Thomas Traherne and Seventeenth-century Thought

Thomas Traherne and Seventeenth-century Thought PDF

Author: Elizabeth S. Dodd

Publisher: Boydell & Brewer

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 245

ISBN-13: 1843844249

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Thomas Traherne has all too often been defined and studied as a solitary thinker, "out of his time", and not as a participant in the complex intellectual currents of the period. The essays collected here take issue with this reading, placing Traherne firmly in his historical context and situating his work within broader issues in seventeenth-century studies and the history of ideas. They draw on recently published textual discoveries alongside manuscripts which will soon be published for the first time. They address major themes in Traherne studies, including Traherne's understanding of matter and spirit, his attitude towards happiness and holiness, his response to solitude and society, and his Anglican identity. As a whole, the volume aims to re-ignite discussion on settled readings of Traherne's work, to reconsider issues in Traherne scholarship which have long lain dormant, and to supplement our picture of the man and his writings through new discoveries and insights. Elizabeth S. Dodd is programme leader for the MA in theology, ministry and mission and lecturer in theology, imagination and culture at Sarum College, Salisbury; Cassandra Gorman is lecturer in English at Trinity College, Cambridge. Contributors: Jacob Blevins, Warren Chernaik, Phoebe Dickerson, Elizabeth S. Dodd, Ana Elena Gonz lez-Trevi o, Cassandra Gorman, Carol Ann Johnston, Alison Kershaw, Kathryn Murphy

Boundless Innocence in Thomas Traherne's Poetic Theology

Boundless Innocence in Thomas Traherne's Poetic Theology PDF

Author: Elizabeth S. Dodd

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-03-16

Total Pages: 255

ISBN-13: 1317172930

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The seventeenth-century poet and divine Thomas Traherne finds innocence in every stage of existence. He finds it in the chaos at the origins of creation as well as in the blessed order of Eden. He finds it in the activities of grace and the hope of glory, but also in the trials of misery and even in the abyss of the Fall. Boundless Innocence in Thomas Traherne’s Poetic Theology traces innocence through Traherne’s works as it transgresses the boundaries of the estates of the soul. Using grammatical and literary categories it explores various aspects of his poetic theology of innocence, uncovering the boundless desire which is embodied in the yearning cry: ’Were all Men Wise and Innocent...’ Recovering and reinterpreting a key but increasingly neglected theme in Traherne’s poetic theology, this book addresses fundamental misconceptions of the meaning of innocence in his work. Through a contextual and theological approach, it indicates the unexplored richness, complexity and diversity of this theme in the history of literature and theology.

The Voluble Soul

The Voluble Soul PDF

Author: Richard Willmott

Publisher: Lutterworth Press

Published: 2021-06-24

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 0718848306

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"The world's fair beauty set my soul on fire." In this first study of the full range of Traherne's poetry Richard Willmott explains his 'metaphysical' poetry to all who are attracted by the beauty of his language, but puzzled by his meaning. He offers guidance both for the student of English, uncertain about Traherne's theological ideas, and the student of theology, put off by seventeenth-century poetic conventions and diction. Using a wealth of quotation, he examines Traherne's verse alongside that of a variety of his contemporaries, including Andrew Marvell, Lucy Hutchinson, Anne Bradstreet and Edward Taylor. Central to Traherne's poetry and generous theology is his delight in the capacity of his soul to approach God through an appreciation of His infinite creation. This soul is 'voluble', not only because it can express its thoughts with fluency, but also because it can enfold within itself the infinity of God's creation, taking in everything that it perceives, considering the latest scientific speculations about the atom and astronomy, but also looking clear-sightedly at Restoration society's materialism and - in one startlingly savage satire - the corruption of the royal court.

Thomas Traherne and the Felicities of the Mind

Thomas Traherne and the Felicities of the Mind PDF

Author: James J. Balakier

Publisher:

Published: 2014-05-14

Total Pages: 237

ISBN-13: 9781624992834

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Thomas Traherne (1637-1674) was one of the most original writers of the early modern period. The exciting discovery of his lost manuscripts at the beginning of the twentieth century aroused an intense interest among poetry lovers and scholars of seventeenth-century literature, which has continued to this day. The finding of other challenging Traherne manuscripts over the course of the century has furthered the study of this remarkable "radically optimistic" figure.The most important contribution of this book is to demonstrate that Felicity is not a simplistic or sentimental notion but is grounded in a cognitive experience, which has been the subject of considerable research in recent decades. The book is framed by an introductory chapter that shows Traherne's position in the early modern history of a science of cognition and a concluding chapter that relates his discovery of a holistic state of consciousness to twentieth-century theoretical and experimental developments. The second and third chapters concentrate on what are recognized to be Traherne's core texts on Felicity, the Centuries and the Dobell folio poem sequence. The analysis of these two works uncovers the deep structures of Traherne's thought and sets the stage for the examination of other texts relevant to his foremost subject, Felicity. The fourth chapter investigates the seminal part played by Felicity in other poetry and prose, including Traherne's Felicity-based ethical treatise Christian Ethicks and the encyclopedic Commentaries of Heaven, which combines poetry with prose. Also included in this investigation are poems which, in effect, constitute another sequence--albeit a sequence badly edited by Traherne's brother Philip after Traherne's death. The subsequent chapter explores the presence of Felicity in texts contained in the Lambeth manuscript, discovered at the end of the twentieth century. These texts confirm the intellectual depth and sublime artistry with which Traherne communicated his cognitive breakthrough. Thomas Traherne and the Felicities of the Mind is an important, timely addition to all literature and British cultural collections.

Poetic Priesthood in the Seventeenth Century

Poetic Priesthood in the Seventeenth Century PDF

Author: Tessie Prakas

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2022-08-25

Total Pages: 253

ISBN-13: 0192857126

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Poetic Priesthood reads seventeenth-century devotional verse as staging a surprising competition between poetry and the established church. The work of John Donne, George Herbert, Richard Crashaw, John Milton, and Thomas Traherne suggests that the demands of faith are better understood by poets than by priests--even while four of these authors were also ordained. While recent scholarship has tended to emphasize the shaping influence of the liturgy on the poetry of this period, this book argues that verse instead presents readers with a mode of articulating piety that relies on formal experimentation, and that varies from the forms of the church rather than straightforwardly reproducing them. In crafting this poetic aid to devotion, these authors practiced an alternative and even more ample form of ministry than in their ecclesiastical activities. In the wake of the Reformation, the liturgy of the English church centered on rituals of communal prayer and praise, but the poetry considered in this study suggests that such rituals in fact risk distracting worshippers from the pleasures and challenges of navigating an individual relationship with God. Yet these poets do not make this suggestion by rejecting communal rituals outright. Their verse invokes ecclesiastical practice as a basis for formal innovation that suggests how intimacy with the divine might look, feel, and sound, connecting humans with their God more precisely and more individually than the liturgy can. As they shift between explicit comment on the liturgy and more subtle departures from it in the interplay of verse form and denotation, these authors claim the work of priesthood for poetry.

Fall Narratives

Fall Narratives PDF

Author: Zohar Hadromi-Allouche

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-12-01

Total Pages: 267

ISBN-13: 1317136683

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Throughout history the motif of ‘the Fall’ has impacted upon our understanding of theology and philosophy and has had an influence on everything from literature to dance. Fall Narratives brings together theologians, historians and artists as well as philosophers and scholars of religion and literature, to explore and reflect on a wide range of concepts of the Fall. Bringing a fresh understanding of the nuanced meanings of the Fall and its various manifestations over time and across space, contributions reflect on the ways in which the Fall can be seen as a transition into absence; how conceptions of the Fall relate to, change, and shape one another; and how the Fall can be seen positively, embracing as it does a narrative of hope.

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