English Nonconformist Poetry, 1660–1700

After the upheavals of the Civil War, religious dissent became a recognized fact of life in England and was finally, if incompletely, accepted in the Toleration Act of 1689. Nonconformists, although constituting a relatively small proportion of the population, produced a volume of printed material which belied their numbers. This body of work was heterogeneous and used for an enormous variety of purposes. In this, the first scholarly edition of nonconformist poetry, the editor draws together a representative selection of dissenting poetry.

The multi-faceted nature of dissenting verse is demonstrated, from the sonnets of the Quaker Martin Mason to the self-consciously ‘witty’ acrostic used to commemorate the Fifth Monarchist Vavasor Powell’s death, to the Quaker schismatic John Perrot’s ‘A sea of the seed's sufferings’. The edition is also the first to give extensive coverage to some of the most prolific and significant nonconformist poets, in particular, the Baptist Benjamin Keach and Robert Wild. English Nonconformist Poetry probes the boundaries of the poetic canon and provides the materials by which a set of silenced voices might be recovered and studied in their own right, thus revealing the cultural debt England’s literary heritage owes to the dissenting tradition.

The edition will contain extensive new editorial material, including a general introduction, headnotes, endnotes, textual variants, a chronology, a first line index and a title index. It will be important for scholars studying Early Modern Literature and History, Bunyan, Milton, and Religious Studies.

• Provides important contextual material for scholars of Milton, Marvell and Bunyan
• Demonstrates how poetry was used as a form of political action by late seventeenth-century nonconformists
• Gives extensive coverage of the prolific nonconformist authors Robert Wild and Benjamin Keach
• Makes difficult texts, firmly rooted in specific historical circumstances, accessible to students

Contents

Volume 1

General Introduction

Robert Wild, Iter boreale. Attempting something upon the March of ... General George Monck (1660); Robert Wild, The Tragedy of Christopher Love at Tower Hill (1660); John Perrot, A Sea of the Seed’s Sufferings (1661); Vavasor Powell, ‘The Lamentations of Jeremiah in Meeter’ (1661); Vavasor Powell, ‘A True Christians Pilgrimage, or Afflicted State’ (1661); Thomas Grantham, The Prisoner against the Prelate ([c.1662]); Martin Mason, ‘Love is a Vertue that Endures Forever’ (1662); Robert Wild, A Poem upon the Imprisonment of Mr Calamy in Newgate (1662); Robert Wild, On the Death of Mr Calamy (1667); Katherine Sutton, A Christian Womans Experiences of the glorious working of Gods free grace (1663); Robert Wild, The Recantation of a Penitent Proteus (1663); Robert Wild, An Essay upon the Late Victory Obtained (1665); Robert Wild, The Grateful Non-Conformist (1665); Robert Wild, The Loyal Nonconformist (1666); Nathaniel Wanley and Robert Wild, An Ingenious Contention, by way of Letter, between Mr Wanly, a Son of the Church; & Dr Wild, a Nonconformist (1668); Robert Wild, Upon the Rebuilding the City (1669); Anon., ‘An Achrostick upon his Dear Deceased Friend. Mr Vavasor Powell’ (1671); Anon., ‘On the Death of Mr Vavasor Powell’ (1671); Robert Wild, Dr Wild’s Humble Thanks ... for Liberty of Conscience (1672)

Appendix

Volume 2
Benjamin Keach, War with the Devil (1673); Robert Wild, A Panegyrique Humbly addrest to the Kings … Delivered (1673); Benjamin Keach, An Elegy on the Death of that most Laborious … John Norcot (1676); Robert Wild, An Exclamation against Popery (1678); Robert Wild, Oliver Cromwells Ghost: or Old Noll newly Revived (1679); Robert Wild, Dr Wild’s Poem. In Nova Fert Animus (1679); Benjamin Keach, The Glorious Lover (1679); Martin Mason, In Memoriam Johannis Perrotti (1682)

Volume 3
Benjamin Keach, Distressed Sion Relieved (1689); Thomas Grantham, ‘O Calvin, why didst thou (like Cain) thy Pious Brother Slay’ (1691); Hercules Collins, The Marrow of Gospel History (1696); Mary Mollineux, Fruits of Retirement: or, Miscellaneous Poems, Moral and Divine (1702), edited by Catherine Wright

Index of Titles and First Lines

Related titles

• The Laudians and the Elizabethan Church : History, Conformity and Religious Identity in Post-Reformation England
• Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720–1840

Leaflets

• English Nonconformist Poetry: colour leaflet

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