Sidney's 'The Defence of Poesy' and Selected Renaissance Literary Criticism

by Various, Gavin Alexander (Introduction), Gavin Alexander (Noted by)

Overview

Controversy raged through England during the 1570-80s as Puritans denounced all manner of games & pastimes as a danger to public morals. Writers quickly turrned their attention to their own art and the first and most influential response came with Philip Sidney's Defense. Here he set out to answer contemporary critics and, with reference to Classical models of criticism, formulated a manifesto for English literature. Also includes George Puttenham's Art of English Poesy, Samuel Daniel's Defence of Rhyme, and passages by writers such as Ben Jonson, Francis Bacon, and George Gascoigne.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780141439389
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	06/29/2004
Series:	Penguin Classics Series
Pages:	544
Sales rank:	880,164
Product dimensions:	5.11(w) x 7.80(h) x 1.23(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Gavin Alexander is a University Assistant Lecturer in English & Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge, and has written on the Sidney family and circle and the literary response to him.

Table of Contents

Sidney's 'The Defence of Poesy' and Selected Renaissance Literary CriticismChronology
Introduction
Further Reading
A Note on the Texts

Sir Philip Sidney
The Defence of Poesy (c.1580; printed 1595)

George Puttingham
Th Art of English Poesy (1589)

Samuel Daniel
A Defence of Rhyme (1603)

Selected Passages
George Gascoigne
Certain Notes of Instruction (1575)

Henry Peachum
The Garden of Eloquence (1577; 1593)

William Webbe
A Discourse of English Poetry (1586)

Sir John Harington
A Brief Apology of Poetry (1591)

Samuel Daniel from Musophilus: Containing a General Defence of Learning (1599)

Thomas Campion from Observations in the Art of English (1602)

Francis Bacon from The Advancement of Learning (1605)

Michael Drayton
To Henry Reynolds, or Poets and Poesy (1627)

Sir William Alexander from Anacrisis. Or a Censure of some Poets Ancient and Modern (c. 1655)

Ben Jonson
A Fit of Rhyme against Rhyme (before 1637)

Ben Jonson from Horace, his Age of Poetry (before 1637)

A Note on Rhetoric
A Note on English Versification
Notes
Index