Literature and class : from the peasants' revolt to the French revolution. / Andrew Hadfield.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hadfield, Andrew, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social classes in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

Manchester : Manchester University Press, [2021]

System Details:

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Summary:

This book explores the intimate relationship between literature and class in England (and later Britain) from the Peasants' Revolt at the end of the fourteenth century to the impact of the French Revolution at the end of the eighteenth century and beginning of the nineteenth. The book argues throughout that class cannot be seen as a modern phenomenon that occurred after the Industrial revolution but that class divisions and relations have always structured societies and that it makes sense to assume a historical continuity. The book explores a number of themes relating to class: class consciousness; class conflict; commercialisation; servitude; rebellion; gender relations; and colonisation. After outlining the history of class relations, five chapters explore the ways in which social class consciously and unconsciously influenced a series of writers: Chaucer, Shakespeare, Behn, Rochester, Defoe, Duck, Richardson, Burney, Blake and Wordsworth.

Contents:

Front Matter

Dedication

Contents

List of figures

List of tables

Acknowledgements

Abbreviations

Introduction

1 Class in England from the late Middle Ages to the end of the eighteenth century

2 Perceptions of class in the late Middle Ages

3 Class struggle in Renaissance literature

4 The Civil War and its aftermath

5 An increasingly commercial society, 170050

6 Gathering pace

Epilogue

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-5261-2582-X

OCLC:

1262183142