Wordsworth's Monastic Inheritance

Poetry, Place, and the Sense of Community

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, Poetry History & Criticism
Cover of the book Wordsworth's Monastic Inheritance by Jessica Fay, OUP Oxford
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Jessica Fay ISBN: 9780192548160
Publisher: OUP Oxford Publication: May 3, 2018
Imprint: OUP Oxford Language: English
Author: Jessica Fay
ISBN: 9780192548160
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Publication: May 3, 2018
Imprint: OUP Oxford
Language: English

This is the first extended study of Wordsworth's complex, subtle, and often conflicted engagement with the material and cultural legacies of monasticism. It reveals that a set of topographical, antiquarian, and ecclesiastical sources consulted by Wordsworth between 1806 and 1822 provided extensive details of the routines, structures, landscapes, and architecture of the medieval monastic system. In addition to offering a new way of thinking about religious dimensions of Wordsworth's work and his views on Roman Catholicism, the book offers original insights into a range of important issues in his poetry and prose, including the historical resonances of the landscape, local attachment and memorialization, gardening and cultivation, Quakerism and silence, solitude and community, pastoral retreat and national identity. Wordsworth's interest in monastic history helps explain significant stylistic developments in his writing. In this often-neglected phase of his career, Wordsworth undertakes a series of generic experiments in order to craft poems capable of reformulating and refining taste; he adapts popular narrative forms and challenges pastoral conventions, creating difficult, austere poetry that, he hopes, will encourage contemplation and subdue readers' appetites for exciting narrative action. This book thus argues for the significance and innovative qualities of some of Wordsworth's most marginalized writings. It grants poems such as The White Doe of Rylstone, The Excursion, and Ecclesiastical Sketches the centrality Wordsworth believed they deserved, and reveals how Wordsworth's engagement with the monastic history of his local region inflected his radical strategies for the creation of taste.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

This is the first extended study of Wordsworth's complex, subtle, and often conflicted engagement with the material and cultural legacies of monasticism. It reveals that a set of topographical, antiquarian, and ecclesiastical sources consulted by Wordsworth between 1806 and 1822 provided extensive details of the routines, structures, landscapes, and architecture of the medieval monastic system. In addition to offering a new way of thinking about religious dimensions of Wordsworth's work and his views on Roman Catholicism, the book offers original insights into a range of important issues in his poetry and prose, including the historical resonances of the landscape, local attachment and memorialization, gardening and cultivation, Quakerism and silence, solitude and community, pastoral retreat and national identity. Wordsworth's interest in monastic history helps explain significant stylistic developments in his writing. In this often-neglected phase of his career, Wordsworth undertakes a series of generic experiments in order to craft poems capable of reformulating and refining taste; he adapts popular narrative forms and challenges pastoral conventions, creating difficult, austere poetry that, he hopes, will encourage contemplation and subdue readers' appetites for exciting narrative action. This book thus argues for the significance and innovative qualities of some of Wordsworth's most marginalized writings. It grants poems such as The White Doe of Rylstone, The Excursion, and Ecclesiastical Sketches the centrality Wordsworth believed they deserved, and reveals how Wordsworth's engagement with the monastic history of his local region inflected his radical strategies for the creation of taste.

More books from OUP Oxford

Cover of the book Translation: A Very Short Introduction by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Daisy Miller and An International Episode by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Jesus: A Very Short Introduction by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Liability of Asset Managers by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book The Dance of the Islands by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Type 2 Diabetes by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Practical Procedures in Anaesthesia and Critical Care by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Banking Regulation and Globalization by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Under the Greenwood Tree by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book EU Merger Control by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book The Oxford Handbook of International Business by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book The Semantics of Clause Linking by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book Generic Enrichment in Vergil and Horace by Jessica Fay
Cover of the book The Infinite Cosmos by Jessica Fay
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy