Writing the Reformation: Actes and Monuments and the Jacobean History PlayIn this study, Marsha Robinson presents the most thorough examination to date of a largely neglected group of plays dealing with the lives and times of Tudor figures - the Jacobean history plays. She argues that, rather than being a nostalgic nod to the past, the vitality of the English Renaissance history play lies in its rehearsal of contemporary issues. Giving serious and detailed attention to the importance of these works in Tudor and post-Tudor politics and culture, she writes an important chapter in both the history of the drama and in its relationship to Tudor thought.Writing the Reformation invests the post-Shakespearean history plays of the Jacobean era-including among others Shakespeare's Henry VIII (1613), Dekker's The Whore of Babylon (1606), and Heywood's If You Know Not Me, You Know Nobody (1604-5)-with new significance by recognizing the role they played in popularizing and re-appropriating Foxe's Book of Martyrs, one of the most formative and culturally significant Reformation texts. Designed to reform the present by presenting the Tudor past as the prologue to apocalyptic fulfillment, these history plays participate with Foxe in the reformation of historiography, investing Reformation history with the tragicomic form indigenous to redemptive history. This book reveals that the post-Reformation stage became a platform for modeling Foxe's new hero, a hero transformed by the imperatives of conscience. It explores the representation of apocalyptic history as coincident with the emergence of female and plebeian voices invested with a new spiritual power.This study presents the historical stage as a site of a continuing Reformation debate over the nature of political authority, the validity of conscience and the challenge to social and gender hierarchies implicit in Protestant doctrine. Relating each play to contemporary political events, this book demonstrates the role of the Jacobean stage in promoting reformation and informing with providential meaning the events unfolding outside the theater. |
From inside the book
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Page 122
... Thou rebel whore and traitor heretic ! ' , ' Thou traitorly whore ! ' , ' Thou rebel whore ! ' ( VIII , 537-38 ) . These invectives associate nonconformity with rebellion – a commonplace charge in a society - 28 ... where dissent was ...
... Thou rebel whore and traitor heretic ! ' , ' Thou traitorly whore ! ' , ' Thou rebel whore ! ' ( VIII , 537-38 ) . These invectives associate nonconformity with rebellion – a commonplace charge in a society - 28 ... where dissent was ...
Page 123
... thou hast done ' ( VIII , 223-24 ) . The Tudor association of female sexuality with apostasy is epitomized in the ... thou lien withal that thou hast so much Scripture ? Thou are some priest's woman , I think , for thou wilt take upon ...
... thou hast done ' ( VIII , 223-24 ) . The Tudor association of female sexuality with apostasy is epitomized in the ... thou lien withal that thou hast so much Scripture ? Thou are some priest's woman , I think , for thou wilt take upon ...
Page 124
... thou not a man's wife ? ' ( VIII , 498 ) . He then rebukes her for leaving her Catholic husband and children ... thou art a woman of fair years ; what shouldst thou meddle with the Scriptures ? It is necessary for thee to believe , and ...
... thou not a man's wife ? ' ( VIII , 498 ) . He then rebukes her for leaving her Catholic husband and children ... thou art a woman of fair years ; what shouldst thou meddle with the Scriptures ? It is necessary for thee to believe , and ...
Contents
Authority on the Tragicomic | 29 |
Staging the Record of Conscience | 55 |
Staging a Female Reformation | 117 |
Copyright | |
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Other editions - View all
Writing the Reformation: Acts and Monuments and the Jacobean History Play Marsha Robinson Limited preview - 2017 |
Writing the Reformation: Acts and Monuments and the Jacobean History Play Marsha Robinson No preview available - 2019 |
Writing the Reformation: Acts and Monuments and the Jacobean History Play Marsha Robinson No preview available - 2017 |
Common terms and phrases
accused Actes and Monuments alludes allusion ambiguous Antichrist apocalyptic history audience authority biblical bishops Bonner Catholic Christ Christian chronicle comedic confessors contest counterpointed court courtroom Cranmer Cromwell's death defend Dekker doctrine dramatic dramatists Duchess of Suffolk earthly ecclesiastical echoes Elizabeth Elizabethan settlement emplotment enacts enemies English Reformation Essex evoked examination example faith female conscience Foxe Foxe's Foxe's martyrs Foxean history plays Foxean plays Gardiner gender God's godly monarch Henry VIII Henry's heresy heretics Heywood historiography interiority interpretation invokes Jacobean James Jane Katherine Parr King Henry magistrate male Marian Marian exiles Oldcastle's papal persecution play's political popular portrays Prince prophecy Protestant Protestantism providential Puritan Queen rebellion record redemption religion religious representation reveals role Scripture sedition Shakespeare's Sir John Oldcastle Sir Thomas Wyatt social spiritual stage synteresis Thomas Lord Cromwell tragicomic traitor transformation trial true Church truth Tudor usurpation voice Whore Wolsey Wolsey's woman women