Donne's Augustine: Renaissance Cultures of Interpretation

by Katrin Ettenhuber

Overview

The poet and preacher John Donne (1572-1631) was one of the most influential authors of early modern England. Donne's Augustine examines his response to an iconic figure in the history of Western religious thought: Saint Augustine of Hippo (354-430). Katrin Ettenhuber argues that Renaissance culture saw not only a revival of the classics, but was equally indebted to the intellectual and literary legacy of the Church Fathers. The study recovers an Augustinian tradition of interpretation which permeated the religious world of the period, but which has until now been largely overlooked. She presents a comprehensive re-evaluation of Donne's writings, ranging from the poems to less familiar prose works, situates him carefully in the poetic, intellectual, and political contexts which frame his works, and engages with recent developments in both literary and historical studies.

Donne's Augustine is the first sustained study of Donne's reading practices, and of the theological sources which shaped his thought. It discovers a range of medieval and early modern texts which transformed the imagination of literary writers in the period but which have been neglected so far: devotional manuals, Scripture commentaries, and religious commonplace books (often in Latin). The study pays close attention to the intellectual and political conditions which informed the reception of Augustine's works, and offers detailed readings of Donne's texts which illuminate the literary aspects of his patristic heritage. Donne's Augustine makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the larger reading and writing culture of Renaissance England, and of the religious debates and controversies in the decades leading up to the Civil War.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199609109
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	09/02/2011
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	6.40(w) x 9.20(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Katrin Ettenhuber is a Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge, and Newton Trust Lecturer in the Faculty of English. Prior to this, she held an A.H. Lloyd Junior Research Fellowship at Christ's College, Cambridge; she is also a former Holderlin scholar of the German National Academic Foundation. She is the editor of volume 5 of the Oxford Edition of the Sermons of John Donne (OUP, forthcoming) and co-editor, with Gavin Alexander and Sylvia Adamson, of Renaissance Figures of Speech (Cambridge, 2007). She has published a number of articles on Donne's sermons, Renaissance patristics, early modern rhetoric, and seventeenth-century manuscript culture.

Table of Contents

Introduction1. How Donne Read Augustine2. Augustinian Case Studies3. 'Ascending Humility': Augustinian Hermeneutics in the iEssayes in Divinity/i4. The Bad Physician: Casuistry and Augustinian Charity in iBiathanatos/i5. 'Medicinall Concoctions': Equity and Charity in the Lincoln's Inn Sermons6. 'Keeping the Peace': Donne, Augustine, and the Crisis of 16297. 'The evidence of things not seen': Donne, Augustine, and the Beatific VisionConclusionAppendixBibliography

Editorial Reviews

"This excellent study is the first sustained effort "to read Donne's reading of
Augustine"; it will prove illuminating for anyone—including critics and historians—concerned with 16th- and 17th-century intellectual culture...Including a full bibliography, this is a necessary resource for institutions where Donne's prose is taught...Essential." —Choice

"Not only a magisterial examination of John Donne's reception and use of Augustine, but also a magisterial examination of his exegetical and hermeneutic practices...One simply cannot say enough about what Ettenhuber has achieved in Donne's Augustine. It is a clearly organized narrative on Donne's growing relationship with one of the most important voices in the whole of Western civilization, but it is so much more...Ettenhuber invites us into the mind of a man who also clearly believed in a spiritual dimension to his being that rested beyond the scope of the mind. Donne's Augustine is acutely aware of that dimension of Donne's life, and with profound scholarly and critical insight, Ettenhuber brings her readers to that part of Donne's life by showing how his love for Augustine reaffirmed the spirit while sharpening the mind. For these reasons, and many more, Donne's Augustine will play a central role in Donne scholarship for decades to come." —Seventeenth-Century News

"Displays an admirable knowledge of Donne's religious prose, of many of hte works of St. Augustine, and of the relationship between the two authors...Ettenhuber has provided a valuable survey of Donne's debt to and interest in St. Augustine." —John Donne Journal

"A triumph of careful and creative scholarship and an exemplary, desk-level account of how Donne and his contemporaries read, thought, and wrote." —Modern Philology

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