English Renaissance
The Renaissance sits at different times in different different countries, and that the English renaissance owes much to its Continental
predecessor, especially focused on trends in learning and the arts, on the evolution
of English humanism, and on religious and political movements like the Reformation
and their impact on English politics and society. It will also dwell on the
literary, cultural and economic developments (the beginning of British imperial
inclinations, for instance) of the period. The issues like the
evolution of courtier poetry, the relation of poets and poetry to Elizabethan
court politics and the role of a newly emerging English nationalism in shaping
the arts of the age.
Renaissance Meaning
Revival or Rebirth of the ancient culture and literature.
There was the huge change was taking place in certain European countries later
spreads in the whole world. Renaissance something which starting for the re organize the previous
things.
Renaissance Causes
- The Contact between East to West - Fall of Ottoman Empire and Crusades
- Rise of Middle class
- Decline of Feudalism – Upsurge of new towns and trades
- Beginning of National States
The Continental and the English Renaissance
Social,
political, religious and cultural forces that we refer to as the Renaissance
was first evident in continental Europe and began to be felt in England only
about the end of the fifteenth century. Perhaps the most important of these
forces in the continent and in England was the spread of the new humanist
learning and ideology especially among the upper classes. This leaning is first
in evidence in Italy. Following the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1493,
refugees from that city had brought with them the vast learning and literature
- especially of the Greeks - that had been stored in the libraries of the city.
This produced the first great Italian humanists like Savonarola, Ficino and
Pico Della Mirandola, who were subsequently to influence early English
humanists like Thomas Linacre (1460 -1 524), John Colet (1467 -15 19) and
William Lyly (1468 -1522) - visitors to Italy who took back to England the new
learning. It was highly influential in the designing of the new syllabi in
schools and universities, especially the work of the great humanist
educationist Desiderius Erasmus (1469-1536), but for a long time it remained
without impact on the literature and art of England. This was primarily because
the English language was as yet immature, socially and politically without
power. The language of the courts was still predominantly French, while that of
leaining remained Latin.
There was no complete real tradition as yet of English
theatre, prose or verse, despite the work of Chaucer in the last. Nor was there
a major school of art that could be influenced by the new learning, as was the
case with Italian artists like Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. By now
produced a generation of writers literate in the ancient languages and
literatures of Latin, Greek and Hebrew, and brought to English writings the
humanism of those works
The invention of the printing press also played a role in
the emergence of the Renaissance in the continent and in England.
It made possible
the sudden and immense popularization of the new learning in Italy, and in the
other European countries. It also contributed substantially to the development
and consolidation of national languages and consequently of national traditions
of literature
Renaissance and the Reformation
As we noted above, the English renaissance was crucially
influenced by another very important historical phenomenon, which
differentiated it substantially from its continental predecessor: the Reformation.
In essence, the 'Reformation' refers to the
The Renaissance various and often bloody and violent
movements against the Roman Catholic church, that spread over Continental
Europe through the 14th and 15th centuries, demanding large scale reforms in
its beliefs and church practices. It, too, was in many ways a consequence of
the spread of the new humanist leaning on the continent, and of the power of
the printing press, which permitted the translation and popularization of the
Bible from Latin and Greek into the European vernaculars, annulling the
laities' dependency on the ecclesiastical orders for the interpretation and
mediation of the Bible. It was led by figures like Martin Luther (1483-1546)
and John Calvin (1509-64) but was preceded by reformers like St. Francis, Peter
Waldo, John Huss, and John Wycliffe who repeatedly critiqued the abuses in
ecclesiastical practices from the early thirteenth century onward. They were,
however, not inclined to actually break from the Roman Catholic Church, an
extremism that later reformers of the sixteenth century adopted, resulting in
the in any breakaway sects that constitute Protestantism. 'the conventional
date for the beginning of the Reformation then is Oct. 3 1, 15 17, the date
that Luther is said to have posted his Ninety-five Theses critiquing the church
on the door of the Castle Church, Wittenberg. It is falsely assumed by many
that Luther had intended to break from the Catholic church, but the fact is
that it was the Catholic church that expelled Luther, against his own desire.
Later reformers however, picked up on Luther's principles of dissent and
deliberately broke from the Catholic church, plunging much of Europe into
religious and civil strife for the next few centuries.
Social and Political Circumstances of the Renaissance
The permeation of the currents of
the renaissance into English culture was both mediated and teinpcred by the
forces of the reformation that had already found root in England. Both forces -
of the renaissance and of the reformation - served to substantially reorganize English society. In the 15th
century, England had had primarily an
agrarian and feudal socio-economic structure, with much of the population
living in the rural countryside, many as tenants to country squires and noble
lords. However, it repeated epidemics of the plague had greatly affected the
population, which is hardly grew in this
period. The shortage of labor proved a blessing to many peasants, who managed
to sell their labor at a premium, and eventually to rise above their class and
form a new class of landed folk called 'yeomen' or small farmers, Many large
landholders converted their land into sheep pasture because of the lack of
labor, leading to land enclosures and the abandonment of many villages. This in
turn led to the dramatic development of the wool industry. The popularity of
the pastoral as a genre and of. the figure of the shepherd in renaissance
English poetry then, is not entirely because of either classical influences or
of Biblical ones, but derived from the English social landscape itself But the
period also saw the growth of London as a commercial and political city, with
the new classes and the re -distributed populations seeking employment, commercial
gains and political power gradually settling in the city.
A part of the new
social constituents were guilds of artisans and craftspeople whose services
were becoming increasing important in catering to the needs of the
growing populace. The emergence of these mixed social sectors was an early part
of the larger process of the dismantling of the feudal economy that was to culminate with the consolidation
of industrial capitalism in the nineteenth century. As yet though, they were
still constrained by the social and economic parameters of that economy.
The migrants
to London in this century were thus mainly seeking social and economic uplift
as well as acceptability in a feudal socio -economic system that barely
recognized them. They became a ready constituency for proselytizing protestant
groups who not only converted their beliefs, but through promoting literacy,
gave them access to educational possibilities that had remained outside their
reach till now. But in doing so, it also spread the sense of tension that we
noted above, between the humanist education they had access to and the
conservative reformist morality of the new religious movements.
English Nationalism and the Renaissance
the nationalist spirit in England is fully in evidence only
by around the middle of the seventeenth century, explicitly on display
especially in John Milton's epic Paradise Lost, the sentiment had been on the rise for
more than a century. In some sense an elementary nationalistic spirit is
evident ever since the beginning of the battles with France in the medieval
period. But with the sixteenth century, this sentiment begins to take the
shape of a lull fledged ideology. We have already hinted at some of the reasons
for this development, like the political distancing of the English from Italy
and France. This in turn was a consequence of the spread of Protestantism in
England, leading to the religious separation from Rome and the establishment of
the Anglican Church under Henry VIII. Thus, English nationalism from its very
inception had been closely allied to religious sentiments, unlike the subsequent
emergence of nationalism's in the
European countries, which followed, rather than preceded, the process of
secularization of society, and the separation of religion and state. Since the
separatist religious agenda of Protestantism in England was intimate to the formation
of a separate English national identity and since the spread of Protestantism
had been primarily through and among the emergent merchant and trading classes,
and in the new hierarchy, the nationalism that emerged was itself very middle
class in its roots. It was not confined to this class however, and found
willing takers in the nobility and aristocracy, especially those who affiliated
themselves to the Anglican Church or other protestant sects. The social origins
of this nationalism ace of some significance. This was the time that England was
growing as a naval and commercial power, and its merchant and trading ships had
traveled all over the known world. English merchant ships were bringing . back
wealth from the distant comers of the globe, including from India and China.
Along with the local growth in agriculture, sheep -rearing and the wool and
cloth industry, England was growing into an important economic power in the
European region. The main beneficiaries of this economic growth as we have
noted were the new classes of merchants and traders, and professional artisans.
The combination of a specifically English Protestantism, the burgeoning economy
and the emergent economic classes led to the promotion of a nationalism that
sometimes served as a qualification for social mobility for the emergent
classes and professions. It led to the consolidation of a sense of national
identity (albeit as yet nascent) that was able to contain, at least in the
sixteenth century, the social tensions that were unleashed by such a drastic
social change, as well as offer channels for upward inability to those who
proclaimed it. This is obvious in Spenser's stated desire to be a truly English poet. It is then
this English nationalism that spurred him as well as other less able poets to
attempt the first truly English epic - a task that was ironically fulfilled
only when that very nationalist ideology was threatened, in the next century by
John Milton. 11 was the later attempts of the English monarchy to return to the
Catholic fold in the 17th century that led to the tearing of the ideological
fabric of Nationalism, and a civil war that lasted for two decades.
Renaissance Important Impact
Foundation of Modern Age : -
- Humanism : Humanistic art and literature
- Rationalism : Rationalist art and literature
- Scientific view point : Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Harvey
Reformation : -
- Autocracy of Church
- Protestant movement started by Martin Luther
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