Lyric Wonder: Rhetoric and Wit in Renaissance English Poetry

James Biester

Published by Cornell University Press 1997

Lyric Wonder

Rhetoric and Wit in Renaissance English Poetry

James Biester

In the series Rhetoric and Society

https://doi.org/10.7591/9781501741272

Overview
Contents

About this book

James Biester sees the shift in late Elizabethan England toward a witty, rough, and obscure lyric style—metaphysical wit and strong lines—as a response to the heightened cultural prestige of wonder. That same prestige was demonstrated in the search for strange artifacts and animals to display in the wonder-cabinets of the period.

By embracing the genres of satire and epigram, poets of the Elizabethan court risked their chances for political advancement, exposing themselves to the danger of being classified either as malcontents or as jesters who lacked the gravitas required of those in power. John Donne himself recognized both the risks and benefits of adopting the'admirable'style, as Biester shows in his close readings of the First and Fourth Satyres.

Why did courtier-poets adopt such a dangerous form of self-representation? The answer, Biester maintains, lies in an extraordinary confluence of developments in both poetics and the interpenetrating spheres of the culture at large, which made the pursuit of wonder through style unusually attractive, even necessary. In a postfeudal but still aristocratic culture, he says, the ability to astound through language performed the validating function that was once supplied by the ability to fight. Combining the insights of the new historicism with traditional literary scholarship, Biester perceives the rise of metaphysical style as a social as well as aesthetic event.

Author / Editor information

James Biester is Associate Professor of English at Loyola University, Chicago.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Foreword Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
Note on Transcriptions and Citations Publicly Available Download PDF	xii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. Strange and Admirable Methods Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	23
2. The Most Dangerous Game: Wonder, Melancholy, 6y and Satire Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	67
3. Suspicious Boldness Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	94
4. Powerful Insinuations: Obscurity as Catalyst and Veil Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	128
5. Passing Wonder or Wonder Passing? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	155
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	201
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	221

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 240
Keywords: Literary Studies; Poetry & Criticism

eBook

Published: May 15, 2019
ISBN: 9781501741272