Violent Masculinities

"A strong contribution to emerging scholarship on early modern masculinities, this exciting collection shows how the achievement of normative manhood depended on the performance of violence. In the turbulent social world of early modern Europe, these essays suggest male aggression signified differently according to distinctions of age, status, and sexuality. These compelling historicist readings of male aggression and suffering illuminate forms of violence ranging from duels to brawls to military campaigns." - Mario DiGangi, Professor of English, Lehman College and the Graduate Center, CUNY, USA

"What did it mean to be a man in early modern Europe? Violent Masculinities challenges the easy association between masculinity and violence, opening up crucial new channels in early modern masculinity studies. The articles here go beyond a simple equation of fictional and historical practice to demonstrate the importance of the place of violence in the early modern mind. With a range of critical approaches, from rhetorical analysis to historical contextualization to the framing of philosophical assumptions, these essays emphasize the textuality of a broad array of critical and historical writings, and give us new insights into what constituted Renaissance manhood." - Jennifer A. Low, Associate Professor of English, Florida Atlantic University, USA

"Violent masculinities - is there any other kind? Cutting their way from Shakespeare to Stukeley, the essays in this volume brutally dispense with the myth that Renaissance men were less violent than their medieval predecessors. With a historical precision and deft close reading, they ask us to consider the many types of violence that make and unmake Renaissance men." - Will Stockton, Associate Professor of English, Clemson University, USA