Theatres and Encyclopedias in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and C pdf epub mobi txt 电子书 下载 2026

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出版者:Cambridge University Press

作者:William N. West

出品人:

页数:312

译者:

出版时间:2006-11-02

价格:USD 58.00

装帧:Paperback

isbn号码:9780521030618

丛书系列:

图书标签:

• 深图藏书
• Renaissance Literature
• Early Modern Europe
• Theatre History
• Encyclopedias
• Cultural History
• Intellectual History
• Book History
• Cambridge Studies
• Renaissance Studies
• Knowledge Production

Theatres and Encyclopedias in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture) A Comprehensive Exploration of Knowledge, Performance, and the Shifting Landscape of European Thought (1500–1750) This meticulously researched volume delves into the dynamic and often intertwined relationship between the burgeoning theatrical practices and the rise of encyclopedic knowledge in Early Modern Europe, spanning roughly from the late fifteenth century through the mid-eighteenth century. Moving beyond simplistic notions of a clear progression from medieval modes of understanding to Enlightenment rationality, this study illuminates the complex ways in which dramatic performance served both as a mirror reflecting, and an active agent shaping, the era’s intense desire to categorize, organize, and present the totality of human and natural knowledge. The Early Modern period, characterized by rapid geographic expansion, religious schism, and the invention of the printing press, witnessed an unprecedented drive toward systematization. Simultaneously, the theatre—from the commercial playhouses of London and the courtly spectacles of Versailles to the public moral plays of the Iberian peninsula—became the central public forum where philosophical debates, political ideologies, and nascent scientific findings were not merely depicted but actively enacted and debated by mass audiences. This book posits that the ambition inherent in constructing a comprehensive encyclopedia—an attempt to map the known world, its history, its classification of species, and its theological foundations—found its functional analogue and popular counterpart in the theatrical repertoire. Plays, often structured around exhaustive catalogues of characters, vices, virtues, historical eras, or mythological figures, functioned as performative encyclopedias, offering curated, sensory, and emotionally resonant models of worldly order (or disorder). Part I: The Architecture of Knowledge and the Stage The initial section establishes the intellectual and material conditions underpinning both phenomena. We examine the legacy of classical encyclopedists like Pliny the Elder and the medieval speculum tradition, tracing how their organizational paradigms influenced early modern lexicography and knowledge compilation. Crucially, we analyze how the architectural principles of Renaissance staging—the perspectival depth, the segmented backdrop representing diverse locales (from the underworld to the heavens), and the use of detailed costume and property design—mirrored the desire to present a miniature, ordered cosmos on stage. A dedicated chapter scrutinizes the impact of the emerging scientific nomenclature and classification systems (precursors to Linnaean taxonomy) on dramatic characterization. Characters are often presented not merely as individuals, but as exemplars of specific social types, humoral balances, or moral categories, much like specimens cataloged in a natural history text. We explore how playwrights engaged, sometimes critically, with new astronomical models, cartographical discoveries, and burgeoning anatomies, integrating these complex data points into accessible, narrative forms. Part II: The Encyclopaedia as Performance Text This section explores the textual kinship between the two forms. We move beyond generalized thematic comparisons to analyze specific structural resonances. For example, the episodic structure common in travel narratives and early encyclopedias, designed to demonstrate breadth, finds a direct parallel in the sprawling, multi-scene structures of chronicle histories and Roman plays, which aim to cover vast temporal expanses or diverse geographic settings. The concept of Wunderkammer (Cabinet of Curiosities) is central here. If the Wunderkammer was a physical, curated encyclopedia of rare objects, the theatre became a temporal, living Wunderkammer, showcasing exotic characters, miraculous events, and morally instructive tableaux. We investigate how the collection and display of the rare and marvelous—whether a distant monarch, a grotesque figure, or a demonstration of mechanical ingenuity—served the dual purpose of entertaining the audience and affirming the collector’s (or the playwright’s) comprehensive grasp of the world's contents. Furthermore, the study addresses the role of glosses, marginalia, and didactic insertions within printed play texts. As plays were increasingly printed, the paratextual apparatus surrounding them—dedications, prefaces arguing for the moral utility of the work, and explanatory footnotes—began to mimic the apparatus of scholarly reference works, framing the performance not merely as entertainment, but as an approved pedagogical tool for understanding history, ethics, and rhetoric. Part III: Authority, Order, and Subversion The final substantive part of the book investigates the political and ideological implications of ordering knowledge through dramatic representation. Encyclopedias, by their very nature, assert an authoritative voice regarding what is true, relevant, and properly categorized. The theatre, particularly when patronized by royal courts, often functioned to reinforce these established hierarchies, using spectacle to validate the monarch’s role as the ultimate orchestrator of both state and cosmos. However, this section also explores moments of profound theatrical resistance. When playwrights deliberately employed encyclopedic structures to catalogue overwhelming disorder—the chaos of civil war, the proliferation of contradictory religious doctrines, or the irrationality of courtly obsession—the performance became a critique of the very systems of classification that sought to impose neat order upon a messy reality. We analyze instances where theatrical language deliberately fractured established taxonomy, creating hybrid or monstrous figures that defied easy placement in existing moral or scientific grids. The transition toward the Age of Reason is examined through the lens of theatre reform. We trace how theorists advocating for neoclassical rigor sought to ‘purify’ the stage, demanding that dramatic representation adhere to stricter rules of probability and decorum—an aesthetic demand that mirrors the desire for clearer, less ambiguous categorization in the encyclopedias of the emerging Enlightenment. Conclusion: The Printed Stage and the Bound World Ultimately, this volume argues that the Early Modern theatre and the ambitious project of the encyclopedia were engaged in a shared epistemological project: the struggle to define the boundaries of the knowable world. By analyzing the structure, content, and reception of dramatic works across England, France, Italy, and the Holy Roman Empire, this study offers a nuanced understanding of how knowledge was disseminated, contested, and transformed into experience during a pivotal epoch in Western intellectual history. It reveals the stage not as a mere reflection of societal concerns, but as an essential, volatile laboratory where the ordering principles of modernity were first tested in public view.

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