Staging Romance

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence Publicover
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Narrative Strategies ◽  
Early Modern Theatre ◽  
Spatial Grammar ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Ideal

This chapter explores the mostly overlooked history of romance on the early modern stage. Analysing the geographies of two little-known plays, Clyomon and Clamydes (1580s?) and Guy of Warwick (early 1590s?), it argues that, in its imaginative openness and its flexible staging of space, the early modern theatre was the ideal environment in which to stage romance’s extravagant spatial and ethnographical imaginings. Further, the chapter demonstrates how a theatrical tradition of clowning enabled these late-Elizabethan dramas to contest the values of the very romance-worlds they had established. It closes with a fresh reading of Francis Beaumont’s parody of romance, The Knight of the Burning Pestle, arguing that the play satirizes dramatic romance’s spatial grammar as well as its narrative strategies.

scholarly journals Thinking Without the Scientific Revolution: Global Interactions and the Construction of Knowledge

2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 445-458 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kapil Raj
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Scientific Revolution ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Scientific Activity ◽  
Narrative Strategies ◽  
Knowledge Domains ◽  
History Of ◽  
Intercultural Interactions ◽  
The Many

Abstract Amongst the many narrative strategies in the recent “global turn” in the history of science, one commonly finds attempts to complement the single European story by multiplying histories of knowledge-making in as many different regional and cultural contexts as possible. Other strategies include attempts to generalize the “Needham Question” of why the Scientific Revolution occurred only in early-modern Europe to the exclusion of other parts of the world, or to challenge the diffusionist vision of the spread of modern science from Europe by attempting to show that non-European scientific traditions already had an understanding of recent European discoveries. These latter strategies seek simply to pluralize the Scientific Revolution without actually unpacking the latter concept itself. This article seeks firstly to show that the “Scientific Revolution” was in fact a Cold War invention intended to bring the freshly decolonized world into the ambit of the West by limiting the conception of modern science to Europe-specific activities thus delegitimizing other knowledge domains and using the term as a spatially circumscribed chronological marker. Using a broader understanding of scientific activity in the early modern period, and mobilizing relational methodologies, such as circulatory and connected historiographies, the paper then re-examines the well-known history of the Hortus Malabaricus, one of the most celebrated seventeenth-century botanical works, to show the short- and long-range knowledge circulations, intercultural interactions and connections involved in its making to bring out the global nature of scientific activity of the period and illustrate relational approaches to global history.

scholarly journals Charting orthographical reliability in a corpus of English historical letters

ICAME Journal ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anni Sairio ◽  
Samuli Kaislaniemi ◽  
Anna Merikallio ◽  
Terttu Nevalainen
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
History Of ◽  
Early English ◽  
English Spelling ◽  
Late Modern ◽  
Bad Data ◽  
Range Of Variation ◽  
The Ideal

Abstract Research into orthography in the history of English is not a simple venture. The history of English spelling is primarily based on printed texts, which fail to capture the range of variation inherent in the language; many manuscript phenomena are simply not found in printed texts. Manuscript-based corpora would be the ideal research data, but as this is resource-intensive, linguists use editions that have been produced by non-linguists. Many editions claim to retain original spellings, but in practice text is always normalized at the graph level and possibly more so. This does not preclude using such a corpus for orthographical research, but there has been no systematic way to determine the philological reliability of an edited text. In this paper we present a typological methodology we are developing for the evaluation of orthographical quality of edition-based corpora, with the aim of making the best use of bad data in the context of editions and manuscript practices. As a case study, we apply this methodology to the Early Modern and Late Modern English sections of the Corpus of Early English Correspondence.

The Eroticism of Emasculation: Confronting the Baroque Body of the Castrato

2003 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 196-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Freitas Freitas
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Function ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Middle Ground ◽  
Male And Female ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
History Of ◽  
The One ◽  
Historical Accounts ◽  
The Ideal

This study suggests that, against the background of early modern views of sexuality, the castrato appears not as the asexual creature sometimes implied today, but as a super-natural manifestation of a widely-held erotic ideal. Recent work in the history of sexuality has shown the prevalence in the early modern period of the "one-sex" model, in which the distinction between male and female is quantitative (with respect to "vital heat") rather than qualitative. This model provides for a large middle ground, encompassing prepubescent children, castrati, and other unusual figures. And that middle ground, in fact, seems to have been a prime locus of sexual desire: the art, literature, and historical accounts of the period argue that boys especially were often viewed -perhaps by both sexes-as erotic objects. Further evidence suggests that this sexual charge also applied to castrati. The plausibility of such an erotic image is strengthened by investigation into the actual sexual function of these singers, which seems to have fallen somewhere between historical legend and modern skepticism. Finally, a survey of castrato roles in opera, from Monteverdi to Handel, shows how these singers were deployed and suggests that their popularity could not have depended entirely on vocal skills. Instead, I argue that castrati were prized at least in part for their unique physicality, their spectacularly exaggerated embodiment of the ideal lover.

Interiority

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Preiss
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
The Body ◽  
Early Modern Theatre ◽  
History Of ◽  
Negative Space ◽  
Revenge Plays ◽  
Plot Structure ◽  
Complex Characters ◽  
The Way

This chapter traces the history of theatrical interiority and shows when and why early modern theatre became invested in it. More specifically, it examines the way the enclosure of the theatres made possible not only a newly commercialized drama but also characterization and plot-structure that depended on an implied but unrevealed depth. The chapter first considers the analogy between round amphitheatres and ‘round’, complex characters before discussing the culture of the money box to establish the link between early modern theatrical economics and its aesthetics. It then looks at the play’s resistance to closure, its messiness and overcomplication, and the ‘interiority’ of its characters and how characters in later revenge plays construct interiority as negative space. It argues that characters are not people so much as playhouses, propagating the illusion of depth after depth has run out, and explains how ‘interiority’ in the early modern theatre begins as merely its exterior reinscribed—its circle reduced into the body of the actor until it became a point, elemental and ‘inviolate’.

scholarly journals Jewish Questions in The Three Ladies of London

Early Theatre ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Brett D. Hirsch
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Theatre History ◽  
Early Modern Theatre ◽  
History Of

In the history of portraying Jews on the early modern stage, critics frequently cite Robert Wilson’s <em>The Three Ladies of London </em>as an anomaly. The play’s first modern editor, H.S.D. Mithal, went so far as to describe Gerontus as ‘a character sui generis’, quite unlike Marlowe’s porridge-poisoning Machiavel, Shakespeare’s knife-whetting usurer, and the devilish doctor in<em> Selimus</em>. This essay explores the questions raised by Wilson’s portrayal of Gerontus, paying particular attention to their critical and theatrical implications. What was understood by the term ‘Jew’ and how might Elizabethan audiences have recognized Gerontus as a Jew? Is the play really an anomaly of early modern theatre history?

Stage

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Weigert
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern Theatre ◽  
Renaissance Period ◽  
Theatrical Representation ◽  
History Of ◽  
Dramatic Performance ◽  
Organizing Principles

This chapter examines transitions in theatrical representation from the multiple presentation areas of the medieval pageants to the fixed stage of the Renaissance period designated for the performance of plays that we associate with the early modern theatre. It also considers some of the performative conventions that persisted, including the use of statues, paintings, and fabric to personify ideas, along with the more conventional body of the actor. By focusing on foundational images pertaining to the history of the European stage, the chapter offers a glimpse into the nature of early modern ‘theatricality’: the practices, representational strategies, and organizing principles that defined dramatic performance from the late fourteenth through to the sixteenth centuries.

History of Ardalānids (1590-1810) by Sharaf al-Dīn bin Shams al-Dīn

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-79
Author(s):  
Sara Zandi Karimi
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
History Of ◽  
Critical Translation

This article is a critical translation of the “History of the Ardalānids.” In doing so, it hopes to make available to a wider academic audience this invaluable source on the study of Iranian Kurdistan during the early modern period. While a number of important texts pertaining to the Kurds during this era, most notably the writings of the Ottoman traveler Evliya Chalabi, focus primarily on Ottoman Kurdistan, this piece in contrast puts Iranian Kurdistan in general and the Ardalān dynasty in particular at the center of its historical narrative. Thus it will be of interest not only to scholars of Kurdish history but also to those seeking more generally to research life on the frontiers of empires.Keywords: Ẕayl; Ardalān; Kurdistan; Iran.ABSTRACT IN KURMANJIDîroka Erdelaniyan (1590-1810)Ev gotar wergereke rexneyî ya “Dîroka Erdelaniyan” e. Bi vê yekê, merema xebatê ew e ku vê çavkaniya pir biqîmet a li ser Kurdistana Îranê ya di serdema pêş-modern de ji bo cemawerê akademîk berdest bike. Hejmareke metnên girîng li ser Kurdên wê serdemê, bi taybetî nivîsînên Evliya Çelebî yê seyyahê osmanî, zêdetir berê xwe didine Kurdistana di bin hukmê Osmaniyan de. Lê belê, di navenda vê xebatê de, bi giştî Kurdistana Îranê û bi taybetî jî xanedana Erdelaniyan heye. Wisa jî ew dê ne tenê ji bo lêkolerên dîroka kurdî belku ji bo ewên ku dixwazin bi rengekî berfirehtir derheq jiyana li ser tixûbên împeretoriyan lêkolînan bikin jî dê balkêş be.ABSTRACT IN SORANIMêjûy Erdellan (1590-1810)Em wutare wergêrranêkî rexneyî “Mêjûy Erdellan”e, bew mebestey em serçawe girînge le ser Kurdistanî Êran le seretakanî serdemî nwê bixate berdest cemawerî ekademî. Jimareyek serçawey girîng le ser kurdekan lew serdeme da hen, diyartirînyan nûsînekanî gerîdey ‘Usmanî Ewliya Çelebîye, ke zortir serincyan le ser ‘Kurdistanî ‘Usmanî bûwe. Em berheme be pêçewanewe Kurdistanî Êran be giştî, we emaretî Erdelan be taybetî dexate senterî xwêndinewekewe. Boye nek tenya bo twêjeranî biwarî mêjûy kurdî, belku bo ewaney le ser jiyan le sinûre împiratoriyekan twêjînewe deken, cêgay serinc debêt.

Conclusion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Randall
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Intellectual History ◽  
Fine Arts ◽  
James Madison ◽  
Modern Conception ◽  
Political World ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
History Of ◽  
Constitutional Thought

The changed conception of conversation that emerged by c.1700 was about to expand its scope enormously – to the broad culture of Enlightenment Europe, to the fine arts, to philosophy and into the broad political world, both via the conception of public opinion and via the constitutional thought of James Madison (1751–1836). In the Enlightenment, the early modern conception of conversation would expand into a whole wing of Enlightenment thought. The intellectual history of the heirs of Cicero and Petrarch would become the practice of millions and the constitutional architecture of a great republic....

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