Lovesickness and gender in early modern English literature / Lesel Dawson.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dawson, Lesel.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

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

English literature.

Lovesickness in literature.

Melancholy in literature.

Women in literature.

Gender identity in literature.

Literature and medicine--England--History--16th century.

Literature and medicine.

Literature and medicine--England--History--17th century.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (255 p.)

Place of Publication:

Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2008.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Lesel Dawson examines figures afflicted with erotic melancholy in early modern literature and provides a historical context for their malady. She discusses how the literary representation of lovesickness relates to issues of gender and identity, making a contribution to the fields of literature, gender, and medical history.

Contents:

Contents; Acknowledgements; List of Illustrations; Introduction: Sweet Poison; 1. 'My Love is as a Fever': Medical Constructions of Desire in Early Modern England; The Physiological Construction of Lovesickness: Origins, Symptoms, and Cures; Historical Accounts of the Experience of Erotic Melancholy; The Look of Love; 2. 'A Thirsty Womb': Lovesickness, Green Sickness, Hysteria, and Uterine Fury; Green Sickness, the Disease of Virgins: 'A Gamesome Bedfellow, Being the Sure Physician'; Hysteria, or the Suffocation of the Mother; Uterine Fury; Shakespeare's Ophelia

A Tale of Two Virgins: Shakespeare and Fletcher's The Two Noble Kinsmen3. Beyond Ophelia: The Anatomy of Female Melancholy; Historical and Literary Examples of Melancholic Women; Masochism and Revenge in Beaumont and Fletcher's The Maid's Tragedy; 'Divorce Betwixt my Body and my Heart': Starvation in Ford's The Broken Heart; 4. Lovesickness and Neoplatonism; Neoplatonic Interpretations of Love and the Female Beloved; Seeing Double: Neoplatonism and Narcissism in John Ford's 'Tis Pity She's a Whore; 'New Sects of Love': William Davenant's The Temple of Love and The Platonick Lovers

5. 'Griefs Will Have their Vent': Physical and Psychological Remedies for LovesicknessPhysical Cures: Purging the Lover's Body; Psychological Cures; 6. Menstruation, Misogyny, and the Cure for Love; Bibliography; Index; A; B; C; D; E; F; G; H; I; J; K; L; M; N; O; P; R; S; T; U; V; W; Z

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [212]-236) and index.

ISBN:

9786611978617

1-281-97861-2

0-19-155609-2

OCLC:

316307306