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Modernism and Physical Illness: Sick Books
by Peter FifieldT. S. Eliot memorably said that separation of the man who suffers from the mind that creates is the root of good poetry. This book argues that this is wrong. Beginning from Virginia Woolf's 'On Being Ill', it demonstrates that modernism is, on the contrary, invested in physical illness as a subject, method, and stylizing force. Experience of physical ailments, from the fleeting to the fatal, the familiar to the unusual, structures the writing of the modernists, both as sufferers and onlookers. Illness reorients the relation to, and appearance of, the world, making it appear newly strange; it determines the character of human interactions and models of behaviour. As a topic, illness requires new ways of writing and thinking, altered ideas of the subject, and a re-examination of the roles of invalids and carers. This book reads the work five authors, who are also known for their illness, hypochondria, or medical work: D. H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, T. S. Eliot, Dorothy Richardson, and Winifred Holtby. It overturns the assumption that illness is a simple obstacle to creativity and instead argues that it is a subject of careful thought and cultural significance.
Modernism and Physical Illness: Sick Books
by Peter FifieldT. S. Eliot memorably said that separation of the man who suffers from the mind that creates is the root of good poetry. This book argues that this is wrong. Beginning from Virginia Woolf's 'On Being Ill', it demonstrates that modernism is, on the contrary, invested in physical illness as a subject, method, and stylizing force. Experience of physical ailments, from the fleeting to the fatal, the familiar to the unusual, structures the writing of the modernists, both as sufferers and onlookers. Illness reorients the relation to, and appearance of, the world, making it appear newly strange; it determines the character of human interactions and models of behaviour. As a topic, illness requires new ways of writing and thinking, altered ideas of the subject, and a re-examination of the roles of invalids and carers. This book reads the work five authors, who are also known for their illness, hypochondria, or medical work: D. H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, T. S. Eliot, Dorothy Richardson, and Winifred Holtby. It overturns the assumption that illness is a simple obstacle to creativity and instead argues that it is a subject of careful thought and cultural significance.
The Deed is Everything: Nietzsche on Will and Action
by Aaron RidleyNietzsche is often held to be an extreme sceptic about human agency, keen to debunk it along every dimension. He dismisses the ideas of freedom, autonomy and morality, we are told, and even the very existence of agents or selves. This book sets out the opposite view. Ridley argues that Nietzsche is committed to an 'expressivist' conception of agency, a conception that allows him to develop highly distinctive accounts not only of freedom, autonomy and morality, but also of selfhood. In the course of the argument, the text revisits a variety of central Nietzschean themes including self-creation, the sovereign individual, will to power, Kantian and Christian morality, and amor fati often to unexpected effect. The Nietzsche who emerges from this book has a clear, if demanding, conception of human agency and a robust commitment to the value of human excellence in all of its forms. This comprehensive study of Nietzsche and the expressivist conception of agency is important reading for all Nietzsche scholars and philosophers of action, but is also of more general interest to academics and students in philosophy.
The Deed is Everything: Nietzsche on Will and Action
by Aaron RidleyNietzsche is often held to be an extreme sceptic about human agency, keen to debunk it along every dimension. He dismisses the ideas of freedom, autonomy and morality, we are told, and even the very existence of agents or selves. This book sets out the opposite view. Ridley argues that Nietzsche is committed to an 'expressivist' conception of agency, a conception that allows him to develop highly distinctive accounts not only of freedom, autonomy and morality, but also of selfhood. In the course of the argument, the text revisits a variety of central Nietzschean themes including self-creation, the sovereign individual, will to power, Kantian and Christian morality, and amor fati often to unexpected effect. The Nietzsche who emerges from this book has a clear, if demanding, conception of human agency and a robust commitment to the value of human excellence in all of its forms. This comprehensive study of Nietzsche and the expressivist conception of agency is important reading for all Nietzsche scholars and philosophers of action, but is also of more general interest to academics and students in philosophy.
The Donatist Church in an Apocalyptic Age (Oxford Early Christian Studies)
by Jesse A. HooverThe Donatist Church in an Apocalyptic Age examines an apocalypse that never happened, seen through the eyes of a dissident church that no longer exists. Jesse A. Hoover considers Donatists, members of an ecclesiastical communion that for a brief moment formed the majority church in Roman North Africa—modern Tunisia, Algeria, and Libya—before fading away sometime between the fifth and seventh centuries. Hoover studies how Donatists perceived the end of the world to offer a glimpse into the inner life of the dissident communion: what it valued, whom it feared, and how it defined its place in history while on the cusp of history's end. By recovering these appeals to apocalyptic themes in surviving Donatist writings, this study uncovers a significant element within the dissident movement's self-perception that has so far gone unexamined. In contrast to previous assessments, it argues that such eschatological expectations are not out of sync with the wider world of Latin Christianity in late antiquity, and that they functioned as an effective polemical strategy designed to counter their opponents' claim to be the true church in North Africa.
The Donatist Church in an Apocalyptic Age (Oxford Early Christian Studies)
by Jesse A. HooverThe Donatist Church in an Apocalyptic Age examines an apocalypse that never happened, seen through the eyes of a dissident church that no longer exists. Jesse A. Hoover considers Donatists, members of an ecclesiastical communion that for a brief moment formed the majority church in Roman North Africa—modern Tunisia, Algeria, and Libya—before fading away sometime between the fifth and seventh centuries. Hoover studies how Donatists perceived the end of the world to offer a glimpse into the inner life of the dissident communion: what it valued, whom it feared, and how it defined its place in history while on the cusp of history's end. By recovering these appeals to apocalyptic themes in surviving Donatist writings, this study uncovers a significant element within the dissident movement's self-perception that has so far gone unexamined. In contrast to previous assessments, it argues that such eschatological expectations are not out of sync with the wider world of Latin Christianity in late antiquity, and that they functioned as an effective polemical strategy designed to counter their opponents' claim to be the true church in North Africa.
The Minor Prophets as Christian Scripture in the Commentaries of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Cyril of Alexandria (Oxford Early Christian Studies)
by Hauna T. OndreyThis work compares the Minor Prophets commentaries of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Cyril of Alexandria, isolating the role each interpreter assigns the Twelve Prophets in their ministry to Old Testament Israel and the texts of the Twelve as Christian scripture. Hauna T. Ondrey argues that Theodore does acknowledge christological prophecies, as distinct from both retrospective accommodation and typology. A careful reading of Cyril's Commentary on the Twelve limits the prospective christological revelation he ascribes to the prophets and reveals the positive role he grants the Mosaic law prior to Christ's advent. Exploring secondly the Christian significance Theodore and Cyril assign to Israel's exile and restoration reveals that Theodore's reading of the Twelve Prophets, while not attempting to be christocentric, is nevertheless self-consciously Christian. Cyril, unsurprisingly, offers a robust Christian reading of the Twelve, yet this too must be expanded by his focus on the church and concern to equip the church through the ethical paideusis provided by the plain sense of the prophetic text. Revised descriptions of each interpreter lead to the claim that a recent tendency to distinguish the Old Testament interpretation of Theodore (negatively) and Cyril (positively) on the basis of their "christocentrism" obscures more than it clarifies and polarizes no less than earlier accounts of Antiochene/Alexandrian exegesis. The conclusion argues against replacing old dichotomies with new and advocates rather for an approach that takes seriously Theodore's positive account of the unity and telos of the divine economy and the full range of Cyril's interpretation.
The Minor Prophets as Christian Scripture in the Commentaries of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Cyril of Alexandria (Oxford Early Christian Studies)
by Hauna T. OndreyThis work compares the Minor Prophets commentaries of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Cyril of Alexandria, isolating the role each interpreter assigns the Twelve Prophets in their ministry to Old Testament Israel and the texts of the Twelve as Christian scripture. Hauna T. Ondrey argues that Theodore does acknowledge christological prophecies, as distinct from both retrospective accommodation and typology. A careful reading of Cyril's Commentary on the Twelve limits the prospective christological revelation he ascribes to the prophets and reveals the positive role he grants the Mosaic law prior to Christ's advent. Exploring secondly the Christian significance Theodore and Cyril assign to Israel's exile and restoration reveals that Theodore's reading of the Twelve Prophets, while not attempting to be christocentric, is nevertheless self-consciously Christian. Cyril, unsurprisingly, offers a robust Christian reading of the Twelve, yet this too must be expanded by his focus on the church and concern to equip the church through the ethical paideusis provided by the plain sense of the prophetic text. Revised descriptions of each interpreter lead to the claim that a recent tendency to distinguish the Old Testament interpretation of Theodore (negatively) and Cyril (positively) on the basis of their "christocentrism" obscures more than it clarifies and polarizes no less than earlier accounts of Antiochene/Alexandrian exegesis. The conclusion argues against replacing old dichotomies with new and advocates rather for an approach that takes seriously Theodore's positive account of the unity and telos of the divine economy and the full range of Cyril's interpretation.
Hellenistic Philosophy
by John SellarsThe Hellenistic period was a rich and exciting time for philosophy. It saw the birth of two new schools of thought, Epicureanism and Stoicism, and important developments in Plato's Academy. Aristotelians and Cynics were also active during the period, all of which created a vibrant philosophical landscape. Many of the ideas now associated with early modern and enlightenment philosophy - such as empiricism, materialism, and religious scepticism - were widely discussed by Hellenistic philosophers. In Hellenistic Philosophy, Sellars offers a thematic introduction to the philosophy of this era. The author highlights the very practical outlook common of the time, in which philosophy was seen as a guide for life, and summarizes the key debates on a series of topics, ranging from epistemology to political philosophy. The works of Hellenistic philosophers had a vital influence on later thought, and especially on the development of early modern philosophy. In providing an accessible outline of this important era, the book is of particular use to students and general readers interested in the period. It is also an invaluable resource for teaching with its guide to Hellenistic philosophers, chronology, and extensive cross-references to standard collections of ancient texts.
The Seigneurial Transformation: Power Structures and Political Communication in the Countryside of Central and Northern Italy, 1080-1130 (Oxford Studies in Medieval European History)
by Alessio FioreIn The Seigneurial Transformation, Alessio Fiore discusses the transformation of the fabric of power in the kingdom of Italy in the period between the late eleventh century and the early twelfth century. The study analyses the major socio-political change of this period, the crisis of royal and public structures, and the development of seigneurial powers, using as a starting point the structures of power over men and land, and the discourses about the exercise of local power. This period was marked by a rapid reshaping of the structures of local power; while the outbreak of civil wars in the 1080s did not imply a clear-cut rupture with the past, it led to a staggering acceleration of pre-existing dynamics, with a reconfiguration of the matrix of power, in turn expressed in a transformation both of the instruments of local political communications and of the practices of power.
The Seigneurial Transformation: Power Structures and Political Communication in the Countryside of Central and Northern Italy, 1080-1130 (Oxford Studies in Medieval European History)
by Alessio FioreIn The Seigneurial Transformation, Alessio Fiore discusses the transformation of the fabric of power in the kingdom of Italy in the period between the late eleventh century and the early twelfth century. The study analyses the major socio-political change of this period, the crisis of royal and public structures, and the development of seigneurial powers, using as a starting point the structures of power over men and land, and the discourses about the exercise of local power. This period was marked by a rapid reshaping of the structures of local power; while the outbreak of civil wars in the 1080s did not imply a clear-cut rupture with the past, it led to a staggering acceleration of pre-existing dynamics, with a reconfiguration of the matrix of power, in turn expressed in a transformation both of the instruments of local political communications and of the practices of power.
The Oxford History of the French Revolution
by William DoyleSince its first publication to mark the bicentenary of the French Revolution in 1989, this Oxford History has established itself as the Revolution's most authoritative and comprehensive one-volume history in English, and has recently been translated into Chinese. Running from the accession of Louis XVI in 1774, it traces the history of France through revolution, terror, and counter-revolution to the final triumph of Napoleon in 1802. It also analyses the impact of events in France upon the rest of Europe and the world beyond. The study shows how a movement which began with optimism and general enthusiasm soon became a tragedy, not only for the ruling orders, but also for the millions of ordinary people whose lives were disrupted by religious upheaval, economic chaos, and civil and international war. Now in its third edition, this volume has been fully updated in the light of current research, and includes an appendix surveying the past and present historiography of the revolutionary period.
The Oxford History of the French Revolution
by William DoyleSince its first publication to mark the bicentenary of the French Revolution in 1989, this Oxford History has established itself as the Revolution's most authoritative and comprehensive one-volume history in English, and has recently been translated into Chinese. Running from the accession of Louis XVI in 1774, it traces the history of France through revolution, terror, and counter-revolution to the final triumph of Napoleon in 1802. It also analyses the impact of events in France upon the rest of Europe and the world beyond. The study shows how a movement which began with optimism and general enthusiasm soon became a tragedy, not only for the ruling orders, but also for the millions of ordinary people whose lives were disrupted by religious upheaval, economic chaos, and civil and international war. Now in its third edition, this volume has been fully updated in the light of current research, and includes an appendix surveying the past and present historiography of the revolutionary period.
Alexander the Great from Britain to Southeast Asia: Peripheral Empires in the Global Renaissance (Classical Presences)
by Su Fang NgNo figure has had a more global impact than Alexander the Great, whose legends have encircled the globe and been translated into a dizzying multitude of languages, from Indo-European and Semitic to Turkic and Austronesian. Alexander the Great from Britain to Southeast Asia examines parallel traditions of the Alexander Romance in Britain and Southeast Asia, demonstrating how rival Alexanders - one Christian, the other Islamic - became central figures in their respective literatures. In the early modern age of exploration, both Britain and Southeast Asia turned to literary imitations of Alexander to imagine their own empires and international relations, defining themselves as peripheries against the Ottoman Empire's imperial center: this shared classical inheritance became part of an intensifying cross-cultural engagement in the encounter between the two, allowing a revealing examination of their cultural convergences and imperial rivalries and a remapping of the global literary networks of the early modern world. Rather than absolute alterity or strangeness, the narrative of these parallel traditions is one of contact - familiarity and proximity, unexpected affinity and intimate strangers.
Alexander the Great from Britain to Southeast Asia: Peripheral Empires in the Global Renaissance (Classical Presences)
by Su Fang NgNo figure has had a more global impact than Alexander the Great, whose legends have encircled the globe and been translated into a dizzying multitude of languages, from Indo-European and Semitic to Turkic and Austronesian. Alexander the Great from Britain to Southeast Asia examines parallel traditions of the Alexander Romance in Britain and Southeast Asia, demonstrating how rival Alexanders - one Christian, the other Islamic - became central figures in their respective literatures. In the early modern age of exploration, both Britain and Southeast Asia turned to literary imitations of Alexander to imagine their own empires and international relations, defining themselves as peripheries against the Ottoman Empire's imperial center: this shared classical inheritance became part of an intensifying cross-cultural engagement in the encounter between the two, allowing a revealing examination of their cultural convergences and imperial rivalries and a remapping of the global literary networks of the early modern world. Rather than absolute alterity or strangeness, the narrative of these parallel traditions is one of contact - familiarity and proximity, unexpected affinity and intimate strangers.
World Medievalism: The Middle Ages in Modern Textual Culture (Oxford Textual Perspectives)
by Louise D'ArcensWorld Medievalism: The Middle Ages in Modern Textual Culture explores the ways in which a range of modern textual cultures have continued to engage creatively with the medieval past in order to come to terms with the global present. Building its argument through four case studies—from the Middle East, France, Southeast Asia, and Indigenous Australia—it shows that to understand medievalism as a cultural idiom with global reach, we need to develop a more nuanced grasp of the different ways 'the Middle Ages' have come to signify beyond Europe as well as within a Europe that has been transformed by multiculturalism and the global economy. The book's case studies are explored within a conceptual framework in which medievalism itself is formulated as 'world-disclosing' a transhistorical encounter that enables the modern subject to apprehend the past 'world' opened up in medieval and medievalist texts and objects. The book analyses the cultural and material conditions under which its texts are produced, disseminated, and received, and examines literature alongside films, television programs, newspapers and journals, political tracts, as well as such material and artefactual texts as photographs, paintings, statues, buildings, rock art, and fossils. While the case studies feature distinctive localised forms of medievalism, taken together they reveal how imperial and global legacies have ensured that the medieval period continues to be perceived as a commonly held past that can be retrieved, reclaimed, or revived in response to the accelerated changes and uncertainties of global modernity.
Movable Types: Roving Creative Printers of the Victorian World
by David FinkelsteinThis is a study of international print networks developed across the English-speaking world over a significant part of the long nineteenth century. The first study of its kind, it draws on unique sources from Australasia, North America, South Africa, the British Isles, and Ireland, to explore how printers interacted and shared trade and cultural identities across international boundaries during the period 1830-1914. Morality, mobility, mobilisation, and solidarity were central to how compositors and print trade workers defined themselves during this period. These themes are addressed in case studies on roving printers, striking printers, and creative printers. The case studies explore the cultural values and trade skills transmitted and embedded by such actors, the global networks that enabled print workers to travel across continents in search of work and experience, the trade actions reliant on mobilization and information-sharing across the printing world, and the creative ideas that printers shared through such means as memoirs, poetry, prose, and trade news contributions to print trade journals and other public outlets.
Movable Types: Roving Creative Printers of the Victorian World
by David FinkelsteinThis is a study of international print networks developed across the English-speaking world over a significant part of the long nineteenth century. The first study of its kind, it draws on unique sources from Australasia, North America, South Africa, the British Isles, and Ireland, to explore how printers interacted and shared trade and cultural identities across international boundaries during the period 1830-1914. Morality, mobility, mobilisation, and solidarity were central to how compositors and print trade workers defined themselves during this period. These themes are addressed in case studies on roving printers, striking printers, and creative printers. The case studies explore the cultural values and trade skills transmitted and embedded by such actors, the global networks that enabled print workers to travel across continents in search of work and experience, the trade actions reliant on mobilization and information-sharing across the printing world, and the creative ideas that printers shared through such means as memoirs, poetry, prose, and trade news contributions to print trade journals and other public outlets.
Censorship and the Representation of the Sacred in Nineteenth-Century England
by Jan-Melissa SchrammThroughout the nineteenth century, the performance of sacred drama on the English public stage was prohibited by law and custom left over from the Reformation: successive Examiners of Plays, under the control of the Lord Chamberlain's Office, censored and suppressed both devotional and blasphemous plays alike. Whilst the Biblical sublime found expression in the visual arts, the epic, and the oratorio, nineteenth-century spoken drama remained secular by force of precedent and law. The maintenance of this ban was underpinned by Protestant anxieties about bodily performance, impersonation, and the power of the image that persisted long after the Reformation, and that were in fact bolstered by the return of Catholicism to public prominence after the passage of the Catholic Relief Act in 1829 and the restoration of the Catholic Archbishoprics in 1850. But even as anti-Catholic prejudice at mid-century reached new heights, the turn towards medievalism in the visual arts, antiquarianism in literary history, and the 'popular' in constitutional reform placed England's pre- Reformation past at the centre of debates about the uses of the public stage and the functions of a truly national drama. This book explores the recovery of the texts of the extant mystery-play cycles undertaken by antiquarians in the early nineteenth century and the eventual return of sacred drama to English public theatres at the start of the twentieth century. Consequently, law, literature, politics, and theatre history are brought into conversation with one another in order to illuminate the history of sacred drama and Protestant ant-theatricalism in England in the long nineteenth-century.
Censorship and the Representation of the Sacred in Nineteenth-Century England
by Jan-Melissa SchrammThroughout the nineteenth century, the performance of sacred drama on the English public stage was prohibited by law and custom left over from the Reformation: successive Examiners of Plays, under the control of the Lord Chamberlain's Office, censored and suppressed both devotional and blasphemous plays alike. Whilst the Biblical sublime found expression in the visual arts, the epic, and the oratorio, nineteenth-century spoken drama remained secular by force of precedent and law. The maintenance of this ban was underpinned by Protestant anxieties about bodily performance, impersonation, and the power of the image that persisted long after the Reformation, and that were in fact bolstered by the return of Catholicism to public prominence after the passage of the Catholic Relief Act in 1829 and the restoration of the Catholic Archbishoprics in 1850. But even as anti-Catholic prejudice at mid-century reached new heights, the turn towards medievalism in the visual arts, antiquarianism in literary history, and the 'popular' in constitutional reform placed England's pre- Reformation past at the centre of debates about the uses of the public stage and the functions of a truly national drama. This book explores the recovery of the texts of the extant mystery-play cycles undertaken by antiquarians in the early nineteenth century and the eventual return of sacred drama to English public theatres at the start of the twentieth century. Consequently, law, literature, politics, and theatre history are brought into conversation with one another in order to illuminate the history of sacred drama and Protestant ant-theatricalism in England in the long nineteenth-century.
Women of Substance in Homeric Epic: Objects, Gender, Agency
by Lilah Grace CanevaroWomen in Greek epic are treated as objects, as commodities to be exchanged in marriage or as the spoils of warfare. However, women in Homeric epic also use objects to negotiate their own agency, subverting the male viewpoint by utilizing on their own terms the very form they themselves are thought by men to embody. Such female objects can transcend their physical limitations and be both symbolically significant and powerfully characterizing. They can be tools of recognition and identification. They can pause narrative and be used agonistically. They can send messages and be vessels for memory. Women of Substance in Homeric Epic offers a new and insightful approach to the Iliad and Odyssey, bringing together Gender Theory and the burgeoning field of New Materialisms, new to classical studies, and thereby combining an approach predicated on the idea of the woman as object with one which questions the very distinction between subject and object. This productive tension leads us to decentre the male subject and to put centre stage not only the woman as object but also the agency of women and objects. The volume comes at a turning point in the gendering of Homeric studies, with the publication of the first English translations by women of the Iliad in 2015 and the Odyssey in 2017, by Caroline Alexander and Emily Wilson respectively. It makes a significant contribution to scholarship by demonstrating that women in Homeric epic are not only objectified, but are also well-versed users of objects; this is something that Homer portrays clearly, that Odysseus understands, but that has often escaped many other men, from Odysseus' alter ego Aethon in Odyssey 19 to modern experts on Homeric epic.
Women of Substance in Homeric Epic: Objects, Gender, Agency
by Lilah Grace CanevaroWomen in Greek epic are treated as objects, as commodities to be exchanged in marriage or as the spoils of warfare. However, women in Homeric epic also use objects to negotiate their own agency, subverting the male viewpoint by utilizing on their own terms the very form they themselves are thought by men to embody. Such female objects can transcend their physical limitations and be both symbolically significant and powerfully characterizing. They can be tools of recognition and identification. They can pause narrative and be used agonistically. They can send messages and be vessels for memory. Women of Substance in Homeric Epic offers a new and insightful approach to the Iliad and Odyssey, bringing together Gender Theory and the burgeoning field of New Materialisms, new to classical studies, and thereby combining an approach predicated on the idea of the woman as object with one which questions the very distinction between subject and object. This productive tension leads us to decentre the male subject and to put centre stage not only the woman as object but also the agency of women and objects. The volume comes at a turning point in the gendering of Homeric studies, with the publication of the first English translations by women of the Iliad in 2015 and the Odyssey in 2017, by Caroline Alexander and Emily Wilson respectively. It makes a significant contribution to scholarship by demonstrating that women in Homeric epic are not only objectified, but are also well-versed users of objects; this is something that Homer portrays clearly, that Odysseus understands, but that has often escaped many other men, from Odysseus' alter ego Aethon in Odyssey 19 to modern experts on Homeric epic.
Dignified Retreat: Writers and Intellectuals in the Age of Richelieu
by Robert A. SchneiderDignified Retreat is a panoramic study of the vibrant literary and intellectual culture that emerged in early seventeenth-century France following the devastating Wars of Religion. This was a period that not only witnessed the recovery of the country following these wars, and the emergence of a strong, 'absolutist' monarchy under the Bourbons, but also the rise and refinement of the French language and the development of a literary culture that would soon be known as French classicism. Casting his net over a wide range of writers and intellectuals, Robert A. Schneider has assembled a roster of more than 100 men and women of letters, those constituting what he calls the 'generation of 1630'. While diverse, and indeed divided between those who hewed to traditional humanism and others more attuned to 'modern' linguistic and literary developments, this cohort largely shared a commitment to a cultural renewal of France, its rise to prominence in the geopolitical arena of Europe, and the emergence of a strong centralized monarchy. They depended on both the traditional aristocracy and the king's powerful minister, Cardinal Richelieu. But despite this dependency, these writers and intellectuals maintained a degree of independence and, more significantly, were the prime movers in crucial cultural developments that are too often identified with royal initiatives. For example, the author demonstrates that the Académie française, founded in 1635 by Richelieu, often considered formative in French cultural history, was actually more the result of the creative initiatives of these men of letters, which the savvy Cardinal only managed to co-opt and turn to the purposes of the crown.
Dignified Retreat: Writers and Intellectuals in the Age of Richelieu
by Robert A. SchneiderDignified Retreat is a panoramic study of the vibrant literary and intellectual culture that emerged in early seventeenth-century France following the devastating Wars of Religion. This was a period that not only witnessed the recovery of the country following these wars, and the emergence of a strong, 'absolutist' monarchy under the Bourbons, but also the rise and refinement of the French language and the development of a literary culture that would soon be known as French classicism. Casting his net over a wide range of writers and intellectuals, Robert A. Schneider has assembled a roster of more than 100 men and women of letters, those constituting what he calls the 'generation of 1630'. While diverse, and indeed divided between those who hewed to traditional humanism and others more attuned to 'modern' linguistic and literary developments, this cohort largely shared a commitment to a cultural renewal of France, its rise to prominence in the geopolitical arena of Europe, and the emergence of a strong centralized monarchy. They depended on both the traditional aristocracy and the king's powerful minister, Cardinal Richelieu. But despite this dependency, these writers and intellectuals maintained a degree of independence and, more significantly, were the prime movers in crucial cultural developments that are too often identified with royal initiatives. For example, the author demonstrates that the Académie française, founded in 1635 by Richelieu, often considered formative in French cultural history, was actually more the result of the creative initiatives of these men of letters, which the savvy Cardinal only managed to co-opt and turn to the purposes of the crown.
Dynastic Politics and the British Reformations, 1558-1630
by Michael QuestierDynastic Politics and the British Reformations, 1558-1630 revisits what used to be regarded as an entirely 'mainstream' topic in the historiography of the later sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries - namely, the link between royal dynastic politics and the outcome of the process usually referred to as 'the Reformation'. As everyone knows, the principal mode of transacting so much of what constituted public political activity in the early modern period, and especially of securing something like political obedience if not exactly stability, was through the often distinctly un-modern management of the crown's dynastic rights, via the line of royal succession and in particular through matching into other royal and princely families. Dynastically, the states of Europe resembled a vast sexual chess board on which the trick was to preserve, advance, and then match (to advantage) one's own most powerful pieces. This process and practice were, obviously, not unique to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But the changes in religion generated by the discontents of western Christendom in the Reformation period made dynastic politics ideologically fraught in a way which had not been the case previously, in that certain modes of religious thought were now taken to reflect on, critique, and hinder this mode of exercising monarchical authority, sometimes even to the extent of defining who had the right to be king or queen.