I have one chapter finished, many more in draft, and I'm stuck on the first chapter, which is holding me up terribly. The goal in all of this is to write a little bit each day, but I've hit a serious wall these months and with the job market in full swing I'm having trouble getting any traction. The first chapter is essentially outlined, and most of the research is done; for some reason I'm just mired in it.
So here's the general breakdown. The dissertation at large argues that Queen Elizabeth's succession caused a tremendous amount of stress and frustration for the English because she forbade any discussion of the subject and she refused to name an heir. As the Virgin Queen aged beyond any possibility of marriage or producing an heir, the English wondered who would succeed and if that transition would be peaceful or would invite civil war and/or foreign invasion. Because the question was cloistered, it had the effect of stirring anxiety and initiating a reappraisal of the past to help predict the future. My dissertation largely focuses on the literary responses to this context and hopes to show how certain genres, like the sonnet, Ovidian epic, and satire, were particularly useful vehicles. The genres developed alternative historiographic models which emphasized the distance between past and present, or the present's independence from historical precedent or literary typology. It was a poetic invested in the material present where the construction of knowledge came with collaboration rather than recovery. It was a poetic that emphasized renewal and imagination rather than lineal progression or teleology.
(Apologies if this is still vague - now you know why I'm stuck in the mud.)
So the first chapter describes the sixteenth century's historiographic method of fusing royal genealogy to England's providential emergence. It centers on illustrations of the Tree of Jesse, a
medieval illustration of Isaiah's prophecy of a flower emerging from Jesse's (King David's father) root. The iconography linked New and Old Testament offering a genealogy from David to Jesus, and suggested a lineal logic that organizes the biblical history, with the flower/Christ as the ultimate end.The Tudor's appropriated this and instead of the recumbent Jesse at the bottom they placed both the Dukes of York and Lancaster. These adorned history books, beginning with Hall's The Union of the Two Noble and Illustrative Families (1550), and presented Henry VIII at the top as the flower from the union of the two previously warring factions. After Elizabeth's ascension, she was added to the top and the biblical allusion to the Virigin was even stronger. After the 1580s, however, these icons in many texts began to be removed, and it is this general turn away from providential history that I am documenting, and how it effected the English at the time. How, in other words, did the English grapple with the fact that their lineal connection to the past was about to be broken?
My goal is to have a substantial draft of this monster done by the end of the month so that I can get back to the good stuff: the poetry!
I need to have this monster done by the end of the school year. No other way.
Let's keep reporting on progress, thinking, tips, things to avoid, etc. This really helps curb the isolated misery endemic to writing a diss.
More soon, I hope.
2 comments:
Kevin,
Your dissertation sounds pretty incredible! (In the good sense.) The lineage stuff reminded me of the Merlin's prophecy section of FQ where he traces Britomart's line to Elizabeth (an emphasis on lineage of the past, yet also figures her as the faerie queen, who Arthur is searching for and will marry (an imaginative leap that connects ER and her virtues with Arthur's mythology).
I think the question you're tackling is really interesting--how writers (and thus the culture) perceived and wrestled with the impending break with the past. I wonder, too, how the various throne contenders fit into the scheme. Were some meant to carry on the line, albeit obliquely? Were some meant to carry on the Protestant lineage begun by HVIII, shifting to a less blood-focused lineage? (I'm rough on my Elizabethan history, so these are real questions for me.) What are the values of the culture that make James the best choice for succession? Are those on display by the 1580s, or did they emerge later? (Please ignore these questions if they're not helpful.)
It's really helpful for me to see what you're ideas your working on. It sounds like you're well on your way, and your deadline sounds totally reasonable.
I'm always happy to look at your writing, if it would help to have other eyes on it.
Thanks amstr for the nice comments. Our shared advisor also sent along some nice comments this weekend, so I'm flying high now.
You're absolutely right with Merlin's prophecy in FQ - only I can't figure out how to get it into the diss. Initially I had a chapter on the epic and defenses of poetry. Many of the epic writers also wrote poetic theory, and I thought initially that the emphasis on the "timelessness" of poetry might be a reaction against the end of the Tudor genealogy. Ultimately the FQ might have to share space with other history writers in the first chapter; or it might help make the transition between history proper, and how it is used in imaginative literature.
The many contenders for the throne all had specific agendas, and it seems that most were not keen on announcing any kind of continuation of Elizabeth's reign (sound familiar to today's politics?). There is evidence that even James, who tried to style himself as the closest, most legitimate cousin to Elizabeth, caught the sense that the country was tired of a female prince and projected manly "virtue" instead. Other contenders were Catholic, foreign and they certainly did not want to carry on the Protestant settlement. There was debate apparently that James was a secret Catholic or that at least he would be sympathetic to the Catholic cause. The messy problem with James is that Henry VIII set up in his will the order of the succession and he specifically did not mention the Stuart line. Some used this to argue that James was disinherited, or that he was of "foreign" birth and therefore could not legally rule. The Jesuit writer Robert Persons used the confusion to argue that since so many contenders are out there with varying degrees of legitimacy the only thing to do was to choose by faith of the prince. His candidate was the Infanta from Spain.
The whole "crisis" came to a head after Mary Queen of Scots was assassinated (1587). It was clear at that point Elizabeth would not bear children and once the nearest rival was put away with the English had to reevaluate how they understood the monarchy and how they defined the right to rule.
It is not my contention that poets offered up their own theories on right to rule. Some obviously did (Spenser may be instructive here; or even Shakespeare's history plays). But I'm after the effects of this reevaluation and how it altered methods of imagining the past's connection to the present and future. The poets from my view are suggesting the present is more independent from the past than historiography suggests; the future has more imaginative possibilities than previously suggested. It also creates an epistemology that focuses more on collaboration than on stable forms or strong centers. According to the poetry, the work of knowing comes from interactions between subjects, not from repeatable precedents or genealogical structures on which the rest of the country depends. It's a poetic which offers strategies for surviving an uncertain future.
It's been a long day, so maybe this is confusing. Thanks for asking, however; it's always helpful to clarify (or try to).
Post a Comment