Literature and Class
From the Peasants' Revolt to the French Revolution
1st Edition
Published on 24. August 2021
352 pages
978-1-5261-2582-8 (ISBN)
Description
This book explores the intimate relationship between literature and class in England (and later Britain) from the Peasants' Revolt at the end of the fourteenth century to the impact of the French Revolution at the end of the eighteenth century and beginning of the nineteenth. The book argues throughout that class cannot be seen as a modern phenomenon that occurred after the Industrial revolution but that class divisions and relations have always structured societies and that it makes sense to assume a historical continuity. The book explores a number of themes relating to class: class consciousness; class conflict; commercialisation; servitude; rebellion; gender relations; and colonisation. After outlining the history of class relations, five chapters explore the ways in which social class consciously and unconsciously influenced a series of writers: Chaucer, Shakespeare, Behn, Rochester, Defoe, Duck, Richardson, Burney, Blake and Wordsworth. -- .
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Manchester
United Kingdom
Edition type
Digital original
ISBN-13
978-1-5261-2582-8 (9781526125828)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Book
08/2021
Manchester University Press
€116.60
Shipment within 15-20 days
Person
Andrew Hadfield is Professor of English at the University of Sussex
Content
- Front matter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction: hidden in plain sight
- Class in England from the late Middle Ages to the end of the eighteenth century
- Perceptions of class in the late Middle Ages
- Class struggle in Renaissance literature
- The Civil War and its aftermath
- An increasingly commercial society, 1700-50
- Gathering pace: Towards the revolutions, 1750-98
- Epilogue: Shelley in Ireland
- Bibliography
- Index
