SOURCE: "Love and Power in the Poetry of Sir Thomas Wyatt," in Modern Language Quarterly, Vol. XXIX, No. 2, June, 1968, pp. 145-60.

In the essay that follows, Wyatt's lyrics are read as literal expressions of his relationship to his lady as well as of his position in the court.

Wyatt's love lyrics establish a relationship between lover and lady in which love is used as an instrument of power. The conventional relationship between suppliant lover and unattainable lady, portrayed by Petrarch, is here rendered in reverse. The stance of Laura's lover is one of unremitting respect and idealization, taken with good will and a melancholy tinged occasionally with self-pitying egoism. The difference, as well as the indebtedness, becomes immediately clear when we consider Wyatt's poetry. The relationship of idealized lady and adoring lover has been given a malign twist, so that we have instead a sadistic lady glorying in...