James I, King of Scots, The Kingis Quair

Lotte Reinbold (University of Cambridge)

Ed. by Sebastian Sobecki, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.3: Scottish Writing and Culture, 400-present.
Vol. editors: Kate Ash-Irisarri (University of Edinburgh), Daniel Cook (University of Dundee), J. Derrick McClure (University of Aberdeen)

Dates

First circulation or publication c. 1424

Places

Scotland (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Poetry (any)

Resources

Introduction and Summary

The Kingis Quair is a dream vision attributed to King James I of Scotland. It survives in one fifteenth-century manuscript, Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Arch. Selden B.24. Unusual for its particularly extended dream frame, its seemingly autobiographical content and regal author, and its complex meditations upon Fortune and free will, the poem is an extraordinary tour-de-force, blending the personal with the political, the religious with the romantic.

The poem is divided into 197 seven-line stanzas, written in the verse form of rhyme royal (ababbcc) familiar from Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde. It describes an imprisoned narrator, who reads Boethius’…

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3814 words

Citation: Reinbold, Lotte. "The Kingis Quair". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 13 April 2021 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=13237, accessed 23 November 2024.]

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