Poetry and Allegiance in the English Civil Wars
Marvell and the Cause of Wit
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Oxford University Press
Published:20th Nov '08
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
This book is about the things which could unite, rather than divide, poets during the English Civil Wars: friendship, patronage relations, literary admiration, and anti-clericalism. The central figure is Andrew Marvell, renowned for his 'ambivalent' allegiance in the late 1640s. Little is known about Marvell's associations in this period, when many of his best-known lyrics were composed. The London literary circle which formed in 1647 under the patronage of the wealthy royalist Thomas Stanley included 'Cavalier' friends of Marvell such as Richard Lovelace but also John Hall, a Parliamentarian propagandist inspired by reading Milton. Marvell is placed in the context of Stanley's impressive circle of friends and their efforts to develop English lyric capability in the absence of traditional court patronage. By recovering the cultural values that were shared by Marvell and the like-minded men with whom he moved in the literary circles of post-war London, we are more likely to find the reasons for their decisions about political allegiance. By focusing on a circle of friends and associates we can also get a sense of how they communicated with and influenced one another through their verse. There are innovative readings of Milton's sonnets and Lovelace's lyric verse, while new light is shed on the origins and audience not only of Marvell's early political poems, including the 'Horatian Ode', but lyrics such as 'To His Coy Mistress'.
an excitingly speculative book about the links between poetry and politics in the seventeenth century * Neil Forsyth, Times Literary Supplement *
tells us much about the intellectual and social world in which Marvell moved... [McDowell's] imaginative reconstruction of the literary life of revolutionary England adds a profoundly important dimension to our understanding of the cultural politics of the 1640s. To read this book is to see that decade from within, to live with its poets, and to hear them sing. * Matthew Adams, The Review of English Studies *
Nicholas McDowell's carefully researched book...adds a great deal to our emerging sense of the complexity of political, social and cultural identity during the 1640s [and] reveals a matrix of allusion, sociability, allegiance and engagement within which our understanding of the multiplicities of Marvell's poetry can be reformulated. * Jerome de Groot, Times Higher Education Supplement *
McDowell's work, through exemplary research and solid conjecture... revitalizes the contextual resources of Marvell scholarship. * Modern Language Review, 105. 2 *
McDowell's methodology is certainly unique [and] succeeds comprehensively in enriching and complicating the age-old debate about Marvell's political and literary loyalties. The book is a significant contribution to the field which all subsequent investigations of Marvell's historical situation will have to contend with. * Noam Reisner, Year's Work in English Studies 89, 1 *
ISBN: 9780199278008
Dimensions: 241mm x 162mm x 24mm
Weight: 635g
306 pages