SOURCE: "John Skelton: The Structure of the Poem," in Philological Quarterly, Vol. XXXII, No. 1, January, 1953, pp. 29-42.

In the following essay, Swallow examines Skelton's unique poetic structure and determines how it differs from medieval literary traditions.

In the work of John Skelton appears the first important Renaissance break with the medieval tradition in poetry. His work covers almost every type of verse practiced in his day, including the morality play; but he proceeded from acceptance of the medieval tradition, through varying stages of revolt against that tradition, to a new form which he devised. This type was highly individualistic, however, in the sense that it did not have much "carryover value." Though he finally broke with the medieval method, Skelton's experiment did not, as did Wyatt's, discover the method which was used so effectively by the great Elizabethan and Jacobean poets.

Skelton's two elegies—"On the Death of...