Anonymity in Early Modern England: 'What's In A Name?' (Annals of English Drama)
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.50 (595 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0754669491 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 198 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2013-03-23 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
Elizabethan Authors Were Often Anonymous Dr. Richard M. Waugaman This intriguing and provocative book originated in a 2004 Shakespeare Society of America seminar. It joins several other recent works that are enlarging our understanding of the crucial role that anonymous authorship played in early modern England. The implications for the Shakespeare authorship question are immense. Orthodox Stratfordian scholars have such unshakeable preconceptions that they often seem blind to the subversive implications of their own discoveries. Most early modern English literature was anonymous, but scholars have nevert
The collection then turns to consider more abstract consequences of anonymity: its function in destabilizing scholarly assumptions about authorship, its ethical ramifications, and its relationship to attribution studies.. Expanding the scholarly conversation about anonymity in Renaissance England, this essay collection explores the phenomenon in all its variety of methods and genres as well as its complex relationship with its alter ego, attribution studies. Contributors address such questions as these: What were the consequences of publishing and reading anonymous texts for Renaissance writers and readers? What cultural constraints and subject positions made anonymous publication in print or manuscript a strategic choice? What are the possible responses to Renaissance anonymity in contemporary classrooms and scholarly debate? The volume opens with essays investigating particular texts-poetry, plays, and pamphlets-and the inflection each genre gives to the issue of anonymity
'It is true that anonymous works receive less attention than those works that can be attributed to a canonical author, and this collection succeeds in suggesting ways in which carefully selected anonymous works may be usefully approached thematically and historically, and as specific genres.' Renaissance Quarterly 'Anonymity in Early Modern England makes an important contribution to early modern studies, precisely because it addresses what many scholars have traditionally avoided. Anonymity is a form of authorship in its own right.' Sixteenth Century Journal . Anonymity is not an unfortunate condition for a book, pamphlet, or manuscript, nor is it merely a pragmatic device by which the author wishes to avoid arrest. The book argues persuasively that anonymity is an es
Janet Wright Starner is associate professor of English at Wilkes University, USA Barbara Howard Traister is professor of English at Lehigh University, USA