American puritan elegy

✍ Scribed by Jeffrey A. Hammond

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2000
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 282
• Series: Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Jeffrey Hammond's study of the funeral elegies of early New England reassesses a body of poems whose importance in their own time has been obscured by almost total neglect in ours. Hammond reconstructs the historical, theological and cultural contexts of these poems to demonstrate how they responded to Puritan views on a specific process of mourning. The elegies emerge, he argues, as performative scripts that consoled readers by shaping their experience. They shed new light on the emotional dimension of Puritanism and the important role of ritual in Puritan culture.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover......Page 1
Half-title......Page 3
Series-title......Page 5
Title......Page 7
Copyright......Page 8
Dedication......Page 9
Contents......Page 13
Preface......Page 15
Acknowledgments......Page 17
Introduction......Page 19
CHAPTER 1 Monuments enduring and otherwise......Page 29
CHAPTER 2 Toward an anthropology of Puritan reading......Page 60
3 Weep for yourselves: the Puritan theology of mourning......Page 87
4 This potent fence: the holy sin of grief......Page 119
5 Lord, is it I?: Christic saints and apostolic mourners......Page 153
6 Diffusing all by pattern: the reading of saintly lives......Page 187
Epilogue: Aestheticizing loss......Page 223
INTRODUCTION......Page 229
1 MONUMENTS ENDURING AND OTHERWISE......Page 234
2 TOWARDS AN ANTHROPOLOGY OF PURITAN READING......Page 240
3 WEEP FOR YOURSELVES: THE PURITAN THEOLOGY OF MOURNING......Page 246
4 THIS POTENT FENCE: THE HOLY SIN OF GRIEF......Page 248
5 LORD, IS IT I?: CHRISTIC SAINTS AND APOSTOLIC MOURNEN......Page 250
6 DIFFUSING ALL BY PATTERN; THE READING OF SAINTLY LIVES......Page 252
EPILOGUE: AESTHETICIZING LOSS......Page 256
Works cited......Page 258
Index......Page 274