LYLY, lift, JOHN (c.1554-1606). An English romancer and dramatist, born in Kent, about 1554. Be graduated at Magdalen College, Ox ford, in 1573, and became N.A. in 1575, and was incorporated M.A. at Cambridge in 1579; went to London and strove unsuccessfully to win a place at Court; secured the patronage of Lord Burghley, who gave him some post in his house hold; took part in the Martin Marprelate con troversy, contributing a tract entitled Pappc with an Hatchet (1589) ; was elected to Parlia ment in 1593, 1597, and 1601; and died November, 1606. Lyly became famous on the publication of Euphucs (part i. 1579; part ii. I580), which added a new word, euphuism (q.17.), to the English language. The style of this romance runs riot in alliteration, antitheses, and similes from mythology and fabulous nat ural history. • Lyly was followed by a large number of writers in this style, known as Eu phuists, among whom were Greene and Lodge, Lyly also wrote eight plays which were per formed at Court by companies of children, They are, in the order of publication: Alexander and Cumpaspe (1584) ; Sapho and Phu° (1584); Emit», ion ( 1591 ) ; Gallathca (1592) : Mydas (1592); Mother Born Lie (1594); The Woman in the Moose (1597) ; and Lore's Metamorphosis (1601). These plays are mostly on mythological themes, and, except The Woman in the Moos, are in prose. The plays written by Lyly, Peek, Greene, Lodge, Marlowe, Kyd, Nash, and Shake speare before 1596 were in prose, in rhyme, and in blank verse mixed with prose and rhyme. Be
fore 1587, when Marlowe in his Tamburlaine made blank verse so beautiful and fitting as to overcome other dramatic styles, prose and rhyme had prevailed. By writing much of his eight dramas in prose Lyly established its use, and his example was followed by Shakespeare. They are interspersed with graceful lyrics. Lyly's charm ing songs, scattered through his dramas, are the forerunners of the lyrics in Shakespeare and other dramatists. The 'quips and cranks,' rep artees and similes of Lyly also were models for a like play of fantastic dialogue in Shakespeare. Consult: Dramatic Works, ed. by Fairholt (Lon don, 1858) ;•Endy»zion,with introduction and full bibliography by Baker (New York, 1894) ; re prints of Euplturs by Artier (London, 186S) and by Landmann (1st part, Heilbronn, 1SS7); and The Works of John Lyly, edited by Warwick Bond (New York, 1902). For Lyly's sources, consult: Landmann, Der Euphuism us (Giessen, 1881) ; his article in New Shakespeare Society Publications (London, 1880-S5). Consult. also, Friedrich Lauehert, Gcsehichtc des Physiologns (Strasshurg. 1889). Landmann thinks Lyly de rived his style from Guevara's Golden Book of Marcus Aurelius, which passed from the Span ish through a French version into English. Some of the characteristics of euphuism may be found in George Pettie's Palace of Pleasure (1576). For euphuism in Shakespeare, consult Rushton, Shakespeare's Euphuism (London, 1871).