Willobie His Avisa

Willobie His Avisa

Title page of the first edition (1594)
Author	John Willobie (possible pseudonym)
Country	England
Language	English
Genre	narrative poetry
Publisher	John Windet
Publication date	1594
Media type	Print
Followed by	Penelope's Complaint or a Mirror for Wanton Minions

Willobie His Avisa is a narrative poem that was published as a pamphlet in London after being entered in the Registers of Stationer's Hall on 3 September 1594. It purports to have been written by a person called "Henry Willobie" with an introduction by "Hadrian Dorrell". It is possible that these are pseudonyms, though a real Henry Willobie certainly existed.

The central story tells of Avisa, who is at first a maid and then an innkeeper's wife. She is besieged by a series of would-be seducers, one after the other. She rebuffs each of them and remains a chaste and a constant wife. It is told in seventy-two cantos, the cantos are made up of six-line stanzas of iambic tetrameters, which rhyme ababcc.

The pedestrian quality of poem has left critics unimpressed, and it was censured by the authorities in 1599. The work is enigmatic regarding the actual identities of its characters and its author, but its popularity suggests that Tudor audiences knew what was being said. It was republished six times between 1594 and 1635.

Willobie His Avisa is of particular interest to Shakespearean studies, because it contains literature's first extant, independent mention of William Shakespeare. This occurs in an introductory poem printed in the first pages. Also, one of the characters, "W.S.", is widely thought to be based on William Shakespeare. W.S. is presented as a friend to "H.W." (Henry Willobie), and offers him advice on wooing Avisa.

The title page reads in full: “Willobie his Avisa. Or The true Picture of a modest Maid, and of a chaste and constant wife. In Hexamiter verse. The like argument whereof, was never heretofore published. Read the preface to the Reader before you enter farther. A vertuous woman is the crown of her husband, but she that maketh him ashamed, is as corruption in his bones. Proverb. 12.4. Imprinted at London by John Windet. 1594.”

After the title page are two epistles: “To all the constant Ladies & Gentlewomen of England that fear God,” and “To the gentle & courteous Reader.” Both are ascribed to Hadrian Dorrell. In the second epistle, dated “From my chamber in Oxford this first of October,” Dorrell claims that he discovered the poem among the papers of his “very good friend and chamber fellow M. Henry Willobie,” a young man, and “a scholar of very good hope,” who has left for foreign lands, leaving with Dorrell “the key of his study, and the use of all his books till his returne.” Dorrell says that he ventured to publish this poem without the author’s consent.

Dorell then says, “Whether it be altogether fayned, or in some part true, or altogether true” he does not know, but he suspects that the name, Avisa, may have been invented as an acronym for the Latin words “Amans Uxor Iviolata Sempre Amanda”, which he translates: “A loving wife, that never violated her faith, is always to be beloved.” Willobie’s intention, Dorell guesses, may be simply to tell a story that sets out “the Idea of a constant wife” to let one type of woman know she can expect “glory & praise” and the others “blacke ignominy, and foule contempt”.