literature – Page 6 – Women's Studies Group 1558

Valerie Schutte: women’s libraries in the age of Mary I

The independent historian Valerie Schutte recently gave a paper on ‘Pre-accession Printed Book Dedications to Mary and Elizabeth Tudor’ at the WSG’s seminar series. Valerie’s Mary I and the Art of Book Dedications: Royal Women, Power, and Persuasion is published by Palgrave Macmillan and is out now. You can read a sample chapter here. Valerie has another title, The Birth of a Queen, marking the 500th anniversary of Mary I’s birth, also in Palgrave’s Queenship and Power series, coming out in the spring.

After the seminar the WSG blog had a chance to catch up with Valerie about her various projects:

“I have several projects I am working on that are of interest to the WSG, and I can’t wait to come to another seminar to talk about them. Many still relate to Queen Mary I. I actually mentioned these at the WSG meeting and got lots of positive feedback. I plan on writing an article titled “Mary in Miniature.” I frequently get asked if any images are connected to the book dedications to Mary. Generally the answer is no. Mary’s books and manuscripts tend not to be illuminated or have gorgeous decoration. In “Mary in Miniature,” I am going to address this lack of images as well as address the few manuscript images of Mary that do actually exist. For my other project on Mary I am planning an essay on her relationship with Hampton Court Palace. This is a palace that she chose to use and visit for the most important personal occasions in her reign, such as her honeymoon and her first childbirth. I am going to address why she chose this palace and how she used it as Queen.

My next major project is one that I mentioned at the WSG meeting and was highly encouraged to pursue. In my first monograph, I spent a chapter recreating the personal library of Queen Mary I. It was some of my most rewarding and enjoyable research. Rather than undertaking a monograph on only one woman’s library and books dedicated to her, I have decided to write one where each chapter is about one woman related to or connected with Queen Mary I, such as Jane Dormer. Each chapter will cover a different woman and her books. Once I have around five or seven women and have recovered their literary history, I will put them together in a monograph along with an introduction and conclusion that tie the patterns of their libraries, book collections, and dedications together. This will allow me to draw conclusions about Mary’s literary influence at court.”

We’re looking forward to hearing further details of Valerie’s work as these projects progress. You can see Valerie’s webpage for further details and relevant cfps. Along with her Unexpected Heirs in Modern Europe and Shakespeare’s Queens (co-edited with Kavita Mudan Finn) collections, it looks like Valerie is going to be extremely busy in 2016.

Update: Women’s Writing in the Nineteenth Century seminars

WSG member Susan Civale’s seminar series hosted by the International Centre for Victorian Women Writers at Canterbury Christ Church University is continuing in 2016. Entitled “Women’s Writing in the Nineteenth Century”, several of the sessions may be of interest to scholars with interests towards the end of WSG’s time period.

The remaining seminars are:
Dr Felicity James (Leicester) on “Women of dissent: religion life writing, and female identity in the long 19th century”, Thursday 28 January 2016 (Room Nf09)
Dr Matt Rubery (QMUL) on “Human audiobooks: women, reading aloud, and technology”, Thursday 25 February 2016 (Room Prg03)
Dr Andrew Maunder (Hertfordshire) on “Infant phenomena: Victorian child stars and early-victorian celebrity culture”, Tuesday 3 May 2016 (Room Prg03)

The seminars are all open to the public, take place from 5pm, with tea & coffee available from 5 and the talk beginning 5.15. For more information, please email Susan.

Susan has also been awarded a Visiting Research Fellowship at Chawton House Library this year to pursue her research on the fiction of Mary Robinson (1757-1800). She will take up her Fellowship in April 2016, and will write about her research for the WSG blog.

WSG members online: Early Modern Medicine blog and the Orlando Project

Now that the academic summer break is well and truly over, WSG wants to highlight the rigorous research of WSG members online. Over the past twenty years the internet has allowed new academic formats to take root and flourish and two great examples are the Orlando Project, co-run by WSGer Isobel Grundy, and the Early Modern Medicine blog, co-edited by WSG committee member Sara Read.

Orlando Project logo

The Orlando Project is a textbase of women’s writing in the British Isles from the beginnings to the present. Collaboratively authored and published by the University of Cambridge online since 2006 and available by subscription, the database is usually open access every March, Women’s History month. Recent entries from WSG’s time period include Lady Hester Pulter (1605-1678) a significant poet who has remained unknown because she did not circulate her work, even in manuscript; Margaret Calderwood (1715-1774) a journal writer; Maria Susanna Cooper (1737-1807) a novelist and poet; and Isabella Hamilton Robinson (1813-1887), an erotic (possibly fantasist) diarist.

The Early Modern Medicine blog was founded by the University of Hertfordshire’s Dr Jennifer Evans and is a fast-growing collection of short essays on all aspects of early modern health, medicine, and gender. Previous posts include discussions of postpartum incontinence, the therapeutic use of human body parts, and prayer and spa cures. Jennifer and Sara also welcome guest bloggers and book reviewers.

In some ways the Orlando Project and the Early Modern Medicine blog represent two poles in the kind of innovative scholarly work, on women’s and gender studies in the early modern period and eighteenth century, that can be presented and disseminated online. And as a group that prides itself on its independent, radical approach, WSG is happy to have connections with both.

Women’s Writing in the Nineteenth Century seminars

WSG member Susan Civale has organised a series of seminars to be hosted by the International Centre for Victorian Women Writers at Canterbury Christ Church University in 2015-2016. Entitled “Women’s Writing in the Nineteenth Century”, several of the sessions may be of interest to scholars with interests towards the end of WSG’s time period.

Dr Sophie Gilmartin (RHUL), Tuesday 20 October 2015
Professor Angela Wright (Sheffield), Thursday 26 November 2015
Dr Felicity James (Leicester), Thursday 28 January 2016
Dr Matt Rubery (QMUL), Thursday 25 February 2016

The seminars are all open to the public, take place at 5.15pm, and details of rooms can be found here. For more information, please email Susan.

Valerie Schutte: Mary I and the Art of Book Dedications

WSG member Valerie Schutte has just had her book Mary I and the Art of Book Dedications: Royal Women, Power and Persuasion published with Palgrave Macmillan (£60 hardback). It is the outcome of her doctoral research, and argues that dedications and the negotiations accompanying them reveal both contemporary perceptions of how statecraft, religion, and gender were, and the political maneuvering attempting to influence how they ought to be. It is part of Palgrave’s Queenship and Power series, for which Valerie is also currently co-editing, with Sarah Duncan, The Birth of a Queen: Essays on the Quincentenary of Mary I (2016).

Valerie Schutte, Front cover of Mary I (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015)

Valerie earned her PhD from the University of Akron. She has a further research project underway, an edited collection on “Unexpected Heirs in Early Modern Europe”, for which she is currently seeking chapter proposals:

This collection seeks scholarship on queens and kings who were not expected to become rulers in their own right. In the early modern era many unexpected heirs came to power, but how, why, and the repercussions have never been the subject of one singular volume. The collection will be submitted to the Queenship and Power series (Palgrave Macmillan) edited by Charles Beem and Carole Levin, with planned publication for late 2017/early 2018.

This volume seeks proposals for submissions that consider unexpected heirs and how they achieved their queenship and kingship. Particularly sought are papers that explore issues facing these monarchs before and after their accessions, how they were educated and prepared for ruling, or their lack of preparation, familial relationships, and obstacles to obtaining power. Proposals on unexpected male and female heirs are welcome, as are papers that examine heirs who did not go on to be queens or kings. The intention for the volume is to engage in the actual lives and cultural afterlives of illegitimate children, daughters, and younger sons and the reception of such heirs.

Chapter proposals of 500 words, accompanied by a brief biography, must be submitted to unexpectedheirs@gmail.com by 1 January 2016 to be considered. Accepted authors will be notified by March 2016, and complete essays will be due by 15 October 2016.