Desire in the Renaissance: Psychoanalysis and Literature

Published by Princeton University Press 1995

Desire in the Renaissance

Psychoanalysis and Literature

Edited by: Valeria Finucci and Regina Schwartz

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400821501

Overview
Contents

About this book

Drawing on a variety of psychoanalytic approaches, ten critics engage in exciting discussions of the ways the "inner life" is depicted in the Renaissance and the ways it is shown to interact with the "external" social and economic spheres. Spurred by the rise of capitalism and the nuclear family, Renaissance anxieties over changes in identity emerged in the period's unconscious--or, as Freud would have it, in its literature. Hence, much of Renaissance literature represents themes that have been prominent in the discourse of psychoanalysis: mistaken identity, incest, voyeurism, mourning, and the uncanny. The essays in this volume range from Spenser and Milton to Machiavelli and Ariosto, and focus on the fluidity of gender, the economics of sexual and sibling rivalry, the power of the visual, and the cultural echoes of the uncanny. The discussion of each topic highlights language as the medium of desire, transgression, or oppression.

The section "Faking It: Sex, Class, and Gender Mobility" contains essays by Marjorie Garber (Middleton), Natasha Korda (Castiglione), and Valeria Finucci (Ariosto). The contributors to "Ogling: The Circulation of Power" include Harry Berger (Spenser), Lynn Enterline (Petrarch), and Regina Schwartz (Milton). "Loving and Loathing: The Economics of Subjection" includes Juliana Schiesari (Machia-velli) and William Kerrigan (Shakespeare). "Dreaming On: Uncanny Encounters" contains essays by Elizabeth J. Bellamy (Tasso) and David Lee Miller (Jonson).

Author / Editor information

Valeria Finucci is Professor of Romance Studies and Regina Schwartz is Professor of English, both at Duke University.

Reviews

"The new historicism, which in recent years has become the predominate mode of reading the Renaissance, rarely manages to account for the 'literariness' of literary texts. I see [this book] as redressing the new historicism's sin of omission."—Giuseppe F. Mazzotta, Yale University

Desire in the Renaissance is impressive in its range, and shows how comprehensive the use of psychoanalytic theory in literary criticism has become. At their best, the essays demonstrate the power of psychoanalysis to elucidate the convoluted workings of literary language, and argue for its peculiar compatibility with the dizzying gamesmanship of early modern texts.---Katy Emck, Times Literary Supplement

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction: Worlds Within and Without Regina Schwartz and Valeria Finucci Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	4
FAKING IT: SEX, CLASS, AND GENDER MOBILITY
The Insincerity of Women Marjorie Garber Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	19
Mistaken Identities: Castiglio(ne)’s Practical Joke Natasha Korda Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	39
The Female Masquerade: Ariosto and the Game of Desire Valeria Finucci Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	61
OGLING: THE CIRCULATION OF POWER
Actaeon at the Hinder Gate: The Stag Party in Spenser’s Gardens of Adonis Harry Berger Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	91
Embodied Voices: Petrarch Reading (Himself Reading) Ovid Lynn Enterline Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	120
Through the Optic Glass: Voyeurism and Paradise Lost Regina Schwartz Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	146
LOVING AND LOATHING: THE ECONOMICS OF SUBJECTION
Libidinal Economies: Machiavelli and Fortune’s Rape Juliana Schiesari Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	169
Female Friends and Fraternal Enemies in As You Like It William Kerrigan Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	184
DREAMING ON: UNCANNY ENCOUNTERS
From Virgil to Tasso: The Epic Topos as an Uncanny Return Elizabeth J. Bellamy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	207
Writing the Specular Son: Jonson, Freud, Lacan, and the (K)not of Masculinity David Lee Miller Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	233
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	261
INDEX Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	263

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