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The Poetry of Kissing in Early Modern Europe: From the Catullan Revival to Secundus, Shakespeare and the English Cavaliers
Contributor(s): Wong, Alex (Author)
ISBN: 1843844664     ISBN-13: 9781843844662
Publisher: Boydell & Brewer
OUR PRICE:   $133.00  
Product Type: Hardcover
Published: June 2017
Qty:
Additional Information
BISAC Categories:
- Literary Criticism | European - General
- Literary Criticism | English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh
LCCN: 2016590271
Series: Studies in Renaissance Literature
Physical Information: 1.1" H x 6.2" W x 9.3" (1.70 lbs) 368 pages
Themes:
- Cultural Region - British Isles
 
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc.
Publisher Description:

There is a great deal of kissing in Renaissance poetry, but modern critics do not generally recognise (as early readers did) that the literary conventions of the kiss were closely related to a fully-formed, lively and popular genre of Neo-Latin -kissing-poems-. Beginning with the imitation of Catullus in fifteenth-century Italy, this specialised form was securely established in the next century by the Dutch poet Janus Secundus, whose elegant Basia (-Kisses-) were an extraordinary international success. Secundus stimulated a long-lived tradition of Latin and vernacular -kisses-, willfully repetitious and yet meticulously varied, which can tell us much about humanist poetics. This book offers a critical account of the Renaissance kiss-poem, using an abundance of vivid and often racy examples, many of them drawn from authors who are all but forgotten today. It shows that the genre had a sophisticated rationale and clear but flexible conventions. These include habits of irony, mood and structure that proved widely influential, and some slippery, self-conscious ways of dealing with masculine sexuality. Presenting new readings of English writers including Sidney, Shakespeare and Donne, the study also reminds us how important Neo-Latin writing was to the literary culture of early modern Britain. A number of well known texts are thus placed in a context unfamiliar to most modern scholars, in order to show how deftly their kisses engage with an international tradition of humanist poetry. Alex Wong is currently a Research Fellow in English literature at St John's College, University of Cambridge.


Contributor Bio(s): Wong, Alex: - St John's College, University of Cambridge; Research Fellow.