“crittickize uppon the smallest word”: Anne Southwell and the place of gender in early modern criticism’

TY - CHAP

T1 - “crittickize uppon the smallest word”: Anne Southwell and the place of gender in early modern criticism’

AU - Scott-Baumann, Elizabeth Jane

PY - 2019/3/21

Y1 - 2019/3/21

N2 - Even as the last half century has seen a growing canon of early modern women poets, prose writers and playwrights, we still have no acknowledged tradition of early women critics. This essay argues that women did write critically, in varied places including manuscript miscellanies, paratexts, poems and letters. Lady Anne Southwell’s two diverse manuscript collections include a defense of poetry and many profoundly critical poems which reveal the range and depth of early modern women’s engagement with traditions of criticism and with questions of theory, style and gender.

AB - Even as the last half century has seen a growing canon of early modern women poets, prose writers and playwrights, we still have no acknowledged tradition of early women critics. This essay argues that women did write critically, in varied places including manuscript miscellanies, paratexts, poems and letters. Lady Anne Southwell’s two diverse manuscript collections include a defense of poetry and many profoundly critical poems which reveal the range and depth of early modern women’s engagement with traditions of criticism and with questions of theory, style and gender.

KW - women

KW - gender

KW - poetry

KW - manuscript

KW - criticism

M3 - Chapter

BT - The Places of Early Modern Criticism

A2 - Marr, Alexander

A2 - Gilby, Emma

A2 - Alexander, Gavin

PB - Oxford Univerity Press; Oxford

ER -