The early modern period inherited and refashioned a culture of remembrance deeply-ingrained in the customs of Christian community. The Arts of Remembrance in Early Modern England maps the new terrain of remembrance in the post-Reformation and charts the creative re-fashioning of remembrance in material, textual and performance culture.
The early modern period inherited a deeply-ingrained culture of Christian remembrance that proved a platform for creativity in a remarkable variety of forms. From the literature of church ritual to the construction of monuments; from portraiture to the arrangement of domestic interiors; from the development of textual rites to drama of the contemporary stage, the early modern world practiced 'arts of remembrance' at every turn. The turmoils of the Reformation and its aftermath transformed the habits of creating through remembrance. Ritually observed and radically reinvented, remembrance was a focal point of the early modern cultural imagination for an age when beliefs both crossed and divided communities of the faithful. The Arts of Remembrance in Early Modern England maps the new terrain of remembrance in the post-Reformation period, charting its negotiations with the material, the textual and the performative.
'The Arts of Remembrance in Early Modern England offers a compelling view of the processes of memorialisation and of remembering, ranging from ecclesiastical practice to literary production, visual culture, and the stage. The collection brings together established scholars and exciting new voices, to consider the wide-ranging effects of the Reformation, and the recurring presence of the dead.' Helen Smith, University of York, UK '... what makes this book truly valuable to students, teachers, and researchers of English literature and cultural studies is the high quality of the essays, each in its own right as well as when seen collectively as constituting a coherent area of inquiry involving material, textual and theatrical instantiations of the arts of remembrance. Insofar as each essay represents the highest caliber of responsible scholarly endeavor and presents hard-won and compelling research findings, this book is a significant contribution to the fertile and ever-widening field of early modern memory studies.' Seventeenth-Century News '... striking, thought-provoking ... sure to excite further debate within the field of memory studies.' Renaissance Quarterly 'The subjects of these essays are diverse and will be of use to historians and scholars of literature and theatre. Coupled with their focus on changing post-Reformation culture, they make for fascinating reading, and an invaluable resource for scholars of memory and post-Reformation religious culture.' Parergon 'Consistent with the Ashgate series to which it belongs ... the volume casts a wide cultural-materialist net over its topic in that the term "materiality" covers at once social practices, reading strategies, artifacts and monuments, book history, and performance, offering a scholarly cornucopia to SHARP members.' SHARP News 'Everyone interested in its subject should look at this volume with care for there is much useful material in it. Some of this has more relevance to church monuments than
