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The Typographic Imaginary in Early Modern English Literature PDF

217 Pages·2018·5.108 MB·English
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The Typographic Imaginary in Early Modern English Literature The Typographic Imaginary in Early Modern English Literature contributes to the understanding of how printing changed early modern English literary culture. Rachel Stenner discusses printers’ manuals; William Caxton’s paratexts; Robert Copland’s dialogues; the prose fictions of William Baldwin, George Gascoigne and Thomas Nashe; and the courtly poetry of Edmund Spenser. This study argues that early modern English literature engages imaginatively with printing and generates a particular aesthetic: the typographic imaginary. Rachel Stenner lectures in Renaissance Literature at the University of Sheffield, UK. Material Readings in Early Modern Culture Series editor: James Daybell Plymouth University, UK Adam Smyth Balliol College, University of Oxford, UK The series provides a forum for studies that consider the material forms of texts as part of an investigation into the culture of early modern England. The editors invite proposals of a multi- or interdisciplinary nature, and particularly welcome proposals that combine archival research with an attention to theoretical models that might illuminate the reading, writing, and making of texts, as well as projects that take innovative approaches to the study of material texts, both in terms of the kinds of primary materials under investigation, and in terms of methodologies. What are the questions that have yet to be asked about writing in its various possible embodied forms? Are there varieties of materiality that are critically neglected? How does form mediate and negotiate content? In what ways do the physical features of texts inform how they are read, interpreted and situated? Recent in this series: The Elizabethan Top Ten Defining Print Popularity in Early Modern England Edited by Andy Kesson and Emma Smith Print Letters in Seventeenth-Century England Politics, Religion, and News Culture By Gary Schneider Singing the News Ballads in Mid-Tudor England By Jenni Hyde Text, Food And The Early Modern Reader Eating Words By Jason Scott-Warren and Andrew Zurcher Reading Drama in Tudor England By Tamara Atkin The Typographic Imaginary in Early Modern English Literature Rachel Stenner First published 2019 by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 and by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2019 Taylor & Francis The right of Rachel Stenner to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN: 978-1-4724-8042-2 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-55185-2 (ebk) Typeset in Sabon by Apex CoVantage, LLC This book is dedicated to Indiana, Joseph, and Jane. Contents List of figures ix Acknowledgements x Note on quotation xi Abbreviations xii Introduction: print and the difference it makes 1 Implications 5 Critical mapping 11 Cases 17 1 Instructional texts and print symbolism: Christopher Plantin, Hieronymus Hornschuch, and Joseph Moxon 32 Processes 35 People 46 Conclusion 51 2 An emergent typographic imaginary in William Caxton’s paratexts 56 Life in literature, diplomacy, and commerce 59 The benefits of printing in Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye 60 Imagined typographic space 64 Reorganising continuity: Mirrour of the World 71 Conclusion 76 3 Robert Copland, Thomas Blague, and the printer–author dialogue 83 Printer–author dialogue and its mutations 84 Characterising the printer: gatekeepers of the press 89 Print and metacommunication: uses of the dialogue form 98 Conclusion 104 viii Contents 4 Protestant printing and humanism in Beware the Cat: undoing printing 110 Protestant printer and humanist scholar 112 Dead bodies and printer’s devils 116 Printing and penning 120 Conclusion 122 5 George Gascoigne and Richard Tottel: negotiating manuscript and print in the poetic miscellany 128 Typographic value in the prefatory poses of A Hundreth Sundrie Flowres 132 The benefits of printing in The Posies of George Gascoigne Esquire 139 Conclusion 142 6 Edmund Spenser’s early and mid-career: public image and machine horror 147 Early career self-presentation: The Shepheardes Calender and Three Proper, and Wittie, Familiar Letters 148 Monstrous typographic fertility in The Faerie Queene 153 Resonant Errour in ‘The Teares of the Muses’ 161 Conclusion 163 7 St Paul’s Churchyard and the meanings of print: Pierce Penilesse His Supplication to the Diuell 169 Nashe’s mosaic of the print trade 173 Waste and matter 179 The figurative authority of print 183 Conclusion 184 Conclusion: love and loathing in Grub Street 188 Index 197 Figures 1.1 ‘Typographus’ woodcut by Joost Amman from The Book of Trades (1568). © Trustees of the British Museum (1904, 0206.103.20) 40 1.2 Woodcut from La Grante Danse Macabre des Hommes et des Femmes (The great dance of death), printed by Matthias Hus in Lyons, 1499. © The British Library Board (I.B.41735, G.1) 45 2.1 William Caxton’s Advertisement (1477). © The Huntington Library, San Marino, California (Z232.C38, A3) 57 2.2 Engraving from Elizabeth Woodville’s copy of William Caxton’s Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye (1473). © The Huntington Library, San Marino, California (62222) 67 3.1 Detail of a page from Everyman, printed by John Skot in 1528. © The Huntington Library, San Marino, California (14195) 86 3.2 Detail of the first page of Robert Copland’s dialogue in William Neville’s The Castell of Pleasure (1530). © The Huntington Library, San Marino, California (49038) 87

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