Sir Thomas North, An Elizabethan Translator

Abstract

Anyone who is familiar with Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, Coriolanus, Antony and Cleopatra, Pericles, or Timon of Athena has been touched by the spirit, if not the word, of Sir Thomas North. The casual student knows that North’s work was a source used in some of Shakespeare’s plays. Scholars have credited North’s translation of Plutarch’s Parallel Lives with providing not only the historical background upon which Shakespeare depended for his plays dealing with ancient, classical heroes, but the "verbal raiment" as well. Tucker Brooke acknowledges Shakespeare’s debt to North by citing some outstanding passages from the plays mentioned...