The notorious French writer Francois Rabelais (1494?-1553) was also widely known for scoffing, supposed atheism, salacious writing, and irresponsible whimsy. This book is the first exploration in more than sixty years of Renaissance England's response to the humorous yet difficult and ambiguous Rabelais.

Anne Lake Prescott describes in entertaining detail how a host of English writers - Philip Sidney, Ben Jonson, John Webster, John Donne, James J, Shakespeare, and Michael Drayton, among many others - collectively and sometimes individually appreciated and condemned Rabelais.