By Einar Thomassen (NHC Fellow, 1999–00) This book is a comprehensive study of “Valentinianism,” the most important Gnostic Christian movement in Antiquity. It is the first attempt to make full use of the Valentinian documents from Nag Hammadi as well as the reports of the Church Fathers. The book discusses the difference between the Eastern … Continued
By Paul Ricœur (NHC Fellow, 1979–80; 1980–81; 1983–84) Time and Narrative builds on Paul Ricoeur’s earlier analysis, in The Rule of Metaphor, of semantic innovation at the level of the sentence. Ricoeur here examines the creation of meaning at the textual level, with narrative rather than metaphor as the ruling concern. Ricoeur finds a "healthy circle" between … Continued
By Christopher Baswell (NHC Fellow, 1993–94) What happens when a prestigious text of one period is read and reused in a different, much later world? What can we learn from the annotations accumulated by a single manuscript as it moved among new institutions and readerships? In this study Christopher Baswell takes as his model Virgil's … Continued
By W. B. YeatsEdited by George Mills Harper (NHC Fellow, 1981–82)
By P. Gabrielle Foreman (NHC Fellow, 2003–04) Activist Sentiments takes as its subject women who in fewer than fifty years moved from near literary invisibility to prolific productivity. Grounded in primary research and paying close attention to the historical archive, this book offers against-the-grain readings of the literary and activist work of Harriet Jacobs, Harriet Wilson, … Continued
By Nigel Smith (NHC Fellow, 2007–08) The seventeenth-century poet Andrew Marvell (1621–1678) is one of the most intriguing figures in English literature. A noted civil servant under Cromwell’s Protectorate, he has been variously identified as a patriot, spy, conspirator, concealed homosexual, father to the liberal tradition, and incendiary satirical pamphleteer and freethinker. But while Marvell’s … Continued
By Houston A. Baker, Jr. (NHC Fellow, 1982–83)
By Cecil W. Wooten (NHC Fellow, 1980–81) Although Cicero's Phillipics are his most mature speeches, they have received little attention as works of oratory. On the other hand, scholars in this century have considered Cicero's attitudes toward and dependence on Demosthenes to be an issue of importance. Cecil Wooten brings together these two concerns, linking Cicero's use … Continued
By Patricia Meyer Spacks (Trustee; NHC Fellow, 1982–83; 1988–89) Desire and Truth offers a major reassessment of the history of eighteenth-century fiction by showing how plot challenges or reinforces conventional categories of passion and rationality. Arguing that fiction creates and conveys its essential truths through plot, Patricia Meyer Spacks demonstrates that eighteenth-century fiction is both profoundly … Continued
Edited by Eliza Richards (NHC Fellow, 2010–11) Long untouched by contemporary events, ideas, and environments, Emily Dickinson's writings have been the subject of intense historical research in recent years. This volume of thirty-three essays by leading scholars offers a comprehensive introduction to the contexts most important for the study of Dickinson's writings. While providing an … Continued