Description
Book SynopsisPhineas Fletcher’s epic allegorical poem The Purple Island (1633) combines anatomical and devotional perspectives on the self as the poet explores the relationship between body and soul. The titular island is figured as both body and as England, thus merging religious, corporeal, devotional, and geo-national narratives. The present critical edition offers the first fresh editorial approach to the poem in over a century and situates the poem in its historical and critical contexts. Although the poem has often been regarded as a bizarre and fragmented curiosity, Johnathan H. Pope compellingly argues in favour of a more unified reading and understanding of the text as a whole, offering a newly-annotated edition that illuminates the text for both the Fletcher specialist and newcomer alike.
Trade Review“Pope’s is an edition of The Purple Island that I hope will introduce a generation of new readers, especially graduate students in nondramatic Renaissance literature, to this important yet understudied poem.” Mark Bayer, University of Texas at San Antonio. In: Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 71, No. 2 (Summer 2018), pp. 836-837.
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction Dedication and Prefatory Poems Canto I Canto II Canto III Canto IIII Canto V Canto VI Canto VII Canto VIII Canto IX Canto X Canto XI Canto XII Francis Quarles, “To my deare friend, the SPENCER of this age” Index
