In Praise of Scribes

Manuscripts and their Makers in Seventeenth-Century England
Erscheinungsjahr 1998
ISBN: 978-0-19-818471-3
Verlag: Oxford University Press

Buch, Englisch, 339 Seiten, Format (B × H): 198 mm x 255 mm, Gewicht: 945 g

In Praise of Scribes is a major contribution to the field of manuscript studies in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This profusely illustrated book argues for the significant role played by clerks and scriveners both in contemporary society and in the transmissional history of literary texts. Specific case studies are offered of a remarkably industrious contributor to the ferment of ideas leading to the Civil War (the so-called 'Feathery Scribe'), as well as of the notorious 'Captain' Robert Julian in the Restoration period. Other case studies exemplify the wide-ranging empirical use which is to be made of material texts, and shed new light on works by Sir Philip Sidney, John Donne, and Katherine Philips, writers who flourished in a manuscript culture. The book explores questions about the nature of that culture vis à vis print culture, about constructions of authorship, and about the complex nature of texts themselves in an evolving society and changing readership.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Beal, Peter

Fachgebiete

• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft | Kulturwissenschaften Kulturwissenschaften

Inhaltsverzeichnis

- List of Illustrations

- List of Abbreviations

- 1: In praise of scribes

- 2: `It shall not therefore kill itself; that is, not bury itself': Donne's Biathanatos and its text

- 3: The Feathery Scribe

- 4: `Hoping they shall only come to your merciful eyes': Sidney's Letter to Queen Elizabeth and its transmission

- 5: `The virtuous Mrs Philips' and 'that whore Castlemaine': Orinda and her Apotheosis, 1664-1668

- Appendix I. Seventeenth-century characters of clerks and scriveners

- Appendix II. Manuscripts by the Feathery Scribe

- Appendix III. Catalogue of papers in Ralph Starkey's study

- Appendix IV. Manuscript texts of Sidney's Letter to Queen Elizabeth

- Appendix V. Katherine Philips's letter to Lady Fletcher

- Appendix VI. John Taylor's verse satire on Katherine Philips

- Index of manuscripts cited

- Bibliography

- General Index

Über Autor(innen)

Author of the 3-volume Index of English Literary Manuscripts (Bowker and Mansell), which is the scholarly reference book in the field and will be known to every likely purchaser for our book.