Lyly

Lyly, or Lilly, John (1553-1606), novelist and dramatist, was born in Kent and educated at Magdalen College, Oxford. After leaving the university he attached himself to Lord Burghley, from whom he does not seem to have received much encouragement. The first part of his famous novel. Euphues, or the Anatomy of Wit, was published in 1579 ; Euphues and his England followed in 1580. He describes the travels, gallantries, and studies of a youth named Euphues, who in the first part visits Naples and Athens, and in the second journeys to England with his friend Philautus. The book abounds in moral dissertations, classical allusions, and descriptions of life and manners, such as the age loved; but its popularity was mainly due to its peculiarities of style, which were much admired by Elizabeth's courtiers, and gave rise to the manner of speaking and writing called "Euphuism." Its characteristics have been described by Dr. Lachmann in his Euphuismus (1881) as "a combination of antithesis with alliteration, assonance, rhyme, and play upon words, a love, for the conformity and correspondence of parallel sentences, and a tendency to accumulate rhetorical figures." Lyly's comedies mark a step forward in the development of the English drama. He is supposed to have died in poverty and neglect in the early part of the 17th century.