Prayer and performance in early modern English literature : gesture, word, and devotion / edited by Joseph William Sterrett, Aarhus Universitet, Denmark.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Sterrett, Joseph, editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

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

English literature.

Religion and literature--England--History--16th century.

Religion and literature.

Religion and literature--England--History--17th century.

Religion and culture--England--History--16th century.

Religion and culture.

Religion and culture--England--History--17th century.

Prayer--England--History--16th century.

Prayer.

Prayer--England--History--17th century.

Religion in literature.

Reformation--England.

Reformation.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xii, 275 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Place of Publication:

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Summary:

Early modern England was a nation alive with intense religious debate, with often violent results. Central to these debates were questions of prayer, questions powerful enough to splinter the English church and to fuel a ferocious civil war. This collection of thirteen newly commissioned essays traces the controversy and value given to the performance of prayer, through the body, the spoken word and written text, as well as its representation on stage. Through close readings of the works of Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare, John Donne, John Milton and Henry Vaughan amongst others, this book examines the performative aspects of prayer in a range of literary modes. This broad range of study is expanded further with chapters focussing on the private religious diaries of men and women throughout the seventeenth century, and the convergence of music and prayer in the work of William Byrd.

Contents:

Cover

Half-title page

Title page

Copyright page

Contents

List of Contributors

Thanksgiving

Introduction: The Power of Performance in Prayer, Now and Then

Chapter 1 Prayer, Bodily Ritual and Performative Utterance: Bucer, Calvin and the Book of Common Prayer

Chapter 2 The Tradition of High Church Prayer in the Seventeenth Century

Chapter 3 Performed Prayer and Sixteenth-Century Non-Conformism

Chapter 4 Enter Mercury, Sleeping: Delivering Prayers on the Early Modern Stage

Chapter 5 Prayer, Performance and Community in Early Modern Drama

Chapter 6 Playing at Prayer: The Spiritual Failure of Performance in Hamlet

Chapter 7 Prayer and Musical Performance: The Verse Anthem

Chapter 8 The Protestant Diary and the Act of Prayer

Chapter 9 Prayer in Context: The Dynamics of Worship in Donne's Encænia Sermon (1623)

Chapter 10 'Your Suit is Granted': Performing Prayer in Early Modern English Poetry

Chapter 11 'The Royal Actor': King Charles I and the Performance of Prayer

Chapter 12 Vaughan's Devotional Prose as Political Act and Prayer

Chapter 13 'The Spirit of Prayer Inspired': Invocation as Prayer in Milton's Poetic Imagination

Notes

Bibliography

Index.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 26 Oct 2018).

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

1-108-69853-0

1-108-55513-6

1-108-57239-1

OCLC:

1060524944