The poet and the antiquaries : Chaucerian scholarship and the rise of literary history, 1532-1635

Resource Information

The work The poet and the antiquaries : Chaucerian scholarship and the rise of literary history, 1532-1635 represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in University of San Diego Libraries. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

The poet and the antiquaries : Chaucerian scholarship and the rise of literary history, 1532-1635

Title remainder

Chaucerian scholarship and the rise of literary history, 1532-1635

Statement of responsibility

Megan L. Cook

Creator

• Cook, Megan L., (Megan Leigh), 1981-

Author

• Cook, Megan L., (Megan Leigh), 1981-

Subject

• Antiquarians -- England -- History -- 16th century
• Antiquarians -- England -- History -- 17th century
• Chaucer, Geoffrey, -1400
• Chaucer, Geoffrey, -1400 -- Criticism and interpretation | History
• Chaucer, Geoffrey, -1400 -- Influence
• Chaucer, Geoffrey, 1343-1400
• Civilization, Medieval, in literature
• Civilization, Medieval, in literature
• Criticism, interpretation, etc
• Edition
• England
• England
• 1500-1700
• English literature -- Early modern, 1500-1700 -- History and criticism
• Geistesleben
• History
• Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.)
• Literaturgeschichte
• Medievalism
• Medievalism -- England -- History -- 16th century
• Medievalism -- England -- History -- 17th century
• Rezeption
• Thynne, Francis, 1545-1608
• English literature -- Early modern
• Antiquarians

Genre

• History
• Criticism, interpretation, etc

Language

eng

Summary

Between 1532 and 1602, the works of Geoffrey Chaucer were published in no less than six folio editions. These were, in fact, the largest books of poetry produced in sixteenth-century England, and they significantly shaped the perceptions of Chaucer that would hold sway for centuries to come. But it is the stories behind these editions that are the focus of the author's interest in this book. She explores how antiquarians - historians, lexicographers, religious polemicists, and other readers with a professional, but not necessarily literary, interest in the English past - played an indispensable role in making Chaucer a figure of lasting literary and cultural importance. After establishing the antiquarian involvement in the publication of the folio editions, the author offers a series of case studies that discuss Chaucer and his works in relation to specific sixteenth-century discourses about the past. She turns to early accounts of Chaucer's biography to show how important they were in constructing the poet as a figure whose life and works could be known, understood, and valued by later readers. She considers the claims made about Chaucer's religious views, especially the assertions that he was a proto-Protestant, and the effects they had on shaping his canon. Looking at early modern views on Chaucerian language, she illustrates how complicated the relations between past and present forms of English were thought to be. Finally, she demonstrates the ways in which antiquarian readers applied knowledge from other areas of scholarship to their reading of Middle English texts. Linking Chaucer's exceptional standing in the poetic canon with his role as a symbol of linguistic and national identity, this book demonstrates how and why Chaucer became not only the first English author to become a subject of historical inquiry but also a crucial figure for conceptualizing the medieval in early modern England

Cataloging source

PU/DLC

Illustrations

illustrations

Index

index present

LC call number

PR1924

LC item number

.C594 2019

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

bibliography