Premodern Places: Calais to Surinam, Chaucer to Aphra Behn - Hardcover

Wallace, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1405113936 ISBN 13: 9781405113939

Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell, 2004

Synopsis

This book recovers places appearing in the mental mapping of medieval and Renaissance writers, from Chaucer to Aphra Behn.

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• A highly original work, which recovers the places that figure powerfully in premodern imagining.
  
• Recreates places that appear in the works of Langland, Chaucer, Dante, Petrarch, Spenser, Shakespeare, Aphra Behn, and many others.
  
• Begins with Calais – peopled by the English from 1347 to 1558 and ends with Surinam – traded for Manhattan by the English in 1667.
  
• Other particular locations discussed include Flanders, Somerset, Genoa, and the Fortunate Islands (Canary Islands).
  
• Includes fascinating anecdotes, such as the story of an English merchant learning love songs in Calais.
  
• Provides insights into major historical narratives, such as race and slavery in Renaissance Europe.
  
• Crosses the traditional divide between the medieval and Renaissance periods.

About this title

Book Description:

This book recovers places appearing in the mental mapping of medieval and Renaissance writers, from Chaucer to Aphra Behn. Beginning with Calais, peopled by the English from 1347 to 1558, and ending with Surinam, traded away from Manhattan in 1667, this well-illustrated book recreates the distinctive cultural life of a range of locations: from Flanders, which led the world in technological innovation; to Somerset, which provided a fitting home to Dante; to the Canaries (Fortunate Islands), which formed the limits of western dreaming.The book's exploration of premodern places features fascinating vignettes, such as an English merchant learning love songs in Calais, coupled with insights into broader economic narratives of political, technological, religious, and economic change. In particular, it provides long geneaologies of blackness and whiteness, race and slavery, in the premodern world.

About the Author:

David Wallace is Judith Rodin Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania and Life Member of Clare Hall, Cambridge. He has traveled extensively, exploring the importance of place both for print and documentary radio.

About this edition

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 1405113936
• ISBN 13: 9781405113939
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 352