SOURCE: Torti, Anna. “Specular Narrative: Hoccleve's Regement of Princes.” In Glass of Form: Mirroring Structures from Chaucer to Skelton, pp. 87-106. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1991.

In the following essay, from her study of mirror metaphors in medieval English literature, Torti discusses Hoccleve's Regement of Princes in terms of its function as autobiography. Torti argues that in his construction of a “mirror” in which Prince Henry can see examples of statesmanship, Hoccleve often reflects an image of himself.

Critical evaluation of Thomas Hoccleve as a mere imitator of Chaucer has had too long a currency,¹ and Hoccleve himself is partly to blame for this. His references to Chaucer are numerous. In the Regement of Princes he apostrophizes his ‘maister’ as ‘flour of eloquence, / Mirour of fructuous entendement, / O, vniuersel fadir in science’ (1962-4), and, using the diminutio technique, contrasts Chaucer's excellence with his own inability to express himself correctly...