written for the most part in English octave verse, with interspersed Latin elegiacs arid Latin prose tables of contents, something like the well-known running commentary to the Ancient Mariner.' It consists of eight books and a prologue, and iu some parts takes the form of a conversation between the lover and his priest, where story and disquisition are heaped on each other in the most unsparing profusion, with the intention apparently of solacing the lover.
The Confessio Amantis ' was written towards the end of Gower's life, and appears by its form to have indicated a wish on his part to conform to that taste for English poetry which Chaucer had awakened among his countrymen. As a poet he ranks very far below his friend. His verses are tedious, overladen with misplaced learning not even poetically introduced; and it seems pretty evident that had Chaucer never lived, Gower would have continued to the end of hie days a composer of Norman couplets and Latin elegiacs.
Some smaller paean of Gower's remain in the library of Trinity Collage, Cambridge, but none of any consequence or merit. The only one of works which is is the ' Conferral° Amautis, which went through four editions before the year 1560. Of his history nothing wore Is known, except that his principal work (the 'Contend° Amanus') was written in consequence of a casual mooting with Richard IL, when that prince Raked him to " book some now thing; " that he beam. blind in his later years, and that at hi. death be was buried In the church of St. Saviour's, Southwark, where his menu meat remains. Whatever may he thought of his poems, no one can deny him the praise of having by his benefactions to the above mentioned building left a monument which no lover of art can pass without admiration. Gower stands half-way between the minstrel of Normandy and the English poet, and be seams to have transferred the faults of a declining literature into the language of one newly arisen.