The performance of nobility in early modern European literature / / David M. Posner [[electronic resource]]

• Record Nr.: UNINA9910454561903321
• Autore: Posner David Matthew
• Pubbl/distr/stampa: Cambridge : , : Cambridge University Press, , 1999
• ISBN: 1-107-11828-X; 0-521-03487-6; 1-280-15456-X; 0-511-11810-4; 0-511-14987-5; 0-511-30989-9; 0-511-48389-9; 0-511-04882-3
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (x, 272 pages) : digital, PDF file(s)
• Collana: Cambridge studies in Renaissance literature and culture ; ; 33
• Disciplina: 809/.93353
• Soggetti: European literature - Renaissance, 1450-1600 - History and criticism; Nobility in literature; Nobility of character in literature
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Note generali: Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).
• Nota di bibliografia: Includes bibliographical references (p. 211-266) and index.
• Nota di contenuto: 1. Introduction: "The Noble Hart" -- ; 2. Montaigne and the staging of the self -- ; 3. Mask and error in Francis Bacon -- ; 4. Noble Romans: Corneille and the theatre of aristocratic revolt -- ; 5. La Bruyere and the end of the theatre of nobility.
• Sommario/riassunto: This valuable study illuminates the idea of nobility as display, as public performance, in Renaissance and seventeenth-century literature and society. Ranging widely from Castiglione and French courtesy manuals, through Montaigne and Bacon, to the literature of the Grand Siècle, David Posner examines the structures of public identity in the period. He focuses on the developing tensions between, on the one hand, literary or imaginative representations of 'nobility' and, on the other, the increasingly problematic historical position of the nobility themselves. These tensions produce a transformation in the notion of ; the noble self as a performance, and eventually doom court society and its theatrical mode of self-presentation. Situated at the intersection of rhetorical and historical theories of interpretation, this book contributes significantly to our understanding of the role of literature both in analysing and in shaping social identity.