In 1994, Debora K. Shuger published her field-changing study, The Renaissance Bible: Scholarship, Sacrifice and Subjectivity. Shuger's book offers a wide-reaching and intellectually ambitious exploration of the centrality of the inter-connected discourses of literature and theology in the period. Throughout, Shuger troubles prevailing assumptions about religion and its purview by expanding the archive of religious writing far beyond the devotional poetry and prose that had so long been the province of literary history.
Shuger deftly traces the connections between biblical scholarship and the histories of politics, nations and peoples, languages, and law, as well as to the most important literary forms of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance: tragedy (ancient and modern), mythology, and the genres of affective devotion that depict Christ's inestimable suffering. The Renaissance Bible discovers how early modern readers rendered the worlds of Scripture intelligible, even palpable, and how they located themselves and their endeavors in a history they shared with classical and biblical antecedents alike.
The essays collected here lay bare the extraordinary powers and resources of The Renaissance Bible, with contributions by leading scholars of early modernity: Anthony Grafton, Brian Cummings, Russ Leo, Beth Quitslund, and Achsah Guibbory.
The chapters in this book were originally published in Reformation.
Shakespeare's Sonnets both generate and demonstrate many of today's most pressing debates about Shakespeare and poetry. They explore history and aesthetics, gender and society, time and memory, and continue to invite divergent responses from critics and poets. This freeze-frame volume showcases the range of current debate and ideas surrounding these still startling poems. Each chapter has been carefully selected for its originality and relevance to the needs of students, teachers, and researchers. Key themes and topics covered include:
Textual issues and editing the sonnets
Reception, interpretation and critical history of the sonnets
The place of the sonnets in teaching
Critical approaches and close reading
Memorialisation and monument-making
Contemporary poetry and the Sonnets
All the essays offer new perspectives and combine to give readers an up-to-date understanding of what is exciting and challenging about Shakespeare's Sonnets. The approach, based on an individual poetic form, reflects how the sonnets are most commonly studied and taught.
In 1994, Debora K. Shuger published her field-changing study, The Renaissance Bible: Scholarship, Sacrifice and Subjectivity. Shuger's book offers a wide-reaching and intellectually ambitious exploration of the centrality of the inter-connected discourses of literature and theology in the period. Throughout, Shuger troubles prevailing assumptions about religion and its purview by expanding the archive of religious writing far beyond the devotional poetry and prose that had so long been the province of literary history.
Shuger deftly traces the connections between biblical scholarship and the histories of politics, nations and peoples, languages, and law, as well as to the most important literary forms of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance: tragedy (ancient and modern), mythology, and the genres of affective devotion that depict Christ's inestimable suffering. The Renaissance Bible discovers how early modern readers rendered the worlds of Scripture intelligible, even palpable, and how they located themselves and their endeavors in a history they shared with classical and biblical antecedents alike.
The essays collected here lay bare the extraordinary powers and resources of The Renaissance Bible, with contributions by leading scholars of early modernity: Anthony Grafton, Brian Cummings, Russ Leo, Beth Quitslund, and Achsah Guibbory.
The chapters in this book were originally published in Reformation.
Shakespeare's Sonnets both generate and demonstrate many of today's most pressing debates about Shakespeare and poetry. They explore history and aesthetics, gender and society, time and memory, and continue to invite divergent responses from critics and poets. This freeze-frame volume showcases the range of current debate and ideas surrounding these still startling poems. Each chapter has been carefully selected for its originality and relevance to the needs of students, teachers, and researchers. Key themes and topics covered include:
Textual issues and editing the sonnets
Reception, interpretation and critical history of the sonnets
The place of the sonnets in teaching
Critical approaches and close reading
Memorialisation and monument-making
Contemporary poetry and the Sonnets
All the essays offer new perspectives and combine to give readers an up-to-date understanding of what is exciting and challenging about Shakespeare's Sonnets. The approach, based on an individual poetic form, reflects how the sonnets are most commonly studied and taught.
Shakespeare in London offers a lively and engaging new reading of some of Shakespeare's major work, informed by close attention to the language of his drama. The focus of the book is on Shakespeare's London, how it influenced his drama and how he represents it on stage. Taking readers on an imaginative journey through the city, the book moves both chronologically, from beginning to end of Shakespeare's dramatic career, and also geographically, traversing London from west to east.
Each chapter focuses on one play and one key location, drawing out the thematic connections between that place and the drama it underwrites. Plays discussed in detail include Hamlet, Richard II, The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, King Lear and Romeo and Juliet. Close textual readings accompany the wealth of contextual material, providing a fresh and exciting way into Shakespeare's work.Shakespeare in London offers a lively and engaging new reading of some of Shakespeare's major work, informed by close attention to the language of his drama. The focus of the book is on Shakespeare's London, how it influenced his drama and how he represents it on stage. Taking readers on an imaginative journey through the city, the book moves both chronologically, from beginning to end of Shakespeare's dramatic career, and also geographically, traversing London from west to east.
Each chapter focuses on one play and one key location, drawing out the thematic connections between that place and the drama it underwrites. Plays discussed in detail include Hamlet, Richard II, The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, King Lear and Romeo and Juliet. Close textual readings accompany the wealth of contextual material, providing a fresh and exciting way into Shakespeare's work.1. Introduction; Hannah Crawforth and Sarah Lewis.- PART I: UNION.- 2. Margaret Cavendish, Wife; Julie Crawford.- 3. Reading Overbury's Wife: Politics and Marriage in 1616; Christina Luckyj.- 4. Representations of the Family in Early Caroline Drama: or, How Do You Solve a Problem Like Henrietta Maria?; Tom MacFaul.- 5. Animal Families; Helen Smith.- PART II: SUCCESSION.- 6. 'Good agreement betwixt the wombe and frute': the Politics of Maternal Power in the Letters of Lady Anne Bacon; Katy Mair.- 7. Allegiance and Alliance: Maternal Genealogies in the Works of Mary Wroth; Naomi Miller.- 8. Mini-Majesty: Dynasty and Succession in the Portraiture of Henry VIII and Edward VI; Naomi Yavneh Klos.- 9. Beyond the Palace: the Transmission of Political Power in the Clifford Circle; Jessica L. Malay.- PART III: REBELLION.- 10. Bare-Forked Animals: King Lear and the Problems of Patriarchalism; Su Fang Ng.- 11. The State, Childhood and Religious Dissent; Lucy Underwood.- 12. Father Figures: Paternal Politics in the Conversion Narratives of Thomas Gage and James Wadsworth; Abigail Shinn.- 13. Family Politics and Age in Early Modern England; Lucy Munro.- Notes.- Bibliography.- Index.-
'These contributors are some of the best, and best-known poets writing today ... The result is a slimly elegant book of new poetry, some of it very fine indeed ... It really is extraordinary that these sonnets, first published in 1609, can still be engendering such a range of new ideas and ways of expressing them.' - The Independent
On Shakespeare's Sonnets: A Poets' Celebration brings together thirty of the world's foremost contemporary poets writing in response to Shakespeare's Sonnets.
In the four hundred years since Shakespeare's death, the Sonnets have invited imitation, homage, critique, parody and pastiche. These new poems probe our relationship to the Sonnets' intricate form and ambitious scope, their investigation of sexuality, wit, memory and poetic survival. These sonnets and longer lyrics explore what it means to write 'on Shakespeare's Sonnets' in the 21st century.
Published in association with the Royal Society of Literature contributing poets include: Andrew Motion, Carol Ann Duffy, Gillian Clarke, Paul Muldoon, Ruth Padel, Simon Armitage, Roger McGough and Jo Shapcott.