WISE: Renaissance Word Play

Sparknotes' No Fear Shakespeare series promises to "translate" the Bard. CliffsNotes and Shmoop offer similar services. But what is it about early modern English that demands translation? Even in modern editions, with their standardized spellings and explanatory footnotes, the language of the Renaissance still feels unsettled and, at times, unsettling. This was a period of unprecedented linguistic play and unmatched verbal chaos. Authors revised, razed, and even invented languages to accommodate realities actual and imagined. This course explores their innovations. Three texts will guide our exploration of semantics, semiotics, and rhetoric: Thomas Nashe's The Unfortunate Traveller (1594), Book One of Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queene (1590), and Sir Philip Sidney's Defence of Poesy (1595). Along the way, we will consult classical, medieval, early modern, and contemporary philosophers and critics who interrogate language, its aspirations, and its failings. Secondary readings will pair Plato, Cicero, and Erasmus, with Freud, Foucault, and Derrida, among others.