Slotkin, Joel Elliot. Sinister aesthetics : the appeal of evil in early modern English literature

Folger bibliographic ID: 352897
Folger call number: PR408.E85 S56 2017
Folger holdings ID: 501430

This engrossing volume studies the poetics of evil in early modern English culture, reconciling the Renaissance belief that literature should uphold morality with the compelling and attractive representations of evil throughout the period's literature. The chapters explore a variety of texts, including Spenser's Faerie Queene, Shakespeare's Richard III, broadside ballads, and sermons, culminating in a new reading of Paradise Lost and a novel understanding of the dynamic interaction between aesthetics and theology in shaping seventeenth century Protestant piety. Through these discussions, the book introduces the concept of "sinister aesthetics": artistic conventions that can make representations of the villainous, monstrous, or hellish pleasurable

General notes

Includes bibliographical references (pages 267-280) and index

Contents

Introduction: Representing evil in early modern England -- "Dreadful harmony" : the poetics of evil in Sidney, Tasso, and Spenser -- Honeyed toads : sinister aesthetics in Richard III -- Monsters and the pleasures of divine justice in English popular print, 1560-1675 -- Satanic sensibilities in Paradise lost -- Milton's sinister God : poetic justice and chiaroscuro in Paradise lost -- Epilogue: The sinister after Milton

Extended title: Sinister aesthetics : the appeal of evil in early modern English literature / Joel Elliot Slotkin

English literature Good and evil in literature Evil in literature Englisch Frühneuenglisch Literatur Das Unheimliche Das Böse

author: Slotkin, Joel Elliot