Pierce Penniless

[3][4] It is written from the point of view of Pierce, a man who has not met with good fortune, who now bitterly complains of the world's wickedness, and addresses his complaints to the devil.

The story is told in a style that is complex, witty, fulminating, extemporaneous, digressive, anecdotal, filled with wicked descriptions, and peppered with newly minted words and Latin phrases.

Printed pamphlets had been a popular and longstanding tradition, but in London in the late 16th century, with the urban population booming, and literacy becoming widespread, they flourished.

[7] The content of these pamphlets often tended to be scandalous or scurrilous, but they contained a variety of material: Satires, war-of-words, anonymous attacks, topical issues, poetry, fiction, etc.

[11] Indeed, the last words that Pierce addresses to the Devil in his supplication express the wish that certain souls will be accepted into Hell, and thus will "not let our air be contaminated with their sixpenny damnation any longer".

[17] Nashe then, in the "Private Epistle of the Author to the Printer", threatens anyone who might suggest his satire has particular victims: "Let the interpreter beware," he says, "...they shall know that I live as their evil angel to haunt them world without end.

The supplication is based on the medieval theme of the Seven Deadly Sins,[20] and enumerates each vice one after the other: Greed, and his wife Dame Niggardise; Pride and his mistress, Lady Swine-Snout; gluttony; sloth; etc.

Each vice is personified in the manner of a prosopopoeia, and provides an opportunity for the story to introduce various sinners, who are described with rich detail—as though they are costumed to appear onstage.