HY 102 Lecture Notes - Lecture 37: Edmund Spenser, Joachim Du Bellay, Ars Nova
30 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
I.The Renaissance in the North
. Observations
1. Italian merchants were familiar figures at northern courts
2. Students from all over Europe attended Italian universities
3. Northern European intellectual life dominated by universities
. Paris, Oxford, Charles University (Prague)
a. Focus was on logic and Christian theology
b. Little room for study of classical literature
4. More secular, urban-oriented educational tradition in Italy
5. Northern rulers less interested in patronizing artists and intellectuals
A. Christian humanism and the Northern Renaissance
1. Northern Christian humanists looked for ethical guidelines in the Christian past
2. They sought wisdom from the Christian ancients
. New Testament
a. The church fathers
3. Northern artists inspired by Italian example to learn classical techniques
B. Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1469-1536)
1. "The prince of the Christian humanists"
2. Born near Rotterdam but was a citizen of the world
3. Devoured the classics and the teachings of the church fathers
4. Attended University of Paris
. Rebelled against Parisian scholasticism
5. Made his living by teaching and writing
6. Traveled to England, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands
7. A Latin prose stylist
. Verbal effects, puns, and irony
8. Promoted the "philosophy of Christ"
. All society is corrupt, go back to the Gospels
9. The Praise of Folly (1509)
. Sarcasm and parody of everything, including himself
10. Colloquies (1518)
. Examined contemporary religious practices
11. Handbook of the Christian Knight (1503)
. Urged the laity to pursue lives of inward piety
12. Complaint of Peace (1517)
. Christian pacifism
13. Textual criticism
. New versions of Jerome, Augustine, and Ambrose
a. The New Testament (1516)
.Greek and Latin translations
C. Sir Thomas More (1478-1535)
1. Lord Chancellor of England (1529)
2. Imprisoned for not taking an oath naming Henry VIII as head of the Church of England
(1534)
. Thrown into the Tower of London and executed
a. Martyrdom
3. Utopia
. An Erasmian critique of contemporary society
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