In November 2000, the Romanian poet Corneliu Vadim Tudor came a surprisingly strong second in his country's presidential elections. The leader of the far-right Greater Romania Party, Vadim Tudor had risen to national prominence with calls for the ethnic cleansing of Hungarians and gypsies. When questioned by a British journalist about his ultra-nationalist policies, the poet retorted: “Yes, I am a nationalist. Jonathan Swift was a nationalist. William Shakespeare was a nationalist. There is nothing wrong with being a nationalist. It means to love your country.” This response succinctly raises several of the questions central to this book. What does it mean to be a nationalist? Was Shakespeare a nationalist? Is there something about nationalism as a doctrine that makes it particularly attractive to poets? And does the phrase “Tudor nationalism” have any meaning, outside of Romania?

As Corneliu Vadim Tudor went on to explain, “what is wrong is to be an extremist, a chauvinist, a xenophobe.” While it is difficult to see how all of these terms do not also apply to the Romanian poet, the distinction being drawn is important. Not all nationalists, in all times and places, have been xenophobes, nor are all xenophobes necessarily nationalists. The latter point is particularly pertinent to our understanding of sixteenth-century England, where the evidence of strong ethnic loyalties and the hatred of “strangers” is incontrovertible.