London has provided the setting and inspiration for a host of literary works in English, from canonical masterpieces to the popular and ephemeral. Drawing upon a variety of methods and materials, the essays in this volume explore the London of Langland and the Peasants' Rebellion, of Shakespeare and the Elizabethan stage, of Pepys and the Restoration coffee house, of Dickens and Victorian wealth and poverty, of Conrad and the Empire, of Woolf and the wartime Blitz, of Naipaul and postcolonial immigration, and of contemporary globalism. Contributions from historians, art historians, theorists and media specialists as well as leading literary scholars exemplify current approaches to genre, gender studies, book history, performance studies and urban studies. In showing how the tradition of English literature is shaped by representations of London, this volume also illuminates the relationship between the literary imagination and the society of one of the world's greatest cities.
London has provided the setting and inspiration for a host of literary works in English, from canonical masterpieces to the popular and ephemeral. Drawing upon a variety of methods and materials, the essays in this volume explore the London of Langland and the Peasants' Rebellion, of Shakespeare and the Elizabethan stage, of Pepys and the Restoration coffee house, of Dickens and Victorian wealth and poverty, of Conrad and the Empire, of Woolf and the wartime Blitz, of Naipaul and postcolonial immigration, and of contemporary globalism. Contributions from historians, art historians, theorists and media specialists as well as leading literary scholars exemplify current approaches to genre, gender studies, book history, performance studies and urban studies. In showing how the tradition of English literature is shaped by representations of London, this volume also illuminates the relationship between the literary imagination and the society of one of the world's greatest cities.
In the two hundred years from 1475 London was transformed from a medieval commune into a metropolis of half a million people, a capital city and a major European trading centre. New possibilities emerged for cultural exchange and combination, social and political order, and literary expression. Integrating literary and historical analysis, and drawing on recent work in literary theory and cultural studies, Literature and Culture in Early Modern London provides a comprehensive account of the changing image and influence of London in lyrics, ballads, jests, epics, satires, plays, pageants, chronicles, treatises, sermons and official documents. Lawrence Manley shows how the literature and culture of London contributed to the new structures of capitalism, the process of 'behaviour urbanisation', and a paradoxical liberation of the individual through the city's concentrated power.
In this major contribution to theater history and cultural studies, authors Lawrence Manley and Sally-Beth MacLean paint a lively portrait of Lord Strange’s Men, a daring company of players that domin
