Reinventing the Middle Ages & the Renaissance: Constructions of the Medieval and Early Modern Periods

The reinvention of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance is an historicized approach to constructions of the past. How and why does the present of any period uses the past to promote its own opinions, beliefs, doctrines or views? In particular, this volume demonstrates that reinventions of past eras or figures can be motivated by a nationalistic desire to create cultural 'roots', to discover origins that justify a regime or group's self-identity, to appropriate a cultural icon or neglected author for a particular political agenda, or to reflect on contemporary social issues via a remote time and place. Reworkings or adaptations of earlier culture often tell us more about the age in which they were produced than the one revived or revisited. This volume features five essays that treat medieval subjects; four focus on Tudor and Stuart figures, religion or politics; and five concentrate on nineteenth-century uses of medieval or early modern events, literary conventions, settings and themes.