The early modern dream vision (1558-1625): genre, authorship and tradition

P Language and Literature > PR English literature

Buffey, Emily ; Wright, Gillian,Griffith, David

University:University of Birmingham

Department:School of English, Drama and American & Canadian Studies

关键词: P Language and Literature;    PR English literature;   

Others  :  http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/7360/1/Buffey17PhD.pdf

来源: University of Birmingham eTheses Repository

【 摘 要 】

This thesis offers the first full-length investigation into the reception and influence of the dream vision poem in the early modern period. One of the main aims of this research is to challenge the assumption that the dream vision was no longer an attractive, appreciated or effective form beyond the Middle Ages. This research breaks new ground by demonstrating that the dream vision was not only a popular form in the post-Reformation period, but was a major and enduring means of literary and political expression throughout the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods. This thesis is therefore part of an ongoing scholarly attempt to reconfigure the former aesthetic judgements that have dominated scholarship since C. S. Lewis dubbed the sixteenth century as the 'drab age' of English verse. The main focus is upon three writers who have been largely ignored or misunderstood by modern scholarship: Barnabe Googe (1540-1594), Richard Robinson (fl. 1570-1589) and Thomas Andrewe (fl. 1600-1604). Through close analysis of their work, this thesis demonstrates that the dream vision could both inform and was greatly informed by contemporary political, cultural and literary developments, as well as the period's relationship with its literary and historical past.