106-210 Elizabethan Texts

Usually 25 points of first-year English, see Prerequisites.

This subject examines poetry, prose and drama written in England during the final decades of the reign of Elizabeth I (1558-1603). It is concerned with writings which take the Queen herself as its subject and engage directly or indirectly with the major political issues of the day. Topical material from controversial pamphlets will be studied, along with visual and material aspects of the cult of Elizabeth (particularly portraits and pageants), and the writings of Elizabeth herself. The main focus is on how texts which are now considered 'literary' were produced out of an engagement with contemporary political events. The subject is informed by feminist and historicist modes of analysis and will engage such general issues as the topical use of history writing; the intersection of cultural codes of masculinity and femininity; the development of aestheticised categories of 'literature' and 'author'; and the consolidation through such writing of an English national identity. Students who successfully complete this subject will be familiar with the main historical events, social practices and cultural production of the Elizabethan period; will have learnt how to analyse texts by Sidney, Spenser and Shakespeare; and will understand contemporary critical and cultural paradigms for the reading of Elizabethan texts.