Philip Sidney
For other people named Philip Sidney, see Philip Sidney
(disambiguation).
Sir Philip Sidney (30 November 1554 – 17 October
1586) was an English poet, courtier, scholar, and soldier,
who is remembered as one of the most prominent figures
of the Elizabethan age. His works include Astrophel and
Stella, The Defence of Poesy (also known as The Defence
of Poetry or An Apology for Poetry), and The Countess of
Pembroke’s Arcadia.
1 Early life
Born at Penshurst Place, Kent, he was the eldest son of
Sir Henry Sidney and Lady Mary Dudley. His mother
was the eldest daughter of John Dudley, 1st Duke of
Northumberland, and the sister of Robert Dudley, 1st
Earl of Leicester. His younger brother, Robert was a
statesman and patron of the arts, and was created Earl
of Leicester in 1618. His younger sister, Mary, mar-
ried Henry Herbert, 2nd Earl of Pembroke and was a
writer, translator and literary patron. Sidney dedicated
his longest work, the Arcadia, to her. After her brother’s
death, Mary reworked the Arcadia, which became known
as The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia.
Philip was educated at Shrewsbury School and Christ
Church, Oxford.
2 Politics and marriage
In 1572, at the age of 18, he was elected to Parliament
as a Member of Parliament for Shrewsbury[1]
and in the
same year travelled to France as part of the embassy to
negotiate a marriage between Elizabeth I and the Duc
D'Alençon. He spent the next several years in main-
land Europe, moving through Germany, Italy, Poland, the
Kingdom of Hungary and Austria. On these travels, he
met a number of prominent European intellectuals and
politicians.
Returning to England in 1575, Sidney met Penelope De-
vereux, the future Lady Rich; though much younger, she
would inspire his famous sonnet sequence of the 1580s,
Astrophel and Stella. Her father, Walter Devereux, 1st
Earl of Essex, is said to have planned to marry his daugh-
ter to Sidney, but he died in 1576. In England, Sidney
occupied himself with politics and art. He defended his
father’s administration of Ireland in a lengthy document.
More seriously, he quarrelled with Edward de Vere, 17th
Earl of Oxford, probably because of Sidney’s opposition
to the French marriage, which de Vere championed. In
the aftermath of this episode, Sidney challenged de Vere
to a duel, which Elizabeth forbade. He then wrote a
lengthy letter to the Queen detailing the foolishness of the
French marriage. Characteristically, Elizabeth bristled at
his presumption, and Sidney prudently retired from court.
During a 1577 diplomatic visit to Prague, Sidney secretly
visited the exiled Jesuit priest Edmund Campion.[2]
Sidney had returned to court by the middle of 1581 and
in 1584 was MP for Kent. That same year Penelope De-
vereux was married, apparently against her will, to Lord
Rich. Sidney was knighted in 1583. An early arrange-
ment to marry Anne Cecil, daughter of Sir William Ce-
cil and eventual wife of de Vere, had fallen through in
1571. In 1583, he married Frances, teenage daughter
of Sir Francis Walsingham. In the same year, he made
a visit to Oxford University with Giordano Bruno, who
subsequently dedicated two books to Sidney.
3 Literary writings
His artistic contacts were more peaceful and more sig-
nificant for his lasting fame. During his absence from
court, he wrote Astrophel and Stella and the first draft
of The Arcadia and The Defence of Poesy. Somewhat
earlier, he had met Edmund Spenser, who dedicated The
Shepheardes Calender to him. Other literary contacts in-
cluded membership, along with his friends and fellow po-
ets Fulke Greville, Edward Dyer, Edmund Spenser and
Gabriel Harvey, of the (possibly fictitious) 'Areopagus', a
humanist endeavour to classicise English verse.
4 Military activity
Both through his family heritage and his personal experi-
ence (he was in Walsingham’s house in Paris during the
St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre), Sidney was a keenly
militant Protestant. In the 1570s, he had persuaded John
Casimir to consider proposals for a united Protestant ef-
fort against the Roman Catholic Church and Spain. In
the early 1580s, he argued unsuccessfully for an assault
on Spain itself. Promoted General of Horse in 1583,[1]
his enthusiasm for the Protestant struggle was given a free
1
2 6 WORKS
rein when he was appointed governor of Flushing in the
Netherlands in 1585. In the Netherlands, he consistently
urged boldness on his superior, his uncle the Earl of Le-
icester. He conducted a successful raid on Spanish forces
near Axel in July, 1586.
5 Injury and death
Memorial for Sir Philip Sidney at the spot where he was fatally
injured
Later that year, he joined Sir John Norris in the Battle
of Zutphen, fighting for the Protestant cause against the
Spanish.[3]
During the battle, he was shot in the thigh
and died of gangrene 26 days later, at the age of 31. As
he lay dying, Sidney composed a song to be sung by his
deathbed.[4]
According to the story, while lying wounded
he gave his water to another wounded soldier, saying,
“Thy necessity is yet greater than mine”.[5]
This became
possibly the most famous story about Sir Phillip, intended
to illustrate his noble and gallant character.[5]
It also in-
spired evolutionary biologist John Maynard Smith to for-
mulate a problem in signalling theory which is known as
the Sir Philip Sidney game.[6]
Sidney’s body was returned to London and interred in the
Old St. Paul’s Cathedral on 16 February 1587. The grave
and monument were destroyed in the Great Fire of Lon-
don in 1666. A modern monument in the crypt lists him
among the important graves lost.
Already during his own lifetime, but even more after his
death, he had become for many English people the very
The funeral of Sir Philip Sidney, 1586
epitome of a Castiglione courtier: learned and politic,
but at the same time generous, brave, and impulsive.
The funeral procession was one of the most elaborate
ever staged, so much so that his father-in-law, Francis
Walsingham, almost went bankrupt.[3]
Never more than a
marginal figure in the politics of his time, he was memo-
rialised as the flower of English manhood in Edmund
Spenser's Astrophel, one of the greatest English Renais-
sance elegies.
An early biography of Sidney was written by his
friend and schoolfellow, Fulke Greville. While Sidney
was traditionally depicted as a staunch and unwavering
Protestant, recent biographers such as Katherine Duncan-
Jones have suggested that his religious loyalties were more
ambiguous.
6 Works
• The Lady of May – This is one of Sidney’s lesser-
known works, a masque written and performed for
Queen Elizabeth in 1578 or 1579.
• Astrophel and Stella – The first of the famous English
sonnet sequences, Astrophel and Stella was prob-
ably composed in the early 1580s. The sonnets
were well-circulated in manuscript before the first
(apparently pirated) edition was printed in 1591;
only in 1598 did an authorised edition reach the
press. The sequence was a watershed in English
Renaissance poetry. In it, Sidney partially nativised
the key features of his Italian model, Petrarch: vari-
ation of emotion from poem to poem, with the atten-
dant sense of an ongoing, but partly obscure, narra-
tive; the philosophical trappings; the musings on the
act of poetic creation itself. His experiments with
rhyme scheme were no less notable; they served to
free the English sonnet from the strict rhyming re-
quirements of the Italian form.
• The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia – The Arca-
dia, by far Sidney’s most ambitious work, was as
significant in its own way as his sonnets. The
3
The Fatal Wounding of Sir Philip Sidney by Benjamin West
work is a romance that combines pastoral elements
with a mood derived from the Hellenistic model of
Heliodorus. In the work, that is, a highly idealised
version of the shepherd’s life adjoins (not always
naturally) with stories of jousts, political treachery,
kidnappings, battles, and rapes. As published in the
sixteenth century, the narrative follows the Greek
model: stories are nested within each other, and
different storylines are intertwined. The work en-
joyed great popularity for more than a century af-
ter its publication. William Shakespeare borrowed
from it for the Gloucester subplot of King Lear; parts
of it were also dramatised by John Day and James
Shirley. According to a widely-told story, King
Charles I quoted lines from the book as he mounted
the scaffold to be executed; Samuel Richardson
named the heroine of his first novel after Sidney’s
Pamela. Arcadia exists in two significantly differ-
ent versions. Sidney wrote an early version (the Old
Arcadia) during a stay at Mary Herbert's house; this
version is narrated in a straightforward, sequential
manner. Later, Sidney began to revise the work on
a more ambitious plan, with much more backstory
about the princes, and a much more complicated
story line, with many more characters. He com-
pleted most of the first three books, but the project
was unfinished at the time of his death—the third
book breaks off in the middle of a sword fight. There
were several early editions of the book. Fulke Gre-
ville published the revised version alone, in 1590.
The Countess of Pembroke, Sidney’s sister, pub-
lished a version in 1593, which pasted the last two
books of the first version onto the first three books
of the revision. In the 1621 version, Sir William
Alexander provided a bridge to bring the two stories
back into agreement.<Evans, 12-13> It was known
in this cobbled-together fashion until the discovery,
in the early twentieth century, of the earlier version.
• An Apology for Poetry[7]
(also known as A Defence
of Poesie and The Defence of Poetry) – Sidney wrote
the Defence before 1583. It is generally believed
that he was at least partly motivated by Stephen Gos-
son, a former playwright who dedicated his attack on
the English stage, The School of Abuse, to Sidney in
1579, but Sidney primarily addresses more general
objections to poetry, such as those of Plato. In his
essay, Sidney integrates a number of classical and
Italian precepts on fiction. The essence of his de-
fence is that poetry, by combining the liveliness of
history with the ethical focus of philosophy, is more
effective than either history or philosophy in rousing
its readers to virtue. The work also offers important
comments on Edmund Spenser and the Elizabethan
stage.
• The Sidney Psalms – These English translations of
the Psalms were completed in 1599 by Philip Sid-
ney’s sister Mary.
7 In popular culture
A memorial, erected in 1986 at the location where he was
mortally wounded by the Spanish, can be found at the
entrance of a footpath (" 't Gallee”) located in front of
the petrol station at the Warnsveldseweg 170.
In Arnhem, in front of the house in the Bakkerstraat 68,
an inscription on the ground reads: “IN THIS HOUSE
DIED ON THE 17 OCTOBER 1586 * SIR PHILIP
SIDNEY * ENGLISH POET, DIPLOMAT AND SOL-
DIER, FROM HIS WOUNDS SUFFERED AT THE
BATTLE OF ZUTPHEN. HE GAVE HIS LIFE FOR
OUR FREEDOM”. The inscription was unveiled on 17
October 2011, exactly 425 years after his death, in the
presence of Philip Sidney, Viscount De L'Isle, a descen-
dant of the brother of Philip Sidney.
The city of Sidney, Ohio, in the United States and a
street in Zutphen, Netherlands, have been named after
Sir Philip. A statue of him can be found in the park at the
Coehoornsingel where, in the harsh winter of 1795, En-
glish and Hanoverian soldiers were buried who had died
while retreating from advancing French troops.[8]
Another statue of Sidney, by Arthur George Walker,
forms the centrepiece of Shrewsbury School's war memo-
rial to alumni who died serving in World War I (unveiled
1924).[9]
Sidney features as a friend of Giordano Bruno and an
agent for Sir Francis Walsingham in the historical crime
novels of S J Parris.
4 9 FURTHER READING
W. B. Yeats appears to allude to Sidney as a model of
the ideal man in his poem “In Memory of Major Robert
Gregory” when he calls Robert Gregory “Our Sidney and
our perfect man”.
Sidney is referenced in the T.S. Eliot's poem “A Cook-
ing Egg”, published in his 1920 poetry collection Aras
Vos Prec, where Eliot expresses a desire to speak with Sir
Philip in heaven.
An extended sketch from Monty Python’s Flying Circus
(Series 3, Episode 10 "E. Henry Thripshaw’s Disease")
featured a police officer, disguised as Sir Philip Sidney,
finding himself transported to the Tudor era after raiding
a pornography shop.
8 References
[1] “History of Parliament”. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
[2] Duncan-Jones (1991), pp. 125–127.
[3] The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Six-
teenth/Early Seventeenth Century, Volume B, 2012, pg.
1037
[4] The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Six-
teenth/Early Seventeenth Century, Volume B, 2012, pg
1037
[5] Charles Carlton (1992). Going to the Wars: The Expe-
rience of the British Civil Wars, 1638–1651, Routledge,
ISBN 0-415-10391-6. p. 216
[6] Maynard Smith, John; David Harper (2003). Animal
Signals. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-
852685-7.
[7] Works by Sir Philip Sidney at Project Gutenberg
[8] Bert Fermin en Michel Groothedde: 'De Lunetten van
Van Coehoorn', Zutphense Archeologische Publicaties
34, 2007, page 7
[9] Francis, Peter (2013). Shropshire War Memorials, Sites
of Remembrance. YouCaxton Publications. pp. 74–75.
ISBN 978-1-909644-11-3.
9 Further reading
Works
• The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia, ed. Maurice
Evans. Penguin Books, 1997. ISBN 0-14-043111-
X
• The Sidney Psalms, completed by Mary Sidney Her-
bert, Countess of Pembroke, ed. R.E. Pritchard.
Fyfield Books. ISBN 978-0-85635-983-5
Books
• Alexander, Gavin. Writing After Sidney: the literary
response to Sir Philip Sidney 1586–1640. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2006.
• Craig, D. H. “A Hybrid Growth: Sidney’s Theory of
Poetry in An Apology for Poetry.” Essential Articles
for the Study of Sir Philip Sidney. Ed. Arthur F.
Kinney. Hamden: Archon Books, 1986.
• Davies, Norman. Europe: A History. London: Pim-
lico, 1997.
• Duncan-Jones, Katherine. Sir Philip Sidney:
Courtier Poet. New Haven and London: Yale Uni-
versity Press, 1991.
• Frye, Northrup. Words With Power: Being a Second
Study of the Bible and Literature. Toronto: Penguin
Books, 1992.
• Garrett, Martin. Ed. Sidney: the Critical Heritage.
London: Routledge, 1996.
• Greville, Fulke.Life of the Renowned Sir Philip Sid-
ney. London, 1652.
• Hale, John. The Civilization of Europe in the Renais-
sance. New York: Atheeum, 1994.
• Jasinski, James. Sourcebook on Rhetoric: Key Con-
cepts in Contemporary Rhetorical Studies. Thousand
Oaks: Sage Publications, 2001.
• Kimbrough, Robert. Sir Philip Sidney. New York:
Twayne Publishers, Inc., 1971.
• Kuin, Roger (ed.), “The Correspondence of Sir
Philip Sidney”. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2012.
• Leitch, Vincent B., Ed. The Norton Anthology of
Theory and Criticism. New York: W. W. Norton &
Company, Inc., 2001.
• Lewis, C. S. English Literature in the Sixteenth Cen-
tury, Excluding Drama. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1954.
• Robertson, Jean. “Philip Sidney.” In The Spenser
Encyclopedia. eds. A. C. Hamilton et al. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 1990.
• Shelley, Percy Bysshe. “A Defence of Poetry.” In
Shelley’s Poetry and Prose: A Norton Critical Edition.
2nd ed. Eds. Donald H. Reiman and Neil Fraistat.
New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2002.
• Sidney, Philip. A Defence of Poesie and Poems.
London: Cassell and Company, 1891.
• The Cambridge History of English and American Lit-
erature. Volume 3. Cambridge: Cambridge Univer-
sity Press, 1910.
5
Articles
• Acheson, Kathy. "'Outrage your face': Anti-
Theatricality and Gender in Early Modern Closet
Drama by Women.” Early Modern Literary Studies
6.3 (January, 2001): 7.1–16. 21 October 2005.
• Bear, R. S. "Defence of Poesie: Introduction. In
Renascence Editions. 21 October 2005.
• Griffiths, Matthew. English Court Poets and Petrar-
chism: Wyatt, Sidney and Spenser. 25 November
2005.
• Harvey, Elizabeth D. Sidney, Sir Philip. In The
Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory & Criticism.
25 November 2005.
• Knauss, Daniel, Philip. Love’s Refinement: Meta-
physical Expressions of Desire in Philip Sidney and
John Donne., Master’s Thesis submitted to the Fac-
ulty of the North Carolina State University. 25
November 2005.
• Maley, Willy. Cultural Materialism and New His-
toricism. 8 November 2005
• Mitsi, Efterpi. The “Popular Philosopher": Plato,
Poetry, and Food in Tudor Aesthetics. In Early
Modern Literary Studies. 9 November 2004.
• Pask, Kevin. “The “mannes state” of Philip Sidney:
Pre-scripting the Life of the Poet in England.” 25
November 2005.
• Staff. Sir Philip Sidney 1554–1586, Poets’ Graves.
Accessed 26 May 2008
Other
• Stump, Donald (ed). “Sir Philip Sidney: World
Bibliography, Saint Louis University. Accessed 26
May 2008. “This site is the largest collection of
bibliographic references on Sidney in existence. It
includes all the items originally published in Sir
Philip Sidney: An Annotated Bibliography of Texts
and Criticism, 1554–1984 (New York: G.K. Hall,
Macmillan 1994) as well updates from 1985 to the
present.”
10 External links
• Works by Philip Sidney at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Philip Sidney at Internet Archive
• Works by Philip Sidney at LibriVox (public domain
audiobooks)
• Audio: Robert Pinsky reads “My True Love Hath
My Heart and I Have His” by Philip Sidney (via
poemsoutloud.net)
• “Archival material relating to Philip Sidney”. UK
National Archives.
• Portraits of Sir Philip Sidney at the National Portrait
Gallery, London
6 11 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES
11 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses
11.1 Text
• Philip Sidney Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Sidney?oldid=746406229 Contributors: Magnus Manske, Atorpen, Deb,
Camembert, Kchishol1970, Llywrch, Ihcoyc, Den fjättrade ankan~enwiki, Charles Matthews, Lord Emsworth, Proteus, Frazzydee, Di-
madick, Bearcat, PBS, Smallweed, Wjhonson, Merovingian, Gidonb, DigitalMedievalist, Advance, Stern~enwiki, Finn-Zoltan, Jastrow,
Antandrus, Doops, Kelson, Neutrality, PRiis, D6, Discospinster, TedPavlic, MeltBanana, Stbalbach, Wareh, Cohesion, Chirag, Nk, Ogress,
Craigy144, Ksnow, Pcpcpc, FeanorStar7, Commander Keane, SDC, Marudubshinki, Graham87, RxS, Ketiltrout, Rjwilmsi, Mayumashu,
Tim!, NatusRoma, JanSuchy, TheMidnighters, Brendan Moody, D.brodale, Jaraalbe, PKM, Gdrbot, Samuel Wiki, Jlittlet, Gaius Cornelius,
Pixley, TheMadBaron, Nikkimaria, Cassini83, Scoutersig, Krilia, Britannicus, Lifebaka, Eskimbot, Srnec, Hmains, Chaojoker, Sadads,
VirtualSteve, Wally Neumann, Raynethackery, JesseRafe, Elendil’s Heir, Ohconfucius, Ser Amantio di Nicolao, MegA, BrownHairedGirl,
Bagel7, Regan123, JHunterJ, EdK, NuncAutNunquam, Necrid Master, Joseph Solis in Australia, Tartangle, Courcelles, Zotdragon, Adam
Keller, Mattbr, Outriggr (2006-2009), Neelix, Cydebot, UberMan5000, Omicronpersei8, Kingstowngalway, Mattisse, Verica Atrebatum,
Phoe, Gossamers, RobotG, Mendedcloak, Charlie35, DagosNavy, Candent shlimazel, The Transhumanist, AJokinen, Demophon, Martin
Garrett, .anacondabot, Magioladitis, AuburnPilot, Waacstats, DWeissman, Vanished user dkjsdfkljeritekk4, Septuagent, Ugajin, Chiswick
Chap, STBotD, VolkovBot, Hqb, Naohiro19 revertvandal, Flozu, L. Clareton, Wassermann~enwiki, Brandon Christopher, FinnWiki, Mf-
cayley, Bentogoa, BiggerTim, Sjwells53, Tatiana.larina, Tom Reedy, LarRan, Wwnorton, Icarusgeek, EoGuy, Shir-El too, Ottava Rima,
SchreiberBike, Popslashgirl, Boleyn, Bilsonius, Ldschneider, Good Olfactory, Julianusimp, Addbot, Gregor1973, Jeanne boleyn, Jim10701,
Тиверополник, Wholetone, Tide rolls, Lightbot, Luckas-bot, Yobot, 2D, Coalpatch, AnomieBOT, Hadrian89, Xqbot, GrouchoBot, Om-
nipaedista, Buchraeumer, Green Cardamom, Emelha, Stolengood, Kwiki, Þjóðólfr, Plucas58, Penshurstplace, Dunnettreader, Full-date
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Philip sidney

  • 1.
    Philip Sidney For otherpeople named Philip Sidney, see Philip Sidney (disambiguation). Sir Philip Sidney (30 November 1554 – 17 October 1586) was an English poet, courtier, scholar, and soldier, who is remembered as one of the most prominent figures of the Elizabethan age. His works include Astrophel and Stella, The Defence of Poesy (also known as The Defence of Poetry or An Apology for Poetry), and The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia. 1 Early life Born at Penshurst Place, Kent, he was the eldest son of Sir Henry Sidney and Lady Mary Dudley. His mother was the eldest daughter of John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland, and the sister of Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester. His younger brother, Robert was a statesman and patron of the arts, and was created Earl of Leicester in 1618. His younger sister, Mary, mar- ried Henry Herbert, 2nd Earl of Pembroke and was a writer, translator and literary patron. Sidney dedicated his longest work, the Arcadia, to her. After her brother’s death, Mary reworked the Arcadia, which became known as The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia. Philip was educated at Shrewsbury School and Christ Church, Oxford. 2 Politics and marriage In 1572, at the age of 18, he was elected to Parliament as a Member of Parliament for Shrewsbury[1] and in the same year travelled to France as part of the embassy to negotiate a marriage between Elizabeth I and the Duc D'Alençon. He spent the next several years in main- land Europe, moving through Germany, Italy, Poland, the Kingdom of Hungary and Austria. On these travels, he met a number of prominent European intellectuals and politicians. Returning to England in 1575, Sidney met Penelope De- vereux, the future Lady Rich; though much younger, she would inspire his famous sonnet sequence of the 1580s, Astrophel and Stella. Her father, Walter Devereux, 1st Earl of Essex, is said to have planned to marry his daugh- ter to Sidney, but he died in 1576. In England, Sidney occupied himself with politics and art. He defended his father’s administration of Ireland in a lengthy document. More seriously, he quarrelled with Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, probably because of Sidney’s opposition to the French marriage, which de Vere championed. In the aftermath of this episode, Sidney challenged de Vere to a duel, which Elizabeth forbade. He then wrote a lengthy letter to the Queen detailing the foolishness of the French marriage. Characteristically, Elizabeth bristled at his presumption, and Sidney prudently retired from court. During a 1577 diplomatic visit to Prague, Sidney secretly visited the exiled Jesuit priest Edmund Campion.[2] Sidney had returned to court by the middle of 1581 and in 1584 was MP for Kent. That same year Penelope De- vereux was married, apparently against her will, to Lord Rich. Sidney was knighted in 1583. An early arrange- ment to marry Anne Cecil, daughter of Sir William Ce- cil and eventual wife of de Vere, had fallen through in 1571. In 1583, he married Frances, teenage daughter of Sir Francis Walsingham. In the same year, he made a visit to Oxford University with Giordano Bruno, who subsequently dedicated two books to Sidney. 3 Literary writings His artistic contacts were more peaceful and more sig- nificant for his lasting fame. During his absence from court, he wrote Astrophel and Stella and the first draft of The Arcadia and The Defence of Poesy. Somewhat earlier, he had met Edmund Spenser, who dedicated The Shepheardes Calender to him. Other literary contacts in- cluded membership, along with his friends and fellow po- ets Fulke Greville, Edward Dyer, Edmund Spenser and Gabriel Harvey, of the (possibly fictitious) 'Areopagus', a humanist endeavour to classicise English verse. 4 Military activity Both through his family heritage and his personal experi- ence (he was in Walsingham’s house in Paris during the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre), Sidney was a keenly militant Protestant. In the 1570s, he had persuaded John Casimir to consider proposals for a united Protestant ef- fort against the Roman Catholic Church and Spain. In the early 1580s, he argued unsuccessfully for an assault on Spain itself. Promoted General of Horse in 1583,[1] his enthusiasm for the Protestant struggle was given a free 1
  • 2.
    2 6 WORKS reinwhen he was appointed governor of Flushing in the Netherlands in 1585. In the Netherlands, he consistently urged boldness on his superior, his uncle the Earl of Le- icester. He conducted a successful raid on Spanish forces near Axel in July, 1586. 5 Injury and death Memorial for Sir Philip Sidney at the spot where he was fatally injured Later that year, he joined Sir John Norris in the Battle of Zutphen, fighting for the Protestant cause against the Spanish.[3] During the battle, he was shot in the thigh and died of gangrene 26 days later, at the age of 31. As he lay dying, Sidney composed a song to be sung by his deathbed.[4] According to the story, while lying wounded he gave his water to another wounded soldier, saying, “Thy necessity is yet greater than mine”.[5] This became possibly the most famous story about Sir Phillip, intended to illustrate his noble and gallant character.[5] It also in- spired evolutionary biologist John Maynard Smith to for- mulate a problem in signalling theory which is known as the Sir Philip Sidney game.[6] Sidney’s body was returned to London and interred in the Old St. Paul’s Cathedral on 16 February 1587. The grave and monument were destroyed in the Great Fire of Lon- don in 1666. A modern monument in the crypt lists him among the important graves lost. Already during his own lifetime, but even more after his death, he had become for many English people the very The funeral of Sir Philip Sidney, 1586 epitome of a Castiglione courtier: learned and politic, but at the same time generous, brave, and impulsive. The funeral procession was one of the most elaborate ever staged, so much so that his father-in-law, Francis Walsingham, almost went bankrupt.[3] Never more than a marginal figure in the politics of his time, he was memo- rialised as the flower of English manhood in Edmund Spenser's Astrophel, one of the greatest English Renais- sance elegies. An early biography of Sidney was written by his friend and schoolfellow, Fulke Greville. While Sidney was traditionally depicted as a staunch and unwavering Protestant, recent biographers such as Katherine Duncan- Jones have suggested that his religious loyalties were more ambiguous. 6 Works • The Lady of May – This is one of Sidney’s lesser- known works, a masque written and performed for Queen Elizabeth in 1578 or 1579. • Astrophel and Stella – The first of the famous English sonnet sequences, Astrophel and Stella was prob- ably composed in the early 1580s. The sonnets were well-circulated in manuscript before the first (apparently pirated) edition was printed in 1591; only in 1598 did an authorised edition reach the press. The sequence was a watershed in English Renaissance poetry. In it, Sidney partially nativised the key features of his Italian model, Petrarch: vari- ation of emotion from poem to poem, with the atten- dant sense of an ongoing, but partly obscure, narra- tive; the philosophical trappings; the musings on the act of poetic creation itself. His experiments with rhyme scheme were no less notable; they served to free the English sonnet from the strict rhyming re- quirements of the Italian form. • The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia – The Arca- dia, by far Sidney’s most ambitious work, was as significant in its own way as his sonnets. The
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    3 The Fatal Woundingof Sir Philip Sidney by Benjamin West work is a romance that combines pastoral elements with a mood derived from the Hellenistic model of Heliodorus. In the work, that is, a highly idealised version of the shepherd’s life adjoins (not always naturally) with stories of jousts, political treachery, kidnappings, battles, and rapes. As published in the sixteenth century, the narrative follows the Greek model: stories are nested within each other, and different storylines are intertwined. The work en- joyed great popularity for more than a century af- ter its publication. William Shakespeare borrowed from it for the Gloucester subplot of King Lear; parts of it were also dramatised by John Day and James Shirley. According to a widely-told story, King Charles I quoted lines from the book as he mounted the scaffold to be executed; Samuel Richardson named the heroine of his first novel after Sidney’s Pamela. Arcadia exists in two significantly differ- ent versions. Sidney wrote an early version (the Old Arcadia) during a stay at Mary Herbert's house; this version is narrated in a straightforward, sequential manner. Later, Sidney began to revise the work on a more ambitious plan, with much more backstory about the princes, and a much more complicated story line, with many more characters. He com- pleted most of the first three books, but the project was unfinished at the time of his death—the third book breaks off in the middle of a sword fight. There were several early editions of the book. Fulke Gre- ville published the revised version alone, in 1590. The Countess of Pembroke, Sidney’s sister, pub- lished a version in 1593, which pasted the last two books of the first version onto the first three books of the revision. In the 1621 version, Sir William Alexander provided a bridge to bring the two stories back into agreement.<Evans, 12-13> It was known in this cobbled-together fashion until the discovery, in the early twentieth century, of the earlier version. • An Apology for Poetry[7] (also known as A Defence of Poesie and The Defence of Poetry) – Sidney wrote the Defence before 1583. It is generally believed that he was at least partly motivated by Stephen Gos- son, a former playwright who dedicated his attack on the English stage, The School of Abuse, to Sidney in 1579, but Sidney primarily addresses more general objections to poetry, such as those of Plato. In his essay, Sidney integrates a number of classical and Italian precepts on fiction. The essence of his de- fence is that poetry, by combining the liveliness of history with the ethical focus of philosophy, is more effective than either history or philosophy in rousing its readers to virtue. The work also offers important comments on Edmund Spenser and the Elizabethan stage. • The Sidney Psalms – These English translations of the Psalms were completed in 1599 by Philip Sid- ney’s sister Mary. 7 In popular culture A memorial, erected in 1986 at the location where he was mortally wounded by the Spanish, can be found at the entrance of a footpath (" 't Gallee”) located in front of the petrol station at the Warnsveldseweg 170. In Arnhem, in front of the house in the Bakkerstraat 68, an inscription on the ground reads: “IN THIS HOUSE DIED ON THE 17 OCTOBER 1586 * SIR PHILIP SIDNEY * ENGLISH POET, DIPLOMAT AND SOL- DIER, FROM HIS WOUNDS SUFFERED AT THE BATTLE OF ZUTPHEN. HE GAVE HIS LIFE FOR OUR FREEDOM”. The inscription was unveiled on 17 October 2011, exactly 425 years after his death, in the presence of Philip Sidney, Viscount De L'Isle, a descen- dant of the brother of Philip Sidney. The city of Sidney, Ohio, in the United States and a street in Zutphen, Netherlands, have been named after Sir Philip. A statue of him can be found in the park at the Coehoornsingel where, in the harsh winter of 1795, En- glish and Hanoverian soldiers were buried who had died while retreating from advancing French troops.[8] Another statue of Sidney, by Arthur George Walker, forms the centrepiece of Shrewsbury School's war memo- rial to alumni who died serving in World War I (unveiled 1924).[9] Sidney features as a friend of Giordano Bruno and an agent for Sir Francis Walsingham in the historical crime novels of S J Parris.
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    4 9 FURTHERREADING W. B. Yeats appears to allude to Sidney as a model of the ideal man in his poem “In Memory of Major Robert Gregory” when he calls Robert Gregory “Our Sidney and our perfect man”. Sidney is referenced in the T.S. Eliot's poem “A Cook- ing Egg”, published in his 1920 poetry collection Aras Vos Prec, where Eliot expresses a desire to speak with Sir Philip in heaven. An extended sketch from Monty Python’s Flying Circus (Series 3, Episode 10 "E. Henry Thripshaw’s Disease") featured a police officer, disguised as Sir Philip Sidney, finding himself transported to the Tudor era after raiding a pornography shop. 8 References [1] “History of Parliament”. Retrieved 2011-10-29. [2] Duncan-Jones (1991), pp. 125–127. [3] The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Six- teenth/Early Seventeenth Century, Volume B, 2012, pg. 1037 [4] The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Six- teenth/Early Seventeenth Century, Volume B, 2012, pg 1037 [5] Charles Carlton (1992). Going to the Wars: The Expe- rience of the British Civil Wars, 1638–1651, Routledge, ISBN 0-415-10391-6. p. 216 [6] Maynard Smith, John; David Harper (2003). Animal Signals. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19- 852685-7. [7] Works by Sir Philip Sidney at Project Gutenberg [8] Bert Fermin en Michel Groothedde: 'De Lunetten van Van Coehoorn', Zutphense Archeologische Publicaties 34, 2007, page 7 [9] Francis, Peter (2013). Shropshire War Memorials, Sites of Remembrance. YouCaxton Publications. pp. 74–75. ISBN 978-1-909644-11-3. 9 Further reading Works • The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia, ed. Maurice Evans. Penguin Books, 1997. ISBN 0-14-043111- X • The Sidney Psalms, completed by Mary Sidney Her- bert, Countess of Pembroke, ed. R.E. Pritchard. Fyfield Books. ISBN 978-0-85635-983-5 Books • Alexander, Gavin. Writing After Sidney: the literary response to Sir Philip Sidney 1586–1640. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. • Craig, D. H. “A Hybrid Growth: Sidney’s Theory of Poetry in An Apology for Poetry.” Essential Articles for the Study of Sir Philip Sidney. Ed. Arthur F. Kinney. Hamden: Archon Books, 1986. • Davies, Norman. Europe: A History. London: Pim- lico, 1997. • Duncan-Jones, Katherine. Sir Philip Sidney: Courtier Poet. New Haven and London: Yale Uni- versity Press, 1991. • Frye, Northrup. Words With Power: Being a Second Study of the Bible and Literature. Toronto: Penguin Books, 1992. • Garrett, Martin. Ed. Sidney: the Critical Heritage. London: Routledge, 1996. • Greville, Fulke.Life of the Renowned Sir Philip Sid- ney. London, 1652. • Hale, John. The Civilization of Europe in the Renais- sance. New York: Atheeum, 1994. • Jasinski, James. Sourcebook on Rhetoric: Key Con- cepts in Contemporary Rhetorical Studies. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, 2001. • Kimbrough, Robert. Sir Philip Sidney. New York: Twayne Publishers, Inc., 1971. • Kuin, Roger (ed.), “The Correspondence of Sir Philip Sidney”. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. • Leitch, Vincent B., Ed. The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2001. • Lewis, C. S. English Literature in the Sixteenth Cen- tury, Excluding Drama. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1954. • Robertson, Jean. “Philip Sidney.” In The Spenser Encyclopedia. eds. A. C. Hamilton et al. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990. • Shelley, Percy Bysshe. “A Defence of Poetry.” In Shelley’s Poetry and Prose: A Norton Critical Edition. 2nd ed. Eds. Donald H. Reiman and Neil Fraistat. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2002. • Sidney, Philip. A Defence of Poesie and Poems. London: Cassell and Company, 1891. • The Cambridge History of English and American Lit- erature. Volume 3. Cambridge: Cambridge Univer- sity Press, 1910.
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    5 Articles • Acheson, Kathy."'Outrage your face': Anti- Theatricality and Gender in Early Modern Closet Drama by Women.” Early Modern Literary Studies 6.3 (January, 2001): 7.1–16. 21 October 2005. • Bear, R. S. "Defence of Poesie: Introduction. In Renascence Editions. 21 October 2005. • Griffiths, Matthew. English Court Poets and Petrar- chism: Wyatt, Sidney and Spenser. 25 November 2005. • Harvey, Elizabeth D. Sidney, Sir Philip. In The Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory & Criticism. 25 November 2005. • Knauss, Daniel, Philip. Love’s Refinement: Meta- physical Expressions of Desire in Philip Sidney and John Donne., Master’s Thesis submitted to the Fac- ulty of the North Carolina State University. 25 November 2005. • Maley, Willy. Cultural Materialism and New His- toricism. 8 November 2005 • Mitsi, Efterpi. The “Popular Philosopher": Plato, Poetry, and Food in Tudor Aesthetics. In Early Modern Literary Studies. 9 November 2004. • Pask, Kevin. “The “mannes state” of Philip Sidney: Pre-scripting the Life of the Poet in England.” 25 November 2005. • Staff. Sir Philip Sidney 1554–1586, Poets’ Graves. Accessed 26 May 2008 Other • Stump, Donald (ed). “Sir Philip Sidney: World Bibliography, Saint Louis University. Accessed 26 May 2008. “This site is the largest collection of bibliographic references on Sidney in existence. It includes all the items originally published in Sir Philip Sidney: An Annotated Bibliography of Texts and Criticism, 1554–1984 (New York: G.K. Hall, Macmillan 1994) as well updates from 1985 to the present.” 10 External links • Works by Philip Sidney at Project Gutenberg • Works by or about Philip Sidney at Internet Archive • Works by Philip Sidney at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks) • Audio: Robert Pinsky reads “My True Love Hath My Heart and I Have His” by Philip Sidney (via poemsoutloud.net) • “Archival material relating to Philip Sidney”. UK National Archives. • Portraits of Sir Philip Sidney at the National Portrait Gallery, London
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    6 11 TEXTAND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES 11 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses 11.1 Text • Philip Sidney Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Sidney?oldid=746406229 Contributors: Magnus Manske, Atorpen, Deb, Camembert, Kchishol1970, Llywrch, Ihcoyc, Den fjättrade ankan~enwiki, Charles Matthews, Lord Emsworth, Proteus, Frazzydee, Di- madick, Bearcat, PBS, Smallweed, Wjhonson, Merovingian, Gidonb, DigitalMedievalist, Advance, Stern~enwiki, Finn-Zoltan, Jastrow, Antandrus, Doops, Kelson, Neutrality, PRiis, D6, Discospinster, TedPavlic, MeltBanana, Stbalbach, Wareh, Cohesion, Chirag, Nk, Ogress, Craigy144, Ksnow, Pcpcpc, FeanorStar7, Commander Keane, SDC, Marudubshinki, Graham87, RxS, Ketiltrout, Rjwilmsi, Mayumashu, Tim!, NatusRoma, JanSuchy, TheMidnighters, Brendan Moody, D.brodale, Jaraalbe, PKM, Gdrbot, Samuel Wiki, Jlittlet, Gaius Cornelius, Pixley, TheMadBaron, Nikkimaria, Cassini83, Scoutersig, Krilia, Britannicus, Lifebaka, Eskimbot, Srnec, Hmains, Chaojoker, Sadads, VirtualSteve, Wally Neumann, Raynethackery, JesseRafe, Elendil’s Heir, Ohconfucius, Ser Amantio di Nicolao, MegA, BrownHairedGirl, Bagel7, Regan123, JHunterJ, EdK, NuncAutNunquam, Necrid Master, Joseph Solis in Australia, Tartangle, Courcelles, Zotdragon, Adam Keller, Mattbr, Outriggr (2006-2009), Neelix, Cydebot, UberMan5000, Omicronpersei8, Kingstowngalway, Mattisse, Verica Atrebatum, Phoe, Gossamers, RobotG, Mendedcloak, Charlie35, DagosNavy, Candent shlimazel, The Transhumanist, AJokinen, Demophon, Martin Garrett, .anacondabot, Magioladitis, AuburnPilot, Waacstats, DWeissman, Vanished user dkjsdfkljeritekk4, Septuagent, Ugajin, Chiswick Chap, STBotD, VolkovBot, Hqb, Naohiro19 revertvandal, Flozu, L. 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Arnold, Widr, Helpful Pixie Bot, DBigXray, Patrug, Mark Arsten, Iamthecheese44, Alanm61, The Traditionalist, Fylbecatulous, Cloptonson, YFdyh- bot, Neidr, Wfedsf, VIAFbot, Nimetapoeg, Yojimbo.stark, Jamescrr, OccultZone, WikiOriginal-9, 41hrothgar, Bedfordanalretentive, Ruit hora, Corridamr, KasparBot, JJMC89, Gal777, JJMC89 bot, 2A02A03F and Anonymous: 110 11.2 Images • File:Ambox_important.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/Ambox_important.svg License: Public do- main Contributors: Own work, based off of Image:Ambox scales.svg Original artist: Dsmurat (talk · contribs) • File:Benjamin_West_-_The_Fatal_Wounding_of_Sir_Philip_Sidney.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ commons/4/41/Benjamin_West_-_The_Fatal_Wounding_of_Sir_Philip_Sidney.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by Ntetos using CommonsHelper. 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