Formal matters

The essays in this collection explore the intersection between literary and material forms of writing in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England by linking formalist analysis with the insights of book history.

The essays in this collection explore the intersection between literary and material forms of writing in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England by linking formalist analysis with the insights of book history.

How do the formal properties of early modern texts, together with the materials that envelop and shape them, relate to the cultural, political, and social world of their production? Formal matters: Reading the materials of English Renaissance literature answers this question by linking formalist analysis with the insights of book history. It thus represents the new English Renaissance literary historiography tying literary composition to the materials and material practices of writing.The book combines studies of familiar and lesser known texts, from the poems and plays of Shakespeare to jests and printed commonplace books. Its ten studies make important, original contributions to research on the genres of early modern literature, focusing on the involvement of literary forms in the scribal and print cultures of compilation, continuation, translation, and correspondence, as well as in matters of political republicanism and popular piety, among others. Taken together, the collection’s essays exemplify how an attention to form and matter can historicise writing without abandoning a literary focus.

Introduction: Allison Deutermann and András KiséryI. Forming Literature1. The first English printed commonplace books and the rise of the common reader – Heather James2. Reading Shakespeare miscellaneously: Ben Jonson, Robert Chester, and the Vatum Chorus of Love’s Martyr – Matthew Zarnowiecki3. ‘Divines into dry Vines’: forms of jesting in Renaissance England – Adam Smyth4. Afterworlds: Thomas Middleton, the book, and the genre of continuation – Jeffrey Todd KnightII. Translations5. Greek playbooks and dramatic forms in early modern England – Tanya Pollard6. Book, list, word: forms of translation in the work of Richard Hakluyt – Henry S. TurnerIII. The matters of writing7. The forms of news from France in Shakespeare’s Henry VI, part three – Alan Stewart8. Writings and the problem of satisfaction in Michaelmas Term – Amanda Bailey9. Saving souls or selling (virtual) godliness? The ‘penny godlinesses’ of John Andrewes and the problem of ‘popular puritanism’ in early Stuart England – Peter Lake10. How to construct a poem: Descartes, Sidney – Shankar Raman11. Afterword – David Scott KastanIndex