ABSTRACT
John Shirley's translations have been preserved in MS BL Additional 5467. However he also includes some information about Le Livre des Bonnes Meurs which he did not find in his base manuscript, stating that John of Wiegnay made his translation from Latin into French 'att the vnyuersite of Orliance' in 1390. The Boke of Gode Matters may therefore represent Shirley's first efforts to master the different activity of translation, and its text may contain the earliest evidence of his techniques. The Secrete of Secretes testifies to Shirley's willingness to expand and adapt the text he was translating; at the same time, however, the text also contains evidence of his carelessness, and of his imperfect knowledge of French. Shirley's interaction with the Secretum Secretorum is on two levels, since he deals with the text as both transcriber and translator. By far the most extensive expansions, alterations, and additions occur during Shirley's description of the actual murder.
