SOURCE: Fox, Denton. “The Coherence of Henryson's Work.” In Fifteenth-Century Studies: Recent Essays, edited by Robert F. Yeager, pp. 275-81. Hamden: Archon Books, 1984.

In this essay, Fox investigates the prominent parallels between Henryson's Fables, the Testament of Cresseid, and Orpheus and Eurydice.

Henryson's three major works, the Fables, the Testament of Cresseid, and Orpheus and Eurydice, are poems which appear to be very dissimilar. I would like to argue here that they are more alike than has been recognized, and that they cast useful light on one another. While it would be possible to bring the dozen or so short poems that are usually attributed to Henryson into this comparison, since there are a number of parallels between them and the major works, it seems safer to leave them alone. This is partly because the attributions of the short poems are less secure, in some cases much less...