Neo-Historicism: Studies in Renaissance Literature, History and Politics(Studies in Renaissance Literature)

Essays on English Renaissance culture make a major contribution to the debate on historical method. For nearly two decades, Renaissance literary scholarship has been dominated by various forms of postmodern criticism which claim to expose the simplistic methodology of `traditional' criticism and to offer a more sophisticated view of the relation between literature and history; however, this new approach, although making scholars more alert to the political significance of literary texts, has been widely criticised on both methodological and theoretical grounds. The revisionist essays collected in this volume make a major contribution to the modern debate on historical method, approaching Renaissance culture from different gender perspectives and a variety of political standpoints, but all sharing an interest in the interdisciplinary study of the past.ROBIN HEADLAM WELLS is Professor of English, University of Surrey Roehampton; GLENN BURGESS is Professor of History, University of Hull; ROWLAND WYMER is Senior Lecturer in English at the University of Hull. Contributors: GLENN BURGESS, STANLEY STEWART, BLAIR WORDEN, ANDREW GURR, KATHARINE EISAMAN MAUS, ROWLAND WYMER, GRAHAM PARRY, MALCOLM SMUTS, STEVEN ZWICKER, HEATHER DUBROW,ROBIN HEADLAM WELLS.

Table of Contents:
The 'Historical Turn' and the Political Culture of Early-Modern England: Towards a Postmodern History? - Glenn Burgess 'New' Guides to the Historically Perplexed - Stanley Stewart Ben Jonson and the Monarchy - Blair Worden Fear of Playing - Andrew Gurr Inwardness and Spectatorship in Early Modern England - Katharine Eisaman Maus Jacobean Pageant or Elizabethan Fin-de-Siècle? The Political Context of Early Seventeenth-Century Tragedy - Rowland Wymer The Ancient British Presence in Renaissance Literature - Graham Parry Occasional Events versus Literary Texts: the Historical Investigation of Political Imagery - R Malcolm Smuts The Politics of Affectivity in Early Modern England - Steven Zwicker 'In thievish ways': Tropes and Robbers in Shakespeare's Sonnets and Early Modern Culture - Heather Dubrow An Orpheus for a Hercules: Redefining Virtue in The Tempest - Robin Headlam Wells

About the Author :
GRAHAM PARRY is Professor of English and Related Literature at University of York, York, UK.