Ruin And Reformation In Spenser Shakespeare And Marvell

Ruin And Reformation In Spenser, Shakespeare, And Marvell Explores Writerly Responses To The Religious Violence Of The Long Reformation In England And Wales, Spanning Over A Century Of Literature And History, From The Establishment Of The National Church Under Henry Viii (1534), To Its Disestablishment Under Oliver Cromwell (1653). It Focuses On Representations Of Ruined Churches, Monasteries, And Cathedrals In The Works Of A Range Of English Protestant Writers, Including Spenser, Shakespeare, Jonson, Herbert, Denham, And Marvell, Reading Literature Alongside Episodes In English Reformation History: From The Dissolution Of The Monasteries And The Destruction Of Church Icons And Images, To The Puritan Reforms Of The 1640s. The Study Departs From Previous Responses To Literatures 'bare Ruined Choirs', Which Tend To Read Writerly Ambivalence Towards The Dissolution Of The Monasteries As Evidence Of Traditionalist, Catholic, Or Laudian Nostalgia For The Pre-reformation Church.