And We are DONE!

I hope everyone is finished or near completion of the paper at this point. For this blog entry, I thought I would simply reflect on the semester and share my thoughts about our class. Not only was the small class setting something new and enjoyable for me, but also, the content was something that I was unusually interested in. While literature classes before this often challenged me, Brit Ren emphasized an even greater importance on the connections that we find between literature, speeches, critical reviews, art, and research, which we often to do not have the opportunity to do! Though the research at times was grueling, I found that it gave me a knowledge that expanded the complete topic which I investigated, making me a feel a small expert in a vast historical world. The majority of the favorite texts that I read came from the Elizabeth collection! I think I am going to ACTUALLY read it past this class because I found it so intriguing. I hope that heading into future literature and writing classes, we can all apply the connection emphasis and the dreaded enthymeme prep :) We made it and I'm so glad it was with this crowd of people! You rock!

--Alexa

Merry Christmas EL371!

In light of my recent posts being more culturally interesting than helpful in research, I thought I'd post one last thing for fun. A part of me is a little sad we did not have a final class meeting because I enjoyed everyone so much. So here's a hearty Renaissance Christmas wish:

On the Morning of Christ's Nativity
This is the month, and this the happy morn
Wherein the Son of Heav'n's eternal King,
Of wedded Maid, and Virgin Mother born,
Our great redemption from above did bring;
For so the holy sages once did sing,
That he our deadly forfeit should release,
And with his Father work us a perpetual peace.

- John Donne "Nativity"

Merry Christmas everyone, thanks for a great semester!

for Kindle: women's oppression

In response to the SOS looking for women's oppression pieces, I thought of something. I'm not sure exactly how it will fit into your argument, Kindle, but I think you could be able to use Emilia Lanyer's poem, "Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum." You'll have to work to get it in, but I think you could use it as an example of how some women were vocal about the oppression. You could provide a feminist viewpoint of the Fall through this piece as Lanyer does, as an objection to the way the Church had portrayed women as the downfall of man. Just a thought. Hope this helps!

I've been Thinking about Pants...

I've been doing some serious research on the equality of women during the Renaissance. I've learned about the "roaring girls", the anonymous women writers, crazy theatrical heroines that changed the perspective of a woman's ability to--- well anyway I've been wondering about pants. It was a really big deal in the US when suddenly the 50's housewife was able to throw on a pair of pant-like things, and I want to know how that happened for women in England...and when. But FIRST I want to know about the silly leggings King James is wearing in this picture. In order to gain perspective on my paper I decided to look up some fun pictures of ole Liz and Jimmy. Then I digressed my research. According to a costume shop in London that specializes in British Renaissance attire, "One style of English Renaissance dress for the wealthy or noble man began with a plain or plaited linen shirt accented at the neck by a small ruffle or ruff. At the wrist, the sleeve was adorned with a similar ruff. Over this was worn a close-fitting square cut vest. Atop the vest, a tunic or doublet, that was slashed and reached nearly to the knee. The V-shaped opening of the tunic revealed the shirt and vest beneath. An example of this style can still be seen today in the uniforms of the "beef-eater" guards at the Tower of London" (Howard). After reading this long description of the layers it takes to dress just a male aristocrat during the Renaissance, I had a revelation. Now I know why they survived in those cold, dank castles without electric heating- LAYERS!!! Howard (costuming specialist) goes on to describe the "hose of finest wool" that went under the boots and the little dress you see James wearing in the top right picture. Though this does not even begin to answer my question about women wearing pants, it helps me to understand the necessity for the goofy layers they wore back then. With fabric and decoration proving your status, it makes perfect, logical sense for the British aristocrats to over-do their wardrobe in order to stay warm and look real good.

A James I Speech--KINDLE SEE THIS!!!

I ran across James' speech, "James I on the Powers of the Monarch" in my research and (sorry this is so specific to Kindle) it has some great quotes for you, Kindle! It might challenge your argument a little bit, but James says that he is "compared to the fathers of families, for a king is truly 'parens patriae', the politic father of his people." I found this quote interesting in light of the section of your paper that deals with the dynamics of the Church vs. the father being head of the home and source of the woman's salvation. This quote brings in another dimension of headship that isn't directly addressed in your paper, which is fine. I just thought you might find this interesting.

I hope this maybe helped some others of you too! Happy studying/writing/maybe you're already done. So Merry Christmas!

Mary Sidney Rocking that Translation.

Hello to all during finals! Hope they are going well. I thought I would just talk a little bit about the women that I am using in my paper, because they have a connection point that works to prove the power of women. As discussed in the Norton, Mary Sidney (Herbert) was a translator in the beginning of her literary career before writing works that dealt more with the theme of Queen Elizabeth. Sidney’s entertainment of Elizabeth becomes one of the distinguishing literary periods in which she moves away from her pattern of translations, though equally valuable for her as an author. Elizabethans understood translations as not only a “display [of] linguistic and technical skills but also for the indirect expression of personal and political concerns” (Lipking 994). As a translator of Robert Garnier’s French tragedy Antonius and Petrach’s Triumph of Death, Sidney was able to evolve the works of male figures in appropriate ways for the female gender, proving her value and the power she had to interpret their works.I though that this was useful in proving the a observable role that females proved moving into the Jacobean era. The other women that connect directly are Amelia Lanyer and Mary wroth, both of whom I have mentioned before. Check them out (Rachel) because they might be useful for you paper! ;)

--Alexa

Colonial Women

Hutner, Heidi. Colonial women: race and culture in Stuart drama. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. Print.

Hey Guys! I don't know if you have checked into some of the e-books that Doug posted on the blog, but I though I would highlight one in particular that I have found helpful. The Colonial Women e-book has proven to be really useful to me for its information pertaining to Aphra Behn. There are other female writers and influences also contained in the piece as well. I thought that the text does a wonderful job of making sure to connect the writers to the Stuart age in general. It gives you some background paired with some of the inferences that the author makes about their impact on culture in a very unbiased way. You should certainly look into this piece if your paper is about women or the Stuart age in general!

--Alexa

Rewind to the Spanish Tragedy

The extra credit speaker on the Spanish Inquisition in Mexico still applies to our readings in the Jacobean-Carolinean ages because the actual Alto de Feys she discussed started in Jacobean times and ended in 1649. So all of this occurs after the Spanish Armada and the great popularity of The Spanish Tragedy. The story of the Spanish Inquisition in Mexico begins in Spain where it is more famously known to have happened. The Inquisition began sometime in the 15th Century and probaby ended sometime in the 17th. The gist of it is that jews and muslims were being forced to convert to Christianity or leave Spain. The third option was to be totrured or killed. A lot of jews in particualr went to Portugual, who then encouraged a lot of people to move to the new world. Apparently a good amount of Jewish merchants saw this as a good business oppurtunity and became heavily involved in the Portugese colonization of the new world. It turns out that was a good business venture and many of the merchants became very prosperous and powerful in new world port cities. Spain still had jurisdiction over Portugual (interesting to consider in The Spanish Tragedy) and they decided to take the inquisition on a new world tour. The Spanish put on these massive exhibitions called Alto de Feys where they tried to recreate damnation in hell through a scene with persecuted jews, fire, executions, and pardonings for the women and children. These displays were kind of like entertainment in the same way that the violence in THe Spaniosh Tragedy was entertainment, except the inquisition violence was real. THe speaker talked a lot about a Grand Alto De Fey in which 108 men accused of Judaism were garretted and then burned at the stake. Their wives and children were pardoned and returned to everyday life. The Spanish of course confiscated the accused men's properties and either sold them or recommisioned them for different purposes. The last Alto de Fey to happen in Mexico was in 1649, the same year Charles I was executed in England.

Will and Aemilia

In light of this beautiful piece of art I stumbled upon through our friend, Facebook, I thought it would be interesting to test its accuracy. We talked about Shakespeare's relationship with Aemilia Layner as the "dark lady" from Shakespeare's sonnets. Here is some research I found: According to John Hudson (famous for his theory about the connection between Lanyer and Shakespeare) Lanyer may have actually written some of Shakespeare's works. Though Doug's arguments about Shakespeare writing his own works (with some collaborations and with the Tribe of Ben) makes much more sense, this argument is a little convincing. At this point I know enough about Shakespeare and his works to know that this is just a broad speculation, but it is thought that "Shakespeare would not have had the requisite knowledge of Jewish lore, written into the plays, that a Jewish Bassano-Lanyer would; and that she agreed to be his ghostwriter, needing the cover of a man’s identity in order to have her work published and performed" (Hudson). Another scholar counters this theory, though, by saying that "if she were no more Jewish than Shakespeare, the argument that he must not have written the plays, must apply to her as well on this score" (Machenery).

Mainly, I was inspired by the picture from facebook, and decided that even knowing a little more about the "dark lady" of the sonnets could be profitable in understanding Lanyer's place as a revolutionary female writer during the renaissance. Not only was she a woman writing taboo stuff, but she wasn't white. I think Lanyer probably invented the Spice Girls' saying, "Girl power!"

Norton is surprisingly useful...

Well, yet again, I referenced the anthology to answer my millions of literary questions. But even more so than that, I was able to find particular female examples that impacted literal through their unique styles. The common though between some of them that I was able to identify was them taking at least one of their pieces to acknowledge Elizabeth as a symbolic figure. For example, Amelia Lanyer's "To the Queen Her Most Excellent Majesty," Elizabeth Cary's "The Tragedy of Mariam, the Fair Queen of Jewry," and of course, Mary Wroth's "Urania." Through these three texts, readers are exposed to the symbolic nature that I am discovering is seen in architecture, painting, and literature as a means to carry on her legacy. The Jacobean era proved to a turning point for women in which they could essentially publish their literature with reliable sources. So once again, I would look at the little biographical sections about the authors that you are interested in because oddly enough, they are higher informative.

Some Books from Gonzaga

This Sunday I went down to the Gonzaga library and checked out a good deal of their section on early modern England. Two of the books I acquired that would probably be useful for our papers are Gloriana's Face by S.P. Cerasano and Marion Wynne-Davies, and The Invention of the Renaissance Woman edited by Pamela Joseph Benson. Gloriana's Face is a collection of essays that study of Queen Elizabeth's portraits and their historical contexts. Part of the books purpose is "to highlight the movement from the private, Elizabethan woman to her more public, Carolingean counterpart." So in many ways this book discusses topics we're working on in our papers such as shifts in women's roles from the Elizabethan to the Carolinean age. The second book The Invention of the Renaissance Woman is a study of the historical setting of 16th century Italy and 17th Century England and the roles of women in these places. It starts off with Italy which provides a look at what was happening to women in Italy around the time of Elizabeth, an interesting look at a neighboring culture. It then focuses on women in England during Elizabeth's and James' reigns. Both of these books are both a look back at Elizabeth and also a look at the influence she left after her death. Gloriana's Face could be particularly valuable to a lot of our papers, and The Invention...

Dear Inner Library Loan, Thanks!

Renaissance Woman: a Sourcebook, by Kate Augusterson, highlights the constructs of femininity during that time in England. This collection of personal accounts from women during Early Modern England is separated into nine basic sections, specifying the particular cultural contruct of the chapter. Augusterson's chapters are: Theology, Biology (yeah, super interesting stuff from ye ole science and the beliefs about a woman's body), Conduct, Sexuality and Motherhood (also really useful for those studying women in every aspect), Politics and Law, EDUCATION!, Work (I thought this section was a little disappointing, to be honest), Writing and Speaking, and Feminism (or the kind of feminist-type-thing they had going on at the time). These sections really helped me to distinguish which parts of the book I deemed most useful for my research, and gave insight into really specific details from Early Modern England, ACTUALLY FROM A WOMAN'S PERSPECTIVE. A lot of the RCE articles are written by women scholars, but much of the content in Augusterson's book is from the actual documents produced by women of the time. Mothers, daughters, writers, seamstresses--these women all had different views. For this reason, the sourcebook is really useful and if anyone would like to make a few copies or flip through it, I will bring it to class!

Aughterson, Kate. Renaissance Woman: a Sourcebook : Constructions of Femininity in England. London: Routledge, 1995. Print.

Cool Book!

Cannon, Mary Agnes. The Education of Women during the Renaissance. Washington, D.C.: [National Capital], 1916. Print.

This book is Mary Cannon's dissertation. Through my research of her dissertation, I have found that this work is actually a lot more helpful than some of the other essays I have read. Because it is meant as a piece of academic writing in order for Cannon to get her PhD, it is more specific to the topic it is named after, and has information that is more direct and supportive of women's education during this time. Cannon says in her preface, "In this dissertation is presented the result of an inquiry into the nature and extent of the pedagogical endeavor in behalf of womankind during the period of the Revival of Learning, that is, from about 1350 to 1600" (5). Cannon separates her chapters by geographical location, making her section about the British Renaissance from pages 97-124. By listing the specific date, Cannon makes it easy to find the passages necessary for discovering what education was like during Elizabeth's reign. The time period discussed in the dissertation stops before James comes to power, but it is still a good resource for the first half of the paper.

Imagery of James I

If I remember correctly, some of you did papers or at least research on the images of women in Renaissance England. In light of that, I thought this book might interest you. Another electronic copy from Whitworth's e-library, this book pays fair attention to the accession of James. The chapter entitled, "The Look of Power" details certain parts of James' coronation speech. This speech is flooded with amorous language aimed at the people of England. James was seen as a "mender of broken hearts" (15). This statement implies that there were broken hearts to begin with. The author continues to explore this idea and writes about James as the husband of England. As far as imagery goes, there is plenty of parallels that can be drawn from that of Elizabeth and that of James. Elizabeth, you recall, frequently referred to England as her husband and its sufficiency to count as "marriage." This section of the book speaks to how James continued with the precedent Elizabeth set. Enjoy!

Applebaum, Robert. Literature and Utopian Politics in Seventeenth-Century England. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002.

Electronic Library Text

Durston, Christopher. James I. Flourence, Kentucky: Routledge, 1993.

This text is available in electronic format through the Whitworth Library. Though not particularly well-written, this book is a dense presentation of the rule of James I. It chronicles many varied aspects from his reign, including his ascension to the throne, religious disputes, foreign policy, and the skepticism of the people regarding the Scot. This last point is developed in a surprising way. I thought that the people of England may have been ready for a male king to take the throne after Elizabeth, but this book points out the negative views that were associated with James. I want to be careful to point out that this was not necessarily the predominate view, but it was prevalent nonetheless. For a quick look at James' reign specifically, this is a great resource.

Kelly

Women in Shakespeare

Anybody looking to research the women in Shakespeare's plays should check out these two books that I currently have: Soliloquy: the Shakespeare Monologues Edited by Michael Earley and Philippa Keil, and Shakespeare's Women: A Playscript for Performance and Analysis by Libby Appel and Michael Flachman. The first book, Soliloquy, is a compilation of all the long monolgues Shakespeare wrote for women characters. It also has some really insightful commentary following each soliloquy and a long introduction about Shakespearean women. This book is incredibly valuable for anybody trying to research how Shakespeare portrayed women since it has a section for almost all of his important female characters. The second book Shakespeare's Women is actually a play written by Appel and Flachman that uses characters and words from Shakespeare's play to act out a kind of analysis of the characters and the roles they perform in their respective plays. It's harder to read than the other one and isn't the original source material from his plays, but it still has some interesting things to say about Shakespeare's women. It deals a lot with the popular notion of Shakespeare's time of women as frail fickle beings and also the variety of characters in his plays.