Writing Metamorphosis in the English Renaissance
1550–1700
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Cambridge University Press
Published:21st Jan '16
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
Susan Wiseman analyses mythical and natural creatures in English Renaissance writing, including Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Tempest.
Wiseman explores the transformations of fantastic creatures including werewolves and wild children in English Renaissance writing. Analysing a variety of texts, from Shakespeare's The Tempest to court records, Writing Metamorphosis in the English Renaissance argues that the seventeenth century is marked by concentration on the potential of the human to change or be changed.Taking Ovid's Metamorphoses as its starting point, this book analyses fantastic creatures including werewolves, bear-children and dragons in English literature from the Reformation to the late seventeenth century. Susan Wiseman tracks the idea of transformation through classical, literary, sacred, physiological, folkloric and ethnographic texts. Under modern disciplinary protocols these areas of writing are kept apart, but this study shows that in the Renaissance they were woven together by shared resources, frames of knowledge and readers. Drawing on a rich collection of critical and historical studies and key philosophical texts including Descartes' Meditations, Wiseman outlines the importance of metamorphosis as a significant literary mode. Her examples range from canonical literature, including Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Tempest, to Thomas Browne on dragons, together with popular material, arguing that the seventeenth century is marked by concentration on the potential of the human, and the world, to change or be changed.
ISBN: 9781316507629
Dimensions: 230mm x 154mm x 15mm
Weight: 380g
256 pages