| Acknowledgments | PAGE IX |
| Notes on citations | XI |
| Introduction: Laureates and beggars | 1 |
| PART I BACKGROUNDS | 13 |
| 1 Laureate Poetics | 15 |
| PART II THE FIRST LANCASTRIAN POETS | 43 |
| 2 John Lydgate: The Invention of the English Laureate | 49 |
| 3 Thomas Hoccleve: Beggar Laureate | 88 |
| PART III FROM LANCASTER TO EARLY TUDOR | 125 |
| 4 Lydgateanism | 131 |
| 5 The Trace of Lydgate: Stephen Hawes, Alexander Barclay, and John Skelton | 174 |
| Epilogue: Sir Thomas Wyatt: Anti-Laureate | |
| Notes | 233 |
| Works cited | 278 |
| Index | 293 |