John Florio, whose long life coincided with the literary careers of William Shakespeare, Sir Philip Sidney, Edmund Spenser, and Ben Jonson, is best known today for his exuberant English translation of the Essays of Michel de Montaigne. In the eyes of his contemporaries, however, he was familiar primarily as a talented language teacher and an indefatigable compiler of dictionaries and linguistic guides. Ambitious, versatile, hugely industrious and occasionally belligerent, Florio was a conspicuous figure in the London of his day: an English native whose first language was Italian; a dedicated scholar who inspired mockery as well as praise; a man patronized by the rich and powerful who nonetheless died in poverty.
Florio was born in London in 1553, shortly before the death of King Edward VI and the accession...
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Citation: Hamlin, William M.. "John Florio". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 28 November 2008; last revised 10 July 2025. [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=1571, accessed 17 December 2025.]
