Written by the Elizabethan courtier and poet Philip Sidney in the early 1580s and published posthumously in 1590, The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia is one of the most ambitious prose fictions of the English Renaissance. Dedicated to Sidney’s sister Mary Herbert, Countess of Pembroke, it weaves together pastoral romance, heroic adventure, political philosophy, and elaborate poetry in a rich and demanding narrative.
Sidney’s Arcadia was enormously influential on later writers, including Shakespeare and Spenser, and it remains essential reading for students of Elizabethan literature. Download this free EPUB from Better Gutenberg to explore a foundational work of English Renaissance prose.