Miserere mei : the penitential Psalms in late medieval and early modern England / Clare Costley King'oo.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

King'oo, Clare Costley.

Contributor:

Class of 1891 Department of Arts Fund.

Horace Howard Furness Memorial Library (University of Pennsylvania)

Series:

Reformations

Reformations: medieval and early modern

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Penitential Psalms--Criticism, interpretation, etc--History.

Penitential Psalms.

History.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

History.

Penn Provenance:

King'oo, Clare Costley (donor) (inscription) (Furness copy)

Pollack, John H. (inscription) (Furness copy)

Physical Description:

xix, 283 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

Notre Dame, Ind. : University of Notre Dame Press, 2012.

Summary:

In Miserere Mei, Clare Costley King'oo examines the critical importance of the Penitential Psalms in England between the end of the fourteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century. During this period, the Penitential Psalms inspired an enormous amount of creative and intellectual work: in addition to being copied and illustrated in Books of Hours and other prayer books, they were expounded in commentaries, imitated in vernacular translations and paraphrases, rendered into lyric poetry, and even modified for singing. Miserere Mei explores these numerous transformations in materiality and genre. Combining the resources of close literary analysis with those of the history of the book, it reveals not only that the Penitential Psalms lay at the heart of Reformation-age debates over the nature of repentance, but also, and more significantly, that they constituted a site of theological, political, artistic, and poetic engagementacross the many polarities that are often said to separate late medieval from early modern culture. Miserere Mei features twenty-five illustrations and provides new analyses of works based on the Penitential Psalms by several key writers of the time, including Richard Maidstone, Thomas Brampton, John Fisher, Martin Luther, Sir Thomas Wyatt, George Gascoigne, Sir John Harington, and Richard Verstegan. It will be of value to anyone interested in the interpretation, adaptation, and appropriation of biblical literature; the development of religious plurality in the West; the emergence of modernity; and the periodization of Western culture. Students and scholars in the fields of literature, religion, history, art history, and the history of material texts will find Miserere Mei particularly instructive and compelling.

Contents:

Introduction: the seven Penitential Psalms. On the origins of a genre

Penitential hermeneutics

Doing penance and praying for the dead

Overview of Miserere mei

Illustrating the Penitential Psalms. King David, sinner/psalmwriter

Sexualizing sin

Adultery, catechesis, and pedagogy

The conflict over penance. Reading suffering in the Penitential Psalms

John Fisher and the economics of penance

Martin Luther's metanoia

Plotting reform. Sir Thomas Wyatt among the evangelicals

Richard Maidstone, Thomas Brampton, and John Croke: the Penitential Psalms as common property

Wyatt's paraphrase, David's conversion(s)

From penance to politics. Repentance, paranoia, and consent in Elizabeth's prayer book

John Stubbs, Theodore Beza, and the importation of Genevan exclusivity

Parody and piety. Move over, David, or, George Gascoigne's De profundis

Sir John Harington's antipenitential hermeneutics

Reappropriation in the Odes of Richard Verstegan

Afterword: a brief reflection on discipline and method.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Conference on Christianity & Literature Book of the Year Award, Winner, 2012

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Class of 1891 Department of Arts Fund.

Furness copy has postcard, from author to John Pollack, laid in.

Furness copy presented to the Penn Libraries in 2012 by author.

ISBN:

9780268033248

0268033242

OCLC:

769430631

Publisher Number:

40020965891