John Taylor was apprenticed to a London waterman, then pressed into naval service (1596-97). He devised a river-pageant for Princess Elizabeth in 1613, afterwards writing lord mayor's pageants and publishing prolifically — sixty pamphlets were collected in the edition of 1630. He was a friend and admirer of George Wither and Ben Jonson.
TEXT RECORDS:
1620The Praise of Hemp-Seed.
1621Taylor's Motto.
1632To Any Body.
1648Drunken Don Quixote, ali-ass Wittypoll.
PUBLICATIONS:
The sculler, rowing from Tiber to Thames. 1612.
Greate Britaine, all in blacke. 1612.
Laugh and be fat: or, a commentary upon the Odcombyan banket. 1612?
Heavens blessing, and earths joy. 1613.
Odcombs complaint. 1613.
The eighth wonder of the world. 1613.
The nipping or snipping of abuses. 1614.
The pennyles pilgrimage, or the money-lesse perambulation, of J. Taylor. 1618.
Mr. Thomas Coriat to his friends in England sendeth greeting. 1618.
A kicksey winsey. 1619.
Taylor his travels; from the citty of London in England, to the Citty of Prague in Bohemia. 1620.
The praise, antiquity, and commodity, of beggery, beggers, and begging. 1621.
Taylor's motto. Et habeo, et careo, et curo. 1621.
A common whore with all these graces grac'd. 1622.
An arrant thiefe. 1622.
Sir Gregory Nonsence his newes from no place. 1622.
The praise and vertue of a jayle, and jaylers. 1623.
Taylors pastorall. 1624.
A bawd. 1624?
The fearefull summer, or Londons calamity. 1625.
A dog of war. 1628?
All the workes of John Taylor. 1630.
The olde, old, very olde man or the age and long life of Thomas Par. 1635.
A swarme of sectaries, and schismatiques. 1641.
A reply as true as steele. 1641.
A pedlar and a Romish priest. 1641.
Mad fashions, old fashions, all out of fashions. 1642.
A full and compleat answer against the writer of a late volume set forth, entitled A tale in a tub. 1642.
A plea for preogative. 1642.
Mad verse, sad verse, glad verse and bad verse. 1644.
Aqua-musae. 1645.
John Taylor's wander to see the wonders of the west. 1649.
A short relation of a long journey. 1652.
A certain traveiles of an uncertaine journey. 1653.
Works. 5 vols, 1870-78.
PROFILE AND
ASSOCIATES:
English
Anglican
no formal education
laborer
poet
Rev. Robert Anton
Nicholas Breton
John Davies of Hereford
Thomas Dekker
Thomas Heywood
Ben Jonson
Martin Parker
Samuel Rowlands
George Wither
REFERENCE:
DNB; NCBEL; DLB.
[Portrait in Memorial of all the English Monarchs (1622)]; John Aubrey, Brief Lives (1669-1696) ed. Clark (1898) 2:252-54; William Winstanley, Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687); Anthony Wood, Athenae Oxonienses (1690-91; 1721); Giles Jacob, An Historical Account of ... English Poets (1720); Alexander Pope, Dunciad (1728; 1743); Cibber-Shiels, Lives of the Poets (1753) 9-11; James Granger, Biographical History (1769; 1824) [portrait]; Biographia Dramatica (1782; 1812); Francis Godolphin Waldron, in Biographical Mirror (1795, 1798) [portrait]; Censura Literaria 2 (1806) 368-73, 6 (1808) 371-81; Restituta 4 (1816) 155-60, 354-57; Alexander Chalmers, General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17); Restituta or ... English Literature Revived (1814-16); John Nichols, Illustrations of the Literary History of the XVIII Century (1817-58) 8:382; Robert Watt, Bibliotheca Britannica (1824); Edward Farr, Select Poetry, chiefly sacred, of the Reign of King James the First (1847); Chambers's Cyclopaedia of English Literature 3rd ed. (1876); Thomas Corser, Collectanea Anglo-Poetica 10 (1880) 286-308; Robert Southey, in Lives of the Uneducated Poets (1831); Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1858-71; 1882); Moulton, Library of Literary Criticism (1901-05); R. B. Dow "The Life and Times of John Taylor the Water Poet" M.A. Thesis, Harvard University, 1930; Bush, OHEL (1945); Unwin (1954) 21-23; Wallace Notestein, Four Worthies (1956); Saunders, Renaissance Poets (1983); Chadwyck-Healey English Poetry Database (1995).
COMMENTARY RECORDS
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BIOGRAPHY RECORDS
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(commentary records)