Louis Karlin

In this early literary effort, More refashioned into vibrant English his Latin source materials to create a highly original contemplative guide in the humanist mode. Neither a saint’s life nor a straightforward biography, More drew on the moral ambiguities of this brilliant and eccentric philosopher’s life with the aim of encouraging the reader to carefully assess the ways in which Pico could be viewed as a paragon of virtue – and the ways in which he fell short – as a means of helping his readers find their own paths to holiness. As readers come to appreciate the subtle and gentle irony in More’s translation, they discover how their superficial understanding of the text finds an analogue in Pico’s lack of self-knowledge. And, ultimately, it is the genius of More’s work that guides the discriminating reader toward achieving the humility needed for honest, scripture-based contemplation.

This essay analyzes More’s use of humor in The Sadness of Christ and A Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation, and finds that rhetorical devices such as satire, parody and the telling of merry tales play an integral role in engaging the reader’s imagination. In these two late works, dealing with the most serious of subjects, the humanist More embraces the rhetorical tradition of Antiquity which assigned a creative function to the imagination and recognized mockery, irony and humor as means of rational persuasion. The essay finds that More provokes laughter for three interrelated aims—to correct and inform the understanding, to strengthen communal bonds, and ultimately to express the joyful hope of the beatific vision.