There emerged, some time around the final two decades of Queen Elizabeth I’s reign, a new type of author in England — the professional. These were men who, as Jason Peacey observes, did not write as an intellectual exercise or to supplement some other source of income but whose livelihood depended entirely on ‘their wits and the fruit of their pens.’ Frequently, these were men fresh out of university who came to London in search of a career in writing, though many were educated only to a grammar school level, and (I believe) possessed extraordinary skills — in their navigation of tumultuous literary waters and perceptiveness of the market — which are often underappreciated.
It was in Phoebe Sheavyn’s The Literary Profession in the Elizabethan Age (1909) that this new breed was first properly identified and it is in Edwin Haviland Miller’s The Professional Writer in Elizabethan England (1959) which these literary creatures are first dissected. The picture of the ‘professional’ writer’s life which can be gleaned from these works is bleak, to understate the facts. These men — among them Robert Greene, Gabriel Harvey, Thomas Nashe, Anthony Munday, Thomas Dekker, and Anthony Nixon — seem to have drawn rather short straws both historically and historiographically.
Historiographically, because these were (according to Miller) men of little literary ability, untalented in business, for whom the act of writing was not so much a passionate endeavour as a desperate pecuniary resort. Historically, because these writers did not, with very few exceptions, experience in their lifetimes any modicum of wealth or general respect. History says they were destitute, scholars tend to think this was not undeserved.
If the lives of these men have been presented as tragic, Miller assumes the role of the rushed playwright who, nearing the end of his creation and realising (to his alarm) that he has not yet rid himself of a great deal of his pitiful cast, swiftly dispenses of them in his conclusion:
In September 1592, Greene, then about thirty-five, died in a squalid tenement of Shoreditch, attended only by his disheveled mistress. In the following year Marlowe was killed in a tavern brawl. Nashe disappeared about 1600—still a young man. Lodge took refuge in a more lucrative profession. Churchyard undoubtedly died in poverty, still pleading for “charitie.”
Miller at least affords these men some implicit sympathy, cogs in a machine ‘[which], inadvertently perhaps, accelerated […] the cultural evolution from ignorance to enlightenment.’ Lambert Ennis is not so kind to Anthony Nixon when his overview of the writer’s life reaches its terminus:
After 1615 Nixon vanished from the literary scene. Of course, he may have gone on revamping anonymous news pamphlets, although I find his style in none. He may have retired to the snug haven of a benefice, but there is slight probability of any such good fortune. My guess is that he retired, instead, to a pauper’s grave.
Though it may charitably be interpreted as a blunt neutrality in isolation, frequent allusions to Nixon as ‘without talent’ and an obvious disbelief in any literary merits make it clear that some cynical delight is taken in Nixon’s inability to secure clerical office and his impoverished end. Ennis’ article is entitled ‘Anthony Nixon: Jacobean Plagiarist and Hack’, so the animosity is unsurprising.
Plagiarism and the Print Market: Anthony Nicks ‘Em?
In fact, the bulk of scholarship concerning this intriguing man (besides incidental references to his works, most often concerning his descriptions of Persia) comes in the form of three articles, which I list below in chronological order:
- F. P. Wilson, ‘Some English Mock-Prognostications’, The Library, 4:1 (1938), 6-43.
- Lambert Ennis, ‘Anthony Nixon: Jacobean Plagiarist and Hack’, Huntington Library Quarterly, 3:4 (1940), 377-403.
- Edwin Haviland Miller, ‘Another Source for Anthony Nixon’s “The Scourge of Corruption (1615)”‘, Huntington Library Quarterly, 17:2 (1954), 173-176.
Nixon’s importance is somewhat auxiliary in the first article. He is discussed between pages 28 and 31 because his The Black Year (1606) — in part a satirical almanac — is, in Wilson’s words, ‘the most blatant example of word-piracy that I know.’ Ennis’ article further explores the nature of his pilfering, offering also a little insight into the life of this ‘master plagiarist.’ Finally, Miller’s short article informs us of yet another victim of Nixon’s literary theft.
Anthony Nixon was active in print from 1602 to 1615. He claims, in a 1605 pamphlet, to have been educated at Oxford University and his writings evince probable clerical training. He may be the same Anthony Nixon who was committed to Newgate Prison in 1592, for the arrest and extortion (under false pretence) of a suspected Papist. He wrote primarily journalistic pieces (writing up news stories) but also ventured into the realms of theology and satire. Ennis describes his writing style as follows:
Nixon’s style can be recognized by his interpolation of Latin phrases into the text, his addiction to explanatory parentheses, his fondness for personified abstractions, his moralizing digressions, and his love for the rhetorical patterns of euphuism — particularly the balanced phrase and the formal simile.
That Nixon, according to Miller, ‘did little in his tracts but excerpt from the pamphlets of other men’ is hyperbolic. Though a cursory glance of these articles may suggest (to paraphrase Miller) that he really did have greater skill with scissors than the pen, it is clear that (even granting the discovery of yet more plagiarism) the majority of his writing was in fact his own. There are 14 distinct works which can reasonably be attributed to him, in the sense that he presented them as his own. Early English Books Online does not attribute his first work The Christian Navy (1602) to him, as it represents little more than Nixon stamping his name on a 1569 work by Barnaby Googe (see Ennis, pp. 379-380). Nor does EEBO list a 1609 pamphlet about the pirates Zymen Danseker and Jack Ward as his, despite the fact that Ennis presents an argument (predicated on Nixon’s connection with the publisher Nathaniel Butter and internal linguistic evidence) which, in my view, renders his authorship probable.
Of these 14 works, the three aforementioned articles demonstrate that six contain flagrant plagiarism. Another, about the travels of the Shirley brothers (published under two titles but which both contain the same text) is heavily informed by a 1601 printed report; Ennis does not explicitly suggest that any direct plagiarism occurs here, though there is in fact (at the very least) a near-verbatim transposition of various sentences from p.10 (‘For they are beyond all measure […] have long expected his second coming’) and p.11-12 (‘We passed from Aleppo through the heart of the Turkes country […] which would most willingly be assisting for their liberty’). These passages reappear in Nixon’s account on signatures J1r-v. With this in mind, I provide below a table which lists each of Nixon’s tainted works and provides the relevant plagiarised texts:
Clearly, his theft was rampant and widespread. It is, as all scholarly commentary has been at pains to point out, also a statistical certainty that there remains more to be spotted. It is entirely possible (even probable) that some has been since the last of those articles was published, nearly 70 years ago, and I have missed it. The digitization of works on EEBO, and advancements in stylometric analysis programs may help us to find more. The most obvious borrowings (i.e. the copying of whole paragraphs verbatim) have for the most part already been uncovered, however, and Nixon (to give him some credit) often refashions what he plunders — swapping in synonyms, reversing the order of clauses, and making other structural changes which may evade even fairly sophisticated plagiarism software.
Dekker, Nixon, and the Changing Literary Landscape
To understand what these new professional writers thought of the market is not always a straightforward task. Outside of literary quarrels, such as that between Thomas Nashe and Gabriel Harvey between 1592 and 1596, explicit references to the print trade are sporadic and frequently short. Of course, it is almost tautological to observe that publishers were hardly going to allow for scathing criticisms of their trade to reach the printing press, let alone sit upon their shelves. Miller uses this reasoning, alongside some insulting commentary in the Nashe-Harvey dispute, to maintain that writers who were (for some period of time) regularly employed by a publisher, exploiting their ‘chronic poverty’, probably did so reluctantly out of necessity and occupied a position not dissimilar to dosmetic servants — ‘For not only did they produce the publisher’s trivia, they had to live in his house.’ In fact, his conclusion maintains that writers’ acceptance of publishers’ hire was typically done ‘reluctantly and contemptuously’.
Anthony Nixon produced at least four pamphlets for Nathaniel Butter, easily one of the most prominent booksellers of the time, between 1608 and 1610. To these can very possibly be appended some number of publications which are now lost. Perhaps Nixon and Butter’s relationship was purely one of necessity, but it does seem somewhat paradoxical to in one moment stress the extreme poverty of these writers and in the next assume a general ungratefulness among them towards their employers. And, despite the implication by Miller that writers exercised little creative freedom when employed in this fashion, Ennis’ investigations reveal that Nixon was often allowed to wax poetic about all sorts of moral, philosophical, and religious matters as long as it in some way assisted the text. Indeed, writers who were commissioned did not need to restrict themselves to the literary styles that were most likely to convince a publisher to purchase their manuscript in the first place. Moreover, as the blog Mercurius Politicus has touched on regarding the newsbooks of the 1640s, we cannot ignore the fact that writers often appeared to take a great pleasure in their work, beyond (or alongside) financial or intellectual motives. This is not to suggest that Nixon would not have preferred wealth and freedom over a more restrictive employment by Butter, but it was hardly slavery.
Thomas Dekker, who was just as much a pamphleteer as a dramatist, is invaluable as a source of information on the nature of the print trade (or at least his perception of it) during this crucial period. He was, it seems, almost addicted to commenting on ‘this Printing Age of ours’ and criticising stationers, readers, and writers alike.
Stationers could never be pleased:
…nor can all men that write (if all that can but speake should write) fit some Stationers. Go to one and offer a coppy, if it be merrie, the man likes no light stuffe, if sad, it will not sell. Another meddles with nothing but what fits the time, I wold haue his shop stuft with nothing but proclamations, because he lyes i’th winde only for the change of weather.
Thomas Dekker and George Wilkins, Jests to make you Merie (1607), sig. A2r
Readers were never satisfied:
…so nice are our Paules Churchyard-walkers in beholding these pictures, that to day they cry excellent at the drawing of that, vpon which to morrow they will cast a mewing countenance…
Ibid.
And, among the throng of people who regularly packed St. Paul’s Churchyard, Dekker had noticed a new type of writer:
they that out of a Meere and Idle vaine-glory will euer be Pamphleting (tho their bookes beeing printed are scarse worth so much Browne paper) and this is a very poore, and foolish ambition.
Thomas Dekker, Lanthorne and Candle-light. Or, The Bell-Mans second Nights-walke (London, 1609), sig. A3r.
If Dekker resembled the character of this compulsive pamphleteer to a greater extent than he would surely have liked to admit, Nixon was almost its archetype. Another comment by Dekker in the same work accuses some writers of ‘scrap[ing] together certaine small paringes of witte, he first cuttes them hansomely in pretty peeces, and of those peeces does he patch vppe a booke.’ Though Nixon is not named (and is never named in a printed attack), Dekker very possibly had him in mind — given that both were working with Butter (albeit in different capacities) in that 1608-1610 period, it seems certain they knew of each other.
Another section of Lanthorne and Candle-light (1609) decries writers who sought multiple patrons for the same work, which could be reprinted in multiple issues — each identical in every way except for its dedication. Miller gives several examples of this practice on p. 122 of his book. To my knowledge, it has not yet been noted that Anthony Nixon was also almost certainly guilty of this tactic. The Hatfield House archives (containing the Cecil Papers) contain a 1605 letter sent from Anthony Nixon to the Earl of Salisbury, Robert Cecil. It accompanies a ‘little Booke’ which he has dedicated to Cecil. Of Nixon’s surviving works only one dates from that year: Oxfords Triumph (1605), an account of James I’s visit to the university. However, the surviving version of this work is dedicated to Thomas Myddleton (the future Lord Mayor of London). Read both the Cecil letter and Myddleton dedication with a careful eye for linguistic decision and emotional framing, however, and the parallels are obvious. Beyond the expected and generic deference, we find the same expressions used (‘imitating which custome, and prescription’, ‘as well strangers as of acquaintance’, etc…), which do not appear in his other dedications. Thus, unless there existed a now-lost pamphlet from the same year which used a near-identical dedication (which is unlikely), it seems Nixon had this pamphlet printed for both Myddleton and Cecil. A further piece of evidence may be the fact that the signature of A2r uses a swash ‘A’ type (i.e. it has a flourish) — this may simply be because the page’s text is in italics, or it may indicate a compositional change.
Incidentally, the Anthony Nixon imprisoned in 1592 petitioned Lord Burghley for release in 1593, claiming to have ‘suffered two bouts of the plague.’ That was, of course, Robert Cecil’s father.
When Nixon was writing under his own name (not anonymously or pretending, as he did in 1610, to be a mercenary soldier), he loved dedicating his works to patrons. This paratext, when it isn’t plagiarised, offers some valuable insight into his understanding of the print market and its readership.
When he dedicated The Scourge of Corruption (1615) to Robert Garset, it did not elude him that the dreaded C-word might affright the ‘Worthy and Judicious Gentleman.’
Sir, if you onely looke upon the Title of this little Booke, you will (perhaps) maruell that I am so bold to make passage of it under your Name, it brings so harsh a name with it.
The rest of the dedication is, unfortunately, ‘borrowed’ from Thomas Dekker’s A Strange Horse-Race (1613). Inappropriate titles addressed to supposedly-reputable patrons were not the only contradictions Nixon engaged in. At times, his extreme (and performative) deference calls into question the very quality of the work he is trying to promote. If, as Nixon claims in his only original contribution to The Christian Navy (1602), Archbishop Whitgift is ‘The stately Eagle’ and Nixon a ‘Flye […] buzz[ing] before his face’, we can hardly expect a ground-breaking piece of theology to follow. At the same time, we must be careful not to take these hyperbolic expressions of humility too literally. Ennis argues that Nixon must have lived in ‘desperate poverty’, presenting as evidence the dedication to The Scourge of Corruption (1615), where he presents himself as an ‘ill debtor, […] knowing that hee is scarce able to ensconce himselfe against beggery.’ Go back a few words, however, and Nixon clearly states he is ‘play[ing] the ill debtor.’ Yes, Nixon was far from affluent, but his depictions of himself to patrons were not autobiographical.
In 1610, Nathaniel Butter had (it seems) received an extraordinary manuscript: an account of a disaffected soldier’s experiences from the Polish-Swedish War which was ongoing at the time. Never mind that Butter had the year prior published what Ennis rightly calls ‘recruiting propaganda’ on behalf of the Swedish King, this story (which paints warfare not as a valiant struggle but a horrifying ordeal) was too good to pass up.
Ennis convincingly demonstrates that this work was authored by Nixon, taking on the voice of the soldier and at that time ‘almost a fixture in Butter’s shop.’ Its epistle to the reader subtly points towards Nixon’s anxieties surrounding the ephemerality of news pamphlets — ‘You may in halfe an hower runne over these afflictions, which I and the rest […] were many months enduring.’
Anthony Nixon had, to an extent severely underappreciated by Wilson, Miller, and Ennis, an acute awareness of what made news memorable — and profitable. Although Nixon was under regular employment by Butter between 1608 and 1610, he had at every instance clear motive to craft as compelling and successful a pamphlet as possible. Success could guarantee further employment in the long term and, more immediately, a greater income. In 1608, he authored, A True Relation of the admirable Voiage and Trauell of William Bush — a journalistic report of a man’s eccentric (and successful) attempt to sail a pinnace over water, transport it using wheels on land, and (using an elaborate system of pulleys) elevate it to the top of a church tower in Lambourn. Thomas Purfoot produced for this account a remarkable title-page woodcut.
Within this report, as I have said, Nixon exhibits a keen understanding of popular fascination. On the significance of an event’s recency and witnesses, he says:
Had the speculation of this matter come to our imagination by sence, or memorie. The respect hereof had not so déepely resided in mens contentments, for ignoti nulla Cupido, But being an obiect presented to the eyes, and ratified to be true by the Testimonie of many thousand witnesses (all one mans labour and workemanship) it hath drawne many mens humors and affections to concur in pleasure, and admiration, and (but that it hath bin séen) it might be thought a thing impossible to be compassed by humane vnderstanding.
In this text, which admittedly includes some instances of plagiarism, Nixon weaves together (with surprising dexterity) a compelling news story, commentaries on the nature of art and science, and metacommentary on the credulity and tastes of the times. Nixon was also capable of creating innovative narrative frameworks if there was a profit motive at play. Ennis notes that his 1612 memorial pamphlet to merchant-tailor Robert Dove is one of the earliest printed biographies. It may, as Ennis claims, have been an ‘accidental’ innovation, but it was an innovation nonetheless.
When academics, be they historians or literary scholars, delve into the muddy waters of early modern cheap print, they often do so in search of Shakespeare — his context, his forerunners, and his influence. Nixon did not have the literary talents of Shakespeare, or (to be frank) of Dekker, Nashe, Harvey, or Greene. What Nixon possessed, however, were the practical talents which allowed him (to borrow the over-used early modern analogy) to navigate the treacherous seas of the print market and remain afloat, albeit in a humble vessel. He was talented enough at writing up reports, generating narratives, and monitoring audience behaviour to catch the eye of the most pioneering news hound of the time (Nathaniel Butter) and, for all his terrible plagiarism, clearly had enough wit to act as literary architect — restructuring his bounty to better fit his purposes.
Perhaps this ‘hack writer’ was not so talentless after all.
Early Modern Scribbling 