Thomas Overbury Biography

Writer, careerist, and political adviser, Sir Thomas Overbury is a minor literary figure associated with the vogue of seventeenth-century English character-writing, a prose form similar to the essay but loosely modeled on the short sketches of character types, such as "The Garrulous Man" and "The Coward," composed by the ancient Greek writer Theophrastus. From 1614 to 1664 Overbury's posthumous character book A Wife Now a Widowe, comprising poems, characters, and "conceited Newes," was reprinted more frequently than other character books, including Joseph Hall's pioneering Characters of Vertues and Vices (1608) and John Earle's popular Micro-cosmographie (1628). Overbury's writings were inextricably linked to his murder in the Tower of London: unflagging public interest in his death by slow poisoning made the publication of his characters a bookseller's dream. Many of the more than eighty Overburian characters appearing in successive publications were written by "other learned Gentlemen his friends," including the...
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