Writing and society : literacy, print, and politics in Britain, 1590-1660 / Nigel Wheale.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Wheale, Nigel.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

English literature--Early modern, 1500-1700--History and criticism.

English literature.

Politics and literature--Great Britain--History--17th century.

Politics and literature.

Publishers and publishing--Great Britain--History--17th century.

Publishers and publishing.

Literature and society--Great Britain--History--17th century.

Literature and society.

Written communication--Great Britain--History--17th century.

Written communication.

Literacy--Great Britain--History--17th century.

Literacy.

Printing--Great Britain--History--17th century.

Printing.

Great Britain--Politics and government--1603-1714.

Great Britain.

Great Britain--Intellectual life--17th century.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (211 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

London ; New York : Routledge, 1999.

Summary:

Writing and Society is a stunning exploration of the relationship between the growth in popular literacy and the development of new readerships and the authors addressing them. It is the first single volume to provide a year-by-year chronology of political events in relation to cultural production.This overview of debates in literary critical theory and historiography includes facsimile pages with commentary from the most influential books of the period. The author describes and analyses:* the development of literacy by status, gender and region in Britain* structures of p

Contents:

WRITING AND SOCIETY Literacy, print and politics in Britain 1590-1660; Copyright; Contents; List of figures; Acknowledgements; 1 'Paper I make my Friend and mind's true Glass': early modern literacy; Christopher Marlowe's new sin; Debating early modern literary culture; 'Vale,soror, anima mea': reading the moment of writing; 2 Status and literacy: the qualities of people; From 'degree' to 'political arithmetic': mapping social hierarchy; The titled nobility: 'the Theatre of Hospitality'; The gentry: 'to be idle, and live upon the sweat of others'

The professions and major trades: 'minds...more thoughtful and full of business 'Yeamen: 'they that in times past made all France afraid'; Craftsmen, tradesmen, copyholders: 'Of the fourth sort of men which do not rule'; Apprentices and servants: 'Seeking service and place'; Husbandmen, cottagers, labourers, vagrants: literacy at the margins of survival; 3 'Towardness': aptitude, gender and rank in early modern education Scripture for the boy who drives the plough; Scripture for the boy who drives the plough; From absey to grammar school

'Education is the bringing up of one, not to live alone, but amongst others, because company is our natural cognisance' 4 'Mechanics in the Suburbs of Literature': printing and publishing 1590-1660; Printing in renaissance London; The Worshipful Company of Stationers; 'Assignable productions of the brain': authorship and copyright; 'Only for you, only to you': patronage, dedications, payment; 'Let not one Brother oppress another. Do as you would be done unto': printing from revolution to Restoration; 5 Censorship and state formation: heresy, sedition and the Celtic literary cultures

'Peace, plenty, love, truth, terror': defining early modern censorship The Stationers' Company, overseer of the intellectual economy; 'Ireland is but swordland': literary patronage, censorship and persecution in the Celtic cultures; 6 'Penny merriments, penny godlinesses': new writing for new readers; Literacy and social change: 'More solid Things do not shew the complexion of the Times so well as Ballads and Libels'; 'To any Reader He or She, It makes no matter what they be': John Taylor the Water Poet; The Praise of Hemp Seed: Taylor's inversion of all values

The hydro-poet, sculler-scholar between cultures 7 'Dressed up with the flowers of a Library': women reading and writing; Mistress Hazzard's revelation; Going astray among the Elizabethans: critical problems in early modern female literacy; Gendered behaviour in early modern society: conventions and realities; 'How careful must you be, To be Your Self': Lady Anne Clifford's Great Picture; 8 'The power of self at such over-flowing times': the politics of literacy; 'I never read it in any book, nor received it from any mouth': writing and revolt 1450-1650; 'Mob' (1691): The common mass of people

the lower orders

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

1-134-88666-7

1-280-13826-2

1-134-88665-9

9786610138265

0-203-98258-4

9780203982587

OCLC:

252967468