Harvey, Gabriel

Gabriel Harvey (1550-1630) served as a Praelector and professor of Rhetoric at Cambridge University from 1574 to 1576 – he graduated from Christ’s College, Cambridge in 1570.

Born in Saffron Walden, Essex, Gabriel was the eldest son of John and Alice Harvey – a farmer and rope maker.

Gabriel’s brothers, Richard and John become entangled in a literary feud against Thomas Nashe. While John never wrote publicly on the issue, Richard would defend himself in the preface of The Lamb of God and his enemies, (1590) only to be mocked by Nashe in return. 

Harvey was committed to relaying his perspective on contemporary literary history with his detailed marginalia (notes scrawled into the margins of books) on the works of writers such as William Shakespeare, Robert Greene, Francis Bacon, Henry Butt, and George Gascoigne. 

Harvey’s obsessive note taking habits may have been mocked by his Cambridge peers, but his process of rereading material in order to replicate and evolve prose is exhibited in his later works. Harvey’s studying habits are best described by himself in the marginalia of Petrus (Peter) Ramus’s Ciceronianus,  in which he writes “I redd ouer this Ciceronianus twise in twoo dayes, being then sophister in Chistes College” (172 Wilson).

Harvey’s first publication, Ode Natalia, (1575) is an elegy dedicated to Petrus Ramus, a French philosopher whose rhetorical method and theories on educational reform greatly influenced Harvey’s career. Harvey also published two Latin translated orations focused on this issue – The Rhetor (November of 1577)  and Ramus’ Ciceronianus (June 1577).

The Rhetor debuted in 1575 at Trinity College, Cambridge as a speech about how rhetoric should be used and its future. Ciceronianus was also given as an oration in the spring of 1576, but is more focused on how one should teach these forms of rhetoric. 

Cicero had a great influence on Harvey’s life from a young age. Harvey writes in his introduction to Ciceronianus, ““Long since I laid claim to the name of a Ciceronian [He writes], and considered this title the highest honor and glory. I firmly agree with those who taught that Marcus Tully alone should be imitated, forever and everywhere; and who believed that in him reposed the fortunes of eloquence and letters.”

On July 27th of 1578, Harvey made an address to the Queen (and was possibly in charge of welcoming her to Audley End, although Harvey’s adversary Thomas Nashe refutes this in his piece, Have with you to Saffron Walden (1596)). In his address, he presents the Queen with the manuscript for his forthcoming book,  G. Harveii Gratulationum Valdinensium Libri quatuor (Gratulationum Valdinensium four Books). Each part of the collection is dedicated to a different person, or group including Queen Elizabeth, The Leicesters, Lord Burghley, and finally, a criticism of Oxford. 

In 1581, Trinity College performed Pedantius, a comedy in which the main character was an obvious caricature of Harvey – even going to the extent of making the main character a Cicereon schoolmaster. Of course, Thomas Nashe found the play hysterically, calling it an “exquisite comedy” in Have With You to Saffron Walden (1596).

At the turn of the 1590’s, Gabriel’s brother Richard Harvey had taken part in the Marprelate controversy with his preface to The Lamb of God and his enemies. In response, Robert Greene decided to personally satirize each member of the Harvey family in his piece A Quip for An Upstart Courtier). Thomas Nashe, directly attacked in Lamb of God, would also rebuke Richard in a passage from his respective work, Pierce Penilesse His Supplication to the Divel (1592). Gabriel would go on to respond to both Nashe and Greene in Foure Letters (1593).

The never-ending counter attacks on each side was ultimately halted by Bishops’ Ban on satire in 1599 – Thomas Nashe and Gabriel Harvey were both banned from writing any more future novels.

Harvey died of unknown causes in 1630; he is buried at Walden Abbey in Saffron-Walden.