This 1979 study relates Shakespeare's work to the poetry, criticism and life of his age. Drawing upon a considerable body of evidence, it shows how Shakespeare was influenced by medieval thought, by classical sources, by the popular verse and the theatre of his day, and by the Elizabethan use of language.

This anthology includes sonnets from Shakespeare, Sidney, and Spenser; popular poems by Donne ("Go, and catch a falling star"), Jonson ("Drink to me only with thine eyes"), Marlowe ("The Passionate Shepherd to His Love"); more.

Writers of the English Renaissance, like their European contemporaries, frequently reflect on the phenomenon of exile—an experience that forces the individual to establish a new personal identity in an alien environment. Although there has been much commentary on this phenomenon as represented in English Renaissance literature, there has been nothing written at length about its counterpart, namely, internal exile: marginalization, or estrangement, within the homeland. This volume considers internal exile as a simultaneously twofold experience. It studies estrangement from one’s society and, correlatively, from one’s normative sense of self. In doing so, it focuses initially on the sonnet sequences by Sidney, Spenser, and Shakespeare (which is to say, the problematics of romance); then it examines the verse satires of Donne, Hall, and Marston (likewise, the problematics of anti-romance). This book argues that the authors of these major texts create mythologies—via the myths of (and accumulated mythographies about) Cupid, satyrs, and Proteus—through which to reflect on the doubleness of exile within one’s own community. These mythologies, at times accompanied by theologies, of alienation suggest that internal exile is a fluid and complex experience demanding multifarious reinterpretation of the incongruously expatriate self. The monograph thus establishes a new framework for understanding texts at once diverse yet central to the Elizabethan literary achievement.

This comprehensive and beautifully illustrated collection of essays conveys a vivid picture of a fascinating and hugely significant period in history. Featuring contributions from thirty-eight international scholars, the book takes a thematic approach to a period which saw the defeat of the Spanish Armada, the explorations of Francis Drake and Walter Ralegh, the establishment of the Protestant Church, the flourishing of commercial theatre and the works of Edmund Spencer, Philip Sidney and William Shakespeare. Encompassing social, political, cultural, religious and economic history, and crossing several disciplines, The Elizabethan World depicts a time of transformation, and a world order in transition. Topics covered include central and local government; political ideas; censorship and propaganda; parliament, the Protestant Church, the Catholic community; social hierarchies; women; the family and household; popular culture, commerce and consumption; urban and rural economies; theatre; art; architecture; intellectual developments ; exploration and imperialism; Ireland, and the Elizabethan wars. The volume conveys a vivid picture of how politics, religion, popular culture, the world of work and social practices fit together in an exciting world of change, and will be invaluable reading for all students and scholars of the Elizabethan period.

This 1999 book offers an original study of lyric form and social custom in the Elizabethan age. Ilona Bell explores the tendency of Elizabethan love poems not only to represent an amorous thought, but to conduct the courtship itself. Where studies have focused on courtiership, patronage and preferment at court, her focus is on love poetry, amorous courtship, and relations between Elizabethan men and women. The book examines the ways in which the tropes and rhetoric of love poetry were used to court Elizabethan women (not only at court and in the great houses, but in society at large) and how the women responded to being wooed, in prose, poetry and speech. Bringing together canonical male poets and women writers, Ilona Bell investigates a range of texts addressed to, written by, read, heard or transformed by Elizabethan women, and charts the beginnings of a female lyric tradition.