Aemilia Lanyer: Gender, Genre, and the Canon

by Marshall Grossman (Editor)

Overview

Aemilia Lanyer was a middle-class Londoner of Jewish-Italian descent and the mistress of Queen Elizabeth's Lord Chamberlain. But she is remembered today as the first Englishwoman to publish a substantial volume of original poems (1611).

Her output is varied, subtle, provocative, and witty. The essays in this volume establish the intrinsic merit of Lanyer's poetry and use her work to interrogate that of her male contemporaries, Donne, Jonson, and Shakespeare. As a whole the collection offers a sustained discussion of the processes of canonization and the construction of literary history.

For this first booklength study of Lanyer's work, Marshall Grossman has assembled a stellar group of Renaissance scholars, including Boyd Berry, David Bevington, Leeds Barroll, Achsah Guibbory, Michael Morgan Holmes, Barbara K. Lewalski, Kari Boyd McBride, Naomi I. Miller, Janel Mueller, Karen Nelson, and Susanne Woods.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813182803
Publisher:	University Press of Kentucky
Publication date:	05/11/2021
Series:	Studies in the English Renaissance
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	288
File size:	763 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Marshall Grossman, professor of English at the University of Maryland College Park is the author of The Story of All Things: Writing the Self in English Renaissance Narrative Poetry.

Table of Contents

Introduction
A. L. Rowse's Dark Lady
Looking for Patrons
Seizing Discourses and Reinventing Genres
Sacred Celebration: The Patronage Poems
Vocation and Authority: Born to Write
The Feminist Poetics of Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum
The Gendering of Genre: Literary History and the Canon
(M)other Tongues: Maternity and Subjectivity
The Love of Other Women: Rich Chains and Sweet Kisses
The Gospel According to Aemilia: Women and the Sacred
Pardon... though I have digrest: Digression as Style in "Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum"
Annotated Bibliography: Texts and Criticism of Aemilia Bassano Lanyer

Editorial Reviews

Renaissance scholars seek to establish Lanyer (1569-1645) as a major literary figure not simply by recovering a woman's voice, but by rewriting literary history into a shape than includes her and alters how we read her male contemporaries such as Donne, Shakespeare, and Jonson. They look at who she was now that she is no longer considered Shakespeare's Dark Lady, patronage, religious language, feminist concerns, and other aspects. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Booknews

Lanyer should not be taught without this varied collection of important essays.

Notes and Queries

Important because it offers a portrait of the emerging official Aemilia Lanyer now in the process of being absorbed into our teaching and our understanding of literary history.

Early Modern Literary Studies

Many of these essays break new ground and, together, they examine the whole of Lanyer's oeuvre from theoretically and historically informed perspectives.

Years Work in English Studies

A thoroughly high quality collection of essays that allows the reader to consider a variety of scholarly questions about the importance of Lanyer.

Renaissance Quarterly

This excellent volume is the first anthology of scholarship and criticism on an important poet and provides many rich cultural contexts for Lanyer's work.

Elaine V. Beilin

This is a fine collection of essays about a poet who deserves her new-found fame.

Choice

The essays' diverse perspectives on recurring issues create a productive dialogue across the volume and highlight the richness of Lanyer's texts.

Seventeenth-Century News

Succeeds in altering the context in which we read the largely male literature of the period.

Bibliotheque d'Humanisme et Renaissance

"This is a fine collection of essays about a poet who deserves her new-found fame." — Choice

"Important because it offers a portrait of the emerging official Aemilia Lanyer now in the process of being absorbed into our teaching and our understanding of literary history." — Early Modern Literary Studies

"This excellent volume is the first anthology of scholarship and criticism on an important poet and provides many rich cultural contexts for Lanyer's work." — Elaine V. Beilin

"Lanyer should not be taught without this varied collection of important essays." — Notes and Queries

"A thoroughly high quality collection of essays that allows the reader to consider a variety of scholarly questions about the importance of Lanyer." — Renaissance Quarterly

"The essays' diverse perspectives on recurring issues create a productive dialogue across the volume and highlight the richness of Lanyer's texts." — Seventeenth-Century News

"Many of these essays break new ground and, together, they examine the whole of Lanyer's oeuvre from theoretically and historically informed perspectives." — Years Work in English Studies

"Succeeds in altering the context in which we read the largely male literature of the period." — Bibliotheque d'Humanisme et Renaissance

From the Publisher