The prologue studies the Tory publication of Milton's Character of the Long Parliament (1681). It argues that the provenance of this tract is best explained if Milton did in fact attempt to include the Digression in his History of Britain. Further ambiguities in Milton's early reputation are discussed in a review of the History's reception. Chapter I surveys Milton's response to the long­ standing demand for a national history and briefly reconsiders his ideas on history and historiography. Chapter II proposes that his political sympathies led Milton to look to the British legends for his historical subject. The strong Protestant and Tudor associations of such native myth have been largely overlooked, and yet they bear strongly on Milton's proposals for a British historical poem. His reappraisal of the myths in the History indicates his disillusionment with his original historical project: and reflects his changing opinion of the national character. Chapter III charts Milton's response to the legends surrounding Lucius, Constantine and the early British church, and traces conflicts between his need to deny church history and his desire to rewrite it. It then turns to his curiously muted views on the Saxon church. Chapter IV compares the use of Gildas's De Excidio in the History with Milton's relative silence on Arthur. Milton's regard for this ancient British jeremiad recalls that of the Reformers and suggests the instability of his commitment to purely classical styles of historiography in his time. Chapter V surveys the conflicting ideological and religious pressures on the history of the Saxons and the Conquest and compares Milton's shifting response to these in his political tracts with his views in the History. The Epilogue returns to Milton's view of the national character, with special reference to the Digression. Presenting his references to climate theory in a wider context, it argues that in moving from a loosely predestinarian position to a belief in free will, Milton first sought some determining natural force to explain England's conduct through the ages.

This thesis involves a study of theatre in early 17th century London, focussing on the work of the boy companies. These were theatre companies made up entirely of child actors, who performed on the stages of the private theatres up until about 1609. The attitude that I take is that the performances staged by these companies constituted a separate theatre-form or performance-practice of its own, and accordingly I approach the plays put on by these companies as being part of a specific repertoire, the study of which nevertheless bears wide implications for our understanding of the culture of early modern London. Regarding their performances in terms of the possibilities which they offered for the de-familiarisation of cultural practices, of selfconsciously staging conventions in high relief, I have followed a seam of scepticism surrounding the representation of identity in this culture. My 'thesis' is that within the cultural practice that this theatre constituted there was an acute awareness of the inconsistencies and evasions which existed within the strategies of self-fashioning in the urban setting, an awareness which was ironically distinguished by a highly ambivalent theatricality. The first chapter involves a reading of one of the last and certainly most demanding plays written for this theatre, Epicoene or The Silent Woman by Ben Jonson. Growing out of Jacques Lacan's studies of subjectivity and the subjective gaze, I approach this playas a performance-text which directly and self-consciously addresses issues of performance and dramaturgy. In chapter two I site the space of the theatre itself with reference to other available 'playing spaces', in particular the banqueting-house and the city itself, as I draw in other plays of the repertoire. The thesis concludes with a discussion of the body of the child as being constructed in this culture as an ambiguous site of passivity and self-avoidance, out of which I turn to deal with the constituting and performing of male and female gender.

No description available.

Critical studies on the comic drama of the seventeenth-century French playwright, Jean-Baptiste Poquelin de Moliere (1622-1673), center attention on biography, production, stylistics, and thematic development. Because of the diversity of themes, and because of the considerable productivity of this dramatist, the analyses of the style and substance of these comedies have often been focused on the use of themes or techniques employed in a single comedy or associated with one single sort of comedy. This thesis, "Farce, critique sociale, et ccm6die morale chez Moliere," proposes to deepen, in two ways, our appreciation of Moliere's combined use of themes and techniques that, in turn, create three sorts of comic modes. First, through a close reading of three of Moliere's major plays (Le medecin malgre lul, Les Precieuses ridicules, and Misanthrope), this thesis attempts to describe the techniques that develop and elucidate a particular comic focus, and thereby enhances our awareness of Moliere's recognition of the necessary relationship between theme and technique in the creation of comedy. The description of this use of comic techniques and the subsequent development of themes encourage classification of these representative plays into three sorts: farce, social comedy, and moral comedy. Such a classification thus expands the narrow perspective of criticism, and encourages a study of the necessary relationship between theme and technique and, perhaps, will suggest future study of the development of Moliere's comic artistry. / Department of Foreign Languages

Edward Taylor indicates an awareness of 17th century religious melancholy in his "Preparatory Meditations," but the minister is largely excluded from current discourse surrounding religious melancholy in Puritan communities. Taylor's presence in this conversation serves to further understanding of religious melancholy in America and also of the complex nature of the condition that is of interest at the present time. Through an analysis of dominant images of the conversion experience from Edward Taylor's poetry, this thesis argues that Taylor provides intimate knowledge of the nature of religious melancholy and also offers a treatment option for the ailing Puritan in the form of hope for salvation.

Discussion in this dissertation is directed toward the lute, vihuela and guitar's notational systems and practices: chapters two, three, four, and five are concerned with the stylistic changes in the notations. The history of the tablatures is presented in a paralled fashion with that of the four-course and five-course guitars. An attempt is made to eliminate the guitarist's lack of knowledge about most practices and about subtle differences in performance. This is accomplished by presenting the development of these notations from the Renaissance to the present day.This study is concerned with the mastery and understanding of notation. After an introduction, the second chapter discusses three main tablatures for the lute and vihuela. It is important to confine oneself to the tablatures, in order that they be throughly understood. Thusthe third chapter deals with ornamentations, the fourth chapter with four-course, five course, six-course and six-string guitar notations, and the fifth chapter encompasses progressive notationfor the modern guitar. Systems for folk and commercial music are not addressed in this paper.The author hopes that with the use of this dissertation, tablatures can be handled with less difficulty and put into proper perspective. Careful thought has been given in selecting representative examples and notational literature excerpts as illustrations for the reader and/or performer. These examples need not only be studied but can be used as preparation for any other related composition. The purpose of this study is to supply teachers, students, and guitarists with a ready-reference guide to the notational practices for the lute, vihuela and guitar, a subject previously shrouded in confusion. / School of Music

The area of early music, especially of its performance, is yet young. Classes in early music performance are offered in only approximately a quarter of the nations colleges and universities, and these are found to vary widely in levels of both faculty and student proficiency, and in the authenticity achieved, resulting from available instruments and knowledge of styles and performance practices affecting interpretation. Although standard sources exist on performance practice, their information on the baroque period highly outweighs that on the Middle Ages or Renaissance. All three periods are encompassed by this writer within early music. Sources regarding practical concerns of an early music program are quite rare., and it is primarily in the few schools granting degrees in early music that a student might learn administrative skills. The lack of funds for instruments or for a faculty specialist often deters the inception of such a program. This guide is intended to serve as a resource tool for the non-specialist already on a faculty, who may happen into the position of collegium director., as well as the interested early musician who cannot attend one of those specializing schools, and who may not have the background to pursue the interest authentically. The hope is to fill a perceived need for a single source, treating both practical matters of directing a program and performance practice of all three.Each of the chapter topics is riled with conflict., both from early and modern writers, so that often concrete solutions cannot be given., and many questions remain unanswered. This work is meant to be a compendium of the many ideas and interpretations,, offering suggestions where possible, otherwise directing the reader to further sources for his own pursuit of solutions. It is hoped that through this work and its reference directions, readers may gain information to help recreate the sounds of early music with as much efficiency., and particularly, authenticity as possible.

The popularity of religious art in late seventeenth century Protestant England stands in apparent contradiction to the profound anti-Catholic sentiment that many current scholars argue characterizes the period. A close analysis of London auction catalogs from 1690 reveals that a significant number of all pictures listed for sale featured typically Catholic subject matter. Consulting both seventeenth century literature and current scholarship provides a rationale for this apparent contradiction. Factional conflict within Protestantism itself was often focused on the issue of religious imagery. Accordingly, it functioned as a means of articulating religious difference. While the radical Puritan mission may have involved abolishing all English "monuments of superstition," Anglicanism held biblical and hagiographic imagery to be an essential aspect of Christian worship. This thesis argues that Anglicans embraced religious imagery as a means of rejecting the Puritan cause and, in doing so, forged a unique Anglican identity.

Among Marston's earliest works are two books of verse satires (Certaine Satyres and The Scourge of Villanie, both 1598) and three plays (Antonio and Mellida, Antonio's Revenge and What You Will, all between 1600-1602) in which he explored the composition of human identity. From the initial premiss that the self is socially constructed and tends always to be dependent on the social and material contexts in which it exists, he developed a conception of existential struggle, in which the individual self either succumbs to the influence of its environment, or else achieves an authentic autonomy by imposing its own reality on the world around it. The thesis is in five main parts. Chapter I reviews theories of identity in the sixteenth century, analyses the Roman verse satires on which Elizabethan satires were modelled, and gives an account of the developments in English society at the end of the sixteenth century that helped to generate a satirical discourse in which anxiety as to the stability of the self was prominent. Chapter II examines these satires, focusing on Marston but paying close attention also to such other authors as Donne, Hall, Guilpin, Lodge and the anonymous author of Micro-Cynicon. Chapters III and IV are a close reading of the three plays named above; it is argued that in them Marston developed the ideas about identity which he had first conceived in the satires into a considered anatomy of the self. Chapter V looks briefly at Marston's later plays, especially Sophonisba (1606) with the same principles in mind. As will be apparent, the emphasis of the thesis is on Marston as a thinker, rather than as a poetic technician or man of the theatre, although these aspects of him are considered where they are relevant.

It is not surprising that most detailed analysis of parliamentary politics during the mid to later 1640s has been directed at the so-called Independent Party. In particular, the work of Mrs. Pearl and David Underdown has achieved a great deal in revealing a clearer picture of the character, personnel and objectives of that party; and in so doing they have also improved our general knowledge of party politics at Westminster. Even so, the detailed character of this recent research has created the need for a similar analysis of those politicians or grandees who constituted the Presbyterian Party. No clear appreciation of party divisions in the two Houses of the parliament is possible without restoring a balance in our understanding of both parties. Indeed, I feel that such a study is essential to enable us to reappraise certain interpretations and to propose different ones where concentration on one area of party politics has resulted in distortion or misleading conclusions. Consequently it has been my purpose in this study of the Presbyterian Party to follow its career from late 1643 to the early autumn of 1647, as well as revealing something of the political background to the alliance of the Scots Comissioners and the Earl of Essex's group. I have also sought to illustrate the conflict in its broadest context by investigating not only how the character of the two 'parties' was affected by the parliamentary tactics they employed, but also the extra-parliamentary contacts and strategy of the Presbyterian party or alliance. Without an understanding of political and religious developments in the City of London, and the intricacies of Montereul's mission, only a partial view of the activities of such leaders as Densil Helles and Sir Philip Stapleton would be obtained. Chapter 1 serves as an introduction to the thesis, and attempts to provide a critical indication of the current state of research into the development of parties in the Long Parliament. I recognise the significance of local and regional interests as factors affecting political activities at Westminster, whilst emphasising the importance of a developing national consciousness amongst the 'grandees' of both Houses in the formation of party groups. I also examine the emergence of religious terms to describe these groups, seeking to ascertain how and why they were adopted and to what extent they reflected the importance of religious differences as the basis of party divisions. The application of religious terms to political groups is traced to royalist confusion, clerical concern for a settled church government in both the Assembly and the City of London, and in particular the preoccupation of the Scottish allies with presbyterianism. Parliamentary sources tend to restrict the political use of the terms 'presbyterian' and 'independent' to the years 1646 and 1647, but I show that the realignment of groups at Westminster which provided the reality behind these terms occurred considerably earlier in the autumn of 1644. Finally I include in Chapter 1 a brief analysis of the Earl of Essex's group or party designed to reveal the political role of the earl and the character of his relationship with his leading advisers in the House of Commons.