Alterations of state : sacred kingship in the English Reformation / Richard C. McCoy.

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Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• 1 Real Presence to Royal Presence
• 2 Sacred Space: John Skelton and Westminster's Royal Sepulcher
• 3 Rites of Memory: Shakespeare and the Elizabethan Compromise
• 4 Idolizing Kings: John Milton and Stuart Rule
• 5 Sacramental to Sentimental: Andrew Marvell and the Restoration

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

In a volume that is deceptively thin for its content, McCoy (Queens College and Graduate Center, CUNY) extends a discussion of the intersection of politics and literature in Renaissance England he began in The Rites of Knighthood: The Literature and Politics of Elizabethan Chivalry (CH, Jun'90). McCoy examines how representative Tudor and Stuart authors expressed the erosion of the sacred dimension of kingship from Henry VII through the Glorious Revolution. The influence of the Protestant reformers saw Christ's sacred presence in the eucharist transferred to the sovereign's royal presence; secularization of royalty following the Civil War eventually eradicated the king's divinity. John Skelton's poetic devotion to the sacredness of the Tudor dynasty had no equal under Elizabeth I, whose politically expedient policy of via media diluted the image of monarchical sanctity, as did the anxiety aroused by her childlessness; these concerns emerge in the political uneasiness portrayed in Hamlet. Milton's Eikonoklastes regarded Charles I's emphasis on a sacred persona as idolatrous, and Andrew Marvell's polemical works continued this process of desacralization. McCoy couples analysis of politics, literature, and artwork with a lucid style, which makes this book not only important for specialists but also accessible for undergraduates. C. Baker Armstrong Atlantic State University