Blackwell Reference Online

This cutting-edge Companion presents a diverse and provocative collection of scholarship on English literature and its contexts from the accession of Henry VII in 1485 to the end of the reign of Elizabeth I in 1603.

Featuring thirty-one newly commissioned essays from both emerging and well-established literary scholars, A Companion to Tudor Literature considers some of the period's most distinctive voices and works. A major focus of the text lies in the literary styles and cultural developments of the first half of the Tudor dynasty - the foundational period that preceded the golden age of Elizabethan England. The Companion explores issues including international influences, religious change, travel and New World discoveries, women's writing, technological innovations, medievalism, and print culture. Also discussed are developments in music, modes of seeing and reading, and implicit questionings of human nature, along with key texts and other representative subjects.

Filled with fresh insight and the latest scholarship, A Companion to Tudor Literature will draw well-deserved attention to this exciting period of literary history.