Daigle, Erica Nicole (Author)
This project asserts that in works by Edmund Spenser, William Shakespeare, John Donne and Aemilia Lanyer, early modern knowledge of Galenic brain physiology is an essential part of Renaissance formulations of identity. As the accepted residence of the soul, the Galenic brain is a place where important questions about subjectivity can be addressed, and my project reads references to the brain in early modern literature as confluences of anatomical knowledge and Christian theories of spiritual identity. These readings uncover a more nuanced picture of the early modern subject as a complex union of flesh and spirit. I begin with an in depth overview of the legacy of Renaissance Galenism. I then read Galenic brain theories that are influential in the early modern texts in my study. This discussion progresses through my reading of the reconciliation of Galenic medicine with Christian doctrine that occurs over several centuries. Chapter two is a focused analysis of how Edmund Spenser constructs the character of Prince Arthur as a compromise between current medical and Christian ideas. I argue that in a critically popular passage in Book II of Spenser's Faerie Queene , contemporary theories of the brain ventricles contribute to an anatomical definition of Christian temperance that contributes to the complexity of Prince Arthur's behavior. In chapter three, I read Richard's famous prison speech in act 5, scene 5 of Shakespeare's Richard II as a theory of his cognition, or the process by which his behavior becomes manifest, and I argue that this reveals the interdependent relationship between early modern personality and the physical body it inhabits. In my chapter on John Donne's poem " The Crosse ," I argue that Donne deliberately departs from accepted anatomies of the cranial sutures in order to assert spiritual causation that maintains and disciplines the passions. Finally, in my concluding chapter on Aemilia Lanyer's Salve Deus Rex Judeaeorum , I argue that Lanyer constructs a female brain that requires the masculine dominance of God's grace in a highly sexualized relationship, and that her model mirrors patriarchal physiological models of women.
...MoreDescription Cited in Diss. Abstr. Int. A 70/08 (2010). Pub. no. AAT 3368948.
Article
Claudio Moreschini;
(2011)
La ricezione del "Quod animi mores" di Galeno fra Medioevo e Rinascimento : traduzioni, edizioni e commenti
(/isis/citation/CBB006473355/)
Book
Knight, David M.;
(2015)
Voyaging in Strange Seas: The Great Revolution in Science
(/isis/citation/CBB001551963/)
Article
Robin, Diana;
(2013)
Women on the Move: Trends in Anglophone Studies of Women in the Italian Renaissance
(/isis/citation/CBB001320631/)
Book
Lestringant, Frank;
Couzinet, Marie-Dominique;
Besse, Jean-Marc;
(2009)
Les méditations cosmographiques à la Renaissance
(/isis/citation/CBB001220751/)
Chapter
Schwarte, Ludger;
(2008)
The Anatomy of the Brain as Instrumentalization of Reason
(/isis/citation/CBB000831239/)
Chapter
Pomata, Gianna;
(2005)
Praxis Historialis: The Uses of Historia in Early Modern Medicine
(/isis/citation/CBB000670276/)
Article
Stefania Fortuna;
(2020)
Pseudo-Galenic texts in the editions of Galen (1490-1689)
(/isis/citation/CBB670899579/)
Chapter
Carlo Gelmetti;
(2015)
La dermatologia e la venereologia dal Rinascimento al XVIII secolo
(/isis/citation/CBB383272190/)
Article
Winnerling, Tobias;
(2010)
Der Fürsten-Theriak. Die wundersamen Knoblauchkräfte der Frühen Neuzeit
(/isis/citation/CBB001032270/)
Book
Coudert, Allison P.;
(2011)
Religion, Magic, and Science in Early Modern Europe and America
(/isis/citation/CBB001201259/)
Book
Koslofsky, Craig;
(2011)
Evening's Empire: A History of the Night in Early Modern Europe
(/isis/citation/CBB001201831/)
Article
Douglas J. Lanska;
(2022)
The medieval cell doctrine: Foundations, development, evolution, and graphic representations in printed books from 1490 to 1630
(/isis/citation/CBB658623028/)
Book
Clark, Stuart;
(2007)
Vanities of the Eye: Vision in Early Modern European Culture
(/isis/citation/CBB000952788/)
Chapter
Berns, Jörg Jochen;
(2008)
Instrumental Sound and Ruling Spaces of Resonance in the Early Modern Period: On the Acoustic Setting of the Princely potestas Claims within a Ceremonial Frame
(/isis/citation/CBB000831255/)
Book
French, Sara L.;
Etheridge, Kay;
(2007)
Origins of Science Learning: Essays on Culture and Knowledge in Early Modern Europe
(/isis/citation/CBB000830144/)
Chapter
Maddalena Chimusso;
(2015)
Sapere teorico e saperi pratici. Note sull'evoluzione della figura e della denominazione dell'ingegnere (XV-XIX)
(/isis/citation/CBB814622613/)
Book
Greefs, Hilde;
Hart, Marjolein 't;
(2006)
Water management, communities, and environment: The Low Countries in comparative perspective, c. 1000--c. 1800 = Waterbeheer, gemeenschappen en de natuurlijke omgeving: De Lage Landen in comparatief perspectief, c. 1000--c. 1800
(/isis/citation/CBB001180778/)
Chapter
Maria Pia Donato;
(2012)
Anatomia, autopsia, sectio: problemi di fonti e di metodo
(/isis/citation/CBB267957700/)
Chapter
Romano Nanni;
(2015)
Prima di Sagredo: i modelli di macchine e il problema di Vitruvio tra XV e XVI secolo
(/isis/citation/CBB165952903/)
Thesis
Sugar, Gabrielle;
(2012)
The New Universe: Conceptions of the Cosmos in the Literary Imagination of Early Modern England
(/isis/citation/CBB001567357/)
Be the first to comment!