Ascham's The Scholemaster, Italianate Englishmen, and the Protestant Circe

Abstract

The Scholemaster (1570) is widely acknowledged as one of the great works of the English humanist tradition. However, in his radical appropriation of the Homeric story of Odysseus and Circe—part of Roger Aschams sixteen-page diatribe against Italy, Italians, and “Italianate Englishmen” that closes Book 1 of the treatise—there emerges an unresolved tension between his reverence for classical learning and his own version of Protestant docta pietas. He tendentiously re-imagines Homer's wily protagonist as a docile figure of piety and self-control and he willingly ignores much of the rich classical tradition as he portrays Circe as merely a temptress of wayfaring travelers. This discussion examines Aschams re-imagining of Homer's story in light of several key sixteenth-century historical and theological sources, concluding that Ascham views good education as the sole and necessary defense against the enchantments of his Italianate Circe.