The role of the human body as a poetic and ideological construct in the 1590 Faerie Queene provides the point of departure for David Lee Miller's richly detailed treatment of Spenser's allegory. In this major contribution to the study of Renaissance literature and ideology, Miller finds the poem organized by a fantasy of bodily wholeness that, like the marriage of Arthur and Gloriana, is both anticipated and deferred in the text. Originally published in 1988. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

The Critical Heritage gathers together a large body of critical sources on major figures in literature. Each volume presents contemporary responses to a writer's work, enabling student and researcher to read the material themselves.

Everyman and Mankind are morality plays which mark the turn of the medieval period to the early modern, with their focus on the individual. Everyman follows a man's journey towards death and his efforts to secure himself a life thereafter, whilst Mankind shows a man battling with temptation and sin, often with great humour. Both texts are modernised here and edited to the highest standards of scholarship, with full on-page commentaries giving the depth of information and insight associated with all Arden editions. The comprehensive, illustrated introduction argues that the plays signal the birth of the early modern consciousness and puts them in their historic and religious contexts. An account is also given of the staging and performance history of the plays and their critical history and significance. With a wealth of helpful and incisive commentary this is the finest edition of the plays available.

In From Princes to Pages, Gavin Schwartz-Leeper provides a wide-ranging assessment of early modern literary characterizations of Thomas Cardinal Wolsey, Henry VIII’s chief minister from 1515-1529. Called the ‘other king’, Wolsey became a contested symbol of the English Reformation through diverse literary depictions that demonstrate the transformative pressures of this complex period. The author traces the development of these characterizations from the satires of John Skelton to Shakespeare and Fletcher’s Henry VIII, and offers new considerations of canonical and lesser-known texts by George Cavendish, John Foxe, and Raphael Holinshed. This study brings together multidisciplinary analyses to demonstrate how Wolsey’s literary lives reveal much about the contemporary shaping of this period, and argues for new ways to understand uses of the past in early modern England.

In this innovative and learned study, Dennis Kezar examines how Renaissance poets conceive the theme of killing as a specifically representational and interpretive form of violence. Closely reading both major poets and lesser known authors of the early modern period, Kezar explores the ethical self-consciousness and accountability that attend literary killing, paying particular attention to the ways in which this reflection indicates the poet's understanding of his audience. Among the many poems through which Kezar explores the concept of authorial guilt elicited by violent representation are Skelton's Phyllyp Sparowe, Spenser's Faerie Queene, Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, the multi-authored Witch of Edmonton, and Milton's Samson Agonistes.