Rev. Giles Fletcher

The son of a distinguished father of the same name, Giles Fletcher was the brother of Phineas and cousin of Richard Fletcher the dramatist. He studied at Westminster School and Trinity College Cambridge (B.A. 1606, Fellow 1608, M.A. 1609, B.D. 1619). Giles Fletcher was ordained in 1613 and in 1617 was made rector of Helmingham, Suffolk, afterwards moving in 1619 to Alderton in Suffolk, where he remained until his early death in 1623. Misled by the entry in Phillips's Theatrum Poetarum (1675) William Winstanley later invented a third Fletcher brother named "George."

TEXT RECORDS:

1603A Canto upon the Death of Eliza.
1610Christ's Victorie in Heaven.
1610Christs Triumph After Death.
1610Christs Triumph over Death.
1610Christs Victorie on Earth.
1612Upon the most lamented Departure of Prince Henrie.

PUBLICATIONS:

Christs victorie and triumph in heaven and earth. 1610.
The young divine's apology [Nathaniel Pownoll, ed. Fletcher]. 1612.
The reward of the faithfull. 1623.
Complete Poems, ed. Grosart. 1876.
Poetical works of Giles and Phineas Fletcher, ed. F. S. Boas. 2 vols, 1908-09.

PROFILE AND
ASSOCIATES:

English
Anglican

Westminster School
Trinity College Cambridge
Bachelor of Arts
Master of Arts
Bachelor of Divinity
College Fellow

clergyman
poet

Edward Benlowes
Rev. Phineas Fletcher
Francis Quarles
Izaac Walton

REFERENCE:

DNB; NCBEL; DLB.

Thomas Fuller, Worthies of England (1662); Edward Phillips, Theatrum Poetarum (1675); Anthony Wood, Athenae Oxonienses (1690-91; 1721); Henry Headley, Select Beauties of Ancient English Poetry (1787); "Giles Fletcher" Town and Country Magazine 20 (Supplement, 1788) 622-23 [from Headley]; George Ellis, Specimens of Early English Poetry (1790; 1801); Robert Anderson, British Poets (1795); Alexander Chalmers, English Poets (1810); Alexander Chalmers, General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17); Nathan Drake, in Shakespeare and his Times (1817; 1838); Thomas Campbell, Specimens of the British Poets (1819); Ezekiel Sanford, British Poets (1819); Rowland Freeman, Kentish Poets (1821); memoir in Fletcher, Christ's Victory and Triumph (1824); Robert Watt, Bibliotheca Britannica (1824); Robert Southey, British Poets, Chaucer to Jonson (1831); Robert Aris Willmott, English Sacred Poets (1834); Richard Cattermole, Sacred Poetry of the Seventeenth Century (1836); Robert Chambers, Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844); Edward Farr, Select Poetry, chiefly sacred, of the Reign of King James the First (1847); Edward S. Creasy, Memoirs of Eminent Etonians (1850); Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1858-71; 1882); George Macdonald, "The Brothers Fletcher" in England's Antiphon (1868); The English Poets, ed. Thomas Humphry Ward (1880); G. Bradford, "Giles Fletcher, Elizabethan Mystic" Andover Review 19 (October 1893); Moulton, Library of Literary Criticism (1901-05); J. D. Wilson, "Giles Fletcher and the Faerie Queene" Modern Language Review 5 (1910) 493-94; H. E. Cory, Spenser, the School of the Fletchers, and Milton (1912); Venn and Venn, Alum. Cant. (1922-27) 1.2.149; Old Westminsters (1928); Evelyn May Albright, "On the Dating of Spenser's Mutability Cantos" Studies in Philology 26 (1929) 482-98; H. M. Belden, "Alanus de Insulis, Giles Fletcher, and the Mutability Cantos" Studies in Philology 26 (1929) 131-44; D. C. Sheldon, "The Complete Poems of Giles Fletcher, the Younger" (Diss: University of Wisconsin, 1938); H. E. G. Rope, "Giles Fletcher" The Month 2 (1932) 14; Bush, OHEL (1945); Earl R. Wasserman, "Moses Brown and the 1783 Edition of Giles and Phineas Fletcher," Modern Language Notes 56 (1941) 288-90; Joan Grundy, The Spenserian Poets (1969); James P. Bobrick, "Giles Fletcher and the Hexameral Tradition" (Diss: Boston University, 1973); Faye P. Whitaker, "Giles Fletcher's Christ's Victorie and Triumph" (Diss: Northwestern University, 1974); Jerome S. Dees, "The Narrator of Christs Victorie and Triumph: What Giles Fletcher learned from Spenser" ELR 6 (1976) 453-65; Frank S. Kastor, Giles and Phineas Fletcher (1978); James Bobrick, "The Numerological Structure of Giles Fletcher's Christs Victorie and Triumph" Texas Studies in Language and Literature 21 (1979) 522-52; Saunders, Renaissance Poets (1983); R. J. Fehrenback, "The Marriage and Last Years of Giles Fletcher the Younger" Modern Philology 83 (1986) 395-98; Spenser Encyclopedia, "Fletcher" (1990) 308-09; Chadwyck-Healey English Poetry Database (1995).

COMMENTARY RECORDS
for Rev. Giles Fletcher:

1.	1610  Phineas Fletcher, ["Upon my Brother, Mr. G. F. his Book entituled Christs Victorie and Triumph"] Fletcher, Christs Victorie (1610) sig. 2v.
2.	1623 ca.  Phineas Fletcher, "Upon my Brother's Book called, The Grounds, Labour, and Reward of Fath" The Purple Island (1633) 101-02.
3.	1632  Phineas Fletcher, "Defuncto fratri" Fletcher, Christs Victorie (1632) sig. ¶3.
4.	1789  Henry Headley, in Select Beauties of Ancient English Poetry (1789; 1810) 2:156-61.
5.	1800  Nathan Drake, in Literary Hours (1800) 2:165-66.
6.	1819  Thomas Campbell, in Specimens of the British Poets (1819; 1845) 80-81.
7.	1825  Anonymous, in Review of Fletcher, Christ's Victory and Triumph; Imperial Magazine 7 (September 1825) 861.
8.	1836  Richard Cattermole, in Sacred Poetry of the Seventeenth Century (1836) 1:83.
9.	1837  Henry Hallam, in Introduction to the Literature of Europe of the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Centuries (1837-39; 1882) 3:244-45.
10.	1847  Edward Farr, in Select Poetry, chiefly sacred, of the Reign of King James the First (1847) xiv.
11.	1859  David Masson, in Life of John Milton (1859-94; 1965) 1:460.
12.	1860  George Gilfillan, in Specimens with Memoirs of the less-known British Poets (1860) 1:190-91.
13.	1868  George Macdonald, "The Brothers Fletcher" in England's Antiphon (1868; 1890) 150-58.
14.	1876  Alexander B. Grosart, in "Memorial Introduction" Giles Fletcher, Complete Poems (1876) 45-50.
15.	1880  John W. Hales, in The English Poets: Selections with Critical Introductions, ed. Thomas Humphry Ward (1880) 2:104-05.
16.	1895  W. J. Courthope, in History of English Poetry (1895-1910) 3:133.

BIOGRAPHY RECORDS
for Rev. Giles Fletcher:

1.	1662  Thomas Fuller, in History of the Worthies of England (1662) 2:221.
2.	1675  Edward Phillips, in Theatrum Poetarum (1675) 2:53.
3.	1690  Anthony Wood, Athenae Oxonienses (1690-91; 1721) 1:F 107.
4.	1787  Henry Headley, in Select Beauties of Ancient English Poetry (1787) 1:liv.
5.	1795  Robert Anderson, "The Life of Giles Fletcher" Works of the British Poets (1795) 4:485-90.
6.	1814  George Dyer, in History of the University and Colleges of Cambridge (1814) 2:195n.
7.	1817  Nathan Drake, in Shakespeare and his Times (1817; 1838) 301-02.
8.	1821  Rowland Freeman, in Kentish Poets (1821) 1:324-27, 352-54.
9.	1831  Robert Southey, in British Poets, Chaucer to Jonson (1831) 807.
10.	1834  Robert Aris Willmott, in Lives of Sacred Poets (1834) 27-56.
11.	1844  Robert Chambers, in Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844; 1850) 1:122.
12.	1876  Alexander B. Grosart, in "Memorial Introduction" Giles Fletcher, Complete Poems (1876) 1-44.