The book shows how classical and Italian influences were modulated into the English literary tradition via French authors such as Marguerite de Navarre, Marot, Ronsard, Viau, etc. whose writing was deeply affected by the tensions of the Reformation and the religious wars they generated. The French influences are traced in authors such as Wyatt, Shakespeare, Milton and Marvell. Much knowledge of classical and contemporary literature reached England via French translations, rendered in turn into English by such anthologists as Painter on whom authors like Shakespeare were deeply dependent.