The Cambridge Companion to English Poetry, Donne to Marvell

Front Cover
Thomas N. Corns
Cambridge University Press, Nov 18, 1993 - Literary Criticism - 306 pages
English poetry in the first half of the seventeenth century is an outstandingly rich and varied body of verse, which can be understood and appreciated more fully when set in its cultural and ideological context. This student Companion, consisting of fourteen new introductory essays by scholars of international standing, informs and illuminates the poetry by providing close reading of texts and an exploration of their background. There are individual studies of Donne, Jonson, Herrick, Herbert, Carew, Suckling, Lovelace, Milton, Crashaw, Vaughan and Marvell. More general essays describe the political and religious context of the poetry, explore its gender politics, explain the material circumstances of its production and circulation, trace its larger role in the development of genre and tradition, and relate it to contemporary rhetorical expectation. Overall the Companion provides an indispensable guide to the texts and contexts of early-seventeenth-century English poetry.

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Contents

Politics and religion
3
The politics of gender
31
Manuscript print and the social history of the lyric
52
Genre and tradition
80
Rhetoric
101
John Donne
123
Ben Jonson
148
Robert Herrick
171
George Herbert
183
Thomas Carew Sir John Suckling and Richard Lovelace
200
John Milton the early works
221
Richard Crashaw
242
Henry Vaughan
256
Andrew Marvell
275
Index
304
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