Best known as a sermon writer whose prose was praised (and borrowed) by T.S. Eliot, Lancelot Andrewes was a bishop and court preacher during the reign of England’s James I. He was noted for his rugged, staccato writing style, full of elaborate metaphors and analogies, along with wide-ranging scholarship, and is often compared to the Metaphysical Poets of the early seventeenth century. The young Milton wrote an elegy for him, and others of his time praised him for his sermons, his piety, and his learning.
Andrewes was born in London, the son of a merchant mariner, and won early attention for his intellectual achievement. He attended Richard Mulcaster’s Merchant Taylors’ School and later won a scholarship to Cambridge, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees and became a
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Citation: Goldfarb, Sheldon. "Lancelot Andrewes". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 04 April 2022 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=115, accessed 18 April 2024.]
