The English Renaissance #2: Transformation
Event Details
“This literature – which to us can sometimes seem difficult, exotic, highbrow, remote – is the product of a certain sensibility and a particular context. The idea of these sessions is to find little doors through which to step into that world and find ways to relate to it through the poetry and human artefacts as representations of that time.”
Vivien Kogut
Please note, participants can sign up for individual sessions or the whole study, joining details below.
Session 2: Transformation
For Europeans this was a time of extraordinary inventions and discoveries: the printing press, the telescope, the microscope, the mechanical clock, atlases, blood circulation, the New World and heliocentrism, are just some of them. The understanding of oneself and the world was in constant flux. How did writers respond to this in England? Could words fully encompass this metamorphosis?
This is one of four meetings which can be attended individually or as a series. In each we will explore the literature of sixteenth and seventeenth century England through some of its texts, placing them in dialogue with iconic images or objects.
With guest appearances from writers including Wyatt, Shakespeare, Herbert, Sidney, Raleigh and Donne, during each session we will read together two unseen texts that engage with a defining theme. We will discuss how writers in Renaissance England expressed their experience of living in a world as precarious as it was exciting and consider how similar or different it is to our own.
JOINING DETAILS:
- The second of four meetings on Zoom led by Vivien Kogut, 27 May 2024, 5.30-7.30 pm (UK)
- Participants can sign up for individual sessions or the whole study: Mondays 5:30-7:30 pm (UK), 20, 27 May & 3, 10 June 2024
- Each session can be booked individually at £35 to include opening notes and resources (if you wish to book all four please email us using the heading ‘English Renaissance’ and we will arrange a discounted price of £120 for the series).
