Skip to Main Content
 

Global Search Box

 
 
 
 

Files

File List


osu1321840691.pdf (1.28 MB)

ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

Counsel, Political Rhetoric, and the Chronicle History Play: Representing Conciliar Rule, 1588-1603

Schuler, Anne-Marie E.
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1321840691

Abstract Details

2011, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, English.
This dissertation advances an account of how the genre of the chronicle history play enacts conciliar rule, by reflecting Renaissance models of counsel that predominated in Tudor political theory. As the texts of Renaissance political theorists and pamphleteers demonstrate, writers did not believe that kings and queens ruled by themselves, but that counsel was required to ensure that the monarch ruled virtuously and kept ties to the actual conditions of the people. Yet, within these writings, counsel was not a singular concept, and the work of historians such as John Guy, Patrick Collinson, and Ann McLaren shows that “counsel” referred to numerous paradigms and traditions. These theories of counsel were influenced by a variety of intellectual movements including humanist-classical formulations of monarchy, constitutionalism, and constructions of a “mixed monarchy” or a corporate body politic. Because the rhetoric of counsel was embedded in the language that men and women used to discuss politics, I argue that the plays perform a kind of cultural work, usually reserved for literature, that reflects, heightens, and critiques political life and the issues surrounding conceptions of conciliar rule. By employing an interdisciplinary methodology that studies the relationship between the rhetoric of counsel as it appears in of early modern printed texts on counsel and the discourse of counsel within the plays, this study analyzes chronicle history plays within their historical and political contexts, including William Shakespeare’s Henry V and Richard II, Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II, and anonymous dramatic works including The Life and Death of Jack Straw and Thomas, Lord Cromwell. I contend that the genre exposes the discrepancies within theory and practice -- sometimes substantiating the political theories and, at others, destabilizing them. My dissertation expands on the work of literary critics who are concerned with issues of hierarchy and the centralization of power. I demonstrate that the plays do not imagine the monarch as a singular entity, but as surrounded by a political nexus that included his counselors, and thereby engage with political debates that legitimated monarchy through its relation to counsel. My dissertation thus fills in an important gap in literary studies, arguing that the genre of the chronicle history play participated in the political debates over the legitimization of monarchy, counsel, and citizenship. In dramatizing the history of English kings and important political figures, the chronicle history play naturally reflects the relationship between people and political institutions. These plays often do not directly reflect the idealized conciliar rule of the political tracts rather they uncover the challenges and tensions inherent within conceptions of conciliar rule. Ultimately, I demonstrate that the plays present conciliar rule as an intricate interplay between people, political institutions, and theoretical ideals.
Richard Dutton (Advisor)
Alan Farmer (Committee Member)
Jennifer Higginbotham (Committee Member)
Luke Wilson (Committee Member)
335 p.
British and Irish Literature
counsel in literature; chronicle history play; Shakespeare; Renaissance drama; conciliar rule

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Schuler, A.-M. E. (2011). Counsel, Political Rhetoric, and the Chronicle History Play: Representing Conciliar Rule, 1588-1603 [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1321840691

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Schuler, Anne-Marie. Counsel, Political Rhetoric, and the Chronicle History Play: Representing Conciliar Rule, 1588-1603. 2011. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1321840691.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Schuler, Anne-Marie. "Counsel, Political Rhetoric, and the Chronicle History Play: Representing Conciliar Rule, 1588-1603." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1321840691

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1321840691
1,028
© 2011, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.