Microcosmographie
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Microcosmographie, or a Peece of the World discovered, in Essayes and Characters (1628) by John Earle is a book of character sketches, including 76 types of stock characters.
The book is Earle's chief title to remembrance. It is a witty and humorous work, which throws light on the manners of the time. First published anonymously in 1628, it became very popular, and ran through ten editions in the lifetime of the author. The style is quaint and epigrammatic; and the reader is frequently reminded of Thomas Fuller by such passages as this: "A university dunner is a gentlemen follower cheaply purchased, for his own money has hyr'd him." Several reprints of the book have been issued since the author's death; and in 1671 a French translation by J Dymock appeared with the title of Le Vice ridicule.
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