Reformation is the leading English-language journal for the publication of original research in scholarship of the Reformation era. Already academically highly regarded, it is published annually under the aegis of the Tyndale Society. Reformation 9 sees the journal building on its past successes and starting to expand. Mary Dove's essay provides a careful and thoughtful analysis of the Lollard translations of the Song of Songs, hence giving an insight into an important chapter in the history of biblical interpretation, and extending the range of the journal back into the later Middle Ages. John McDlarmid's learned discussion of Tyndale's The Practice of Prelates (1530) demonstrates yet more evidence of Tyndale's scholarship and his knowledge of a European tradition of Protestantism. James Conlan provides a provocative discussion of the progress of the Reformation, arguing that Protestantism had a greater impact in coastal towns and ports.
Matthew Dimmock considers the image of the 'Turk' in religious controversies after the Reformation, showing how the conflict between the Ottoman Empire and Christian Europe influenced the course of the Reformation, both materially and intellectually. A related point is made in Elena Levy-Navarro's analysis of John Bale's use of the image of sodomy to represent the pains of hell. Eliane Glaser revisits Oliver Cromwell's decision to readmit the Jews into England in 1655, and concludes that the Jews were less a real issue for those involved in the debates, than a means of furthering political argument. These articles demonstrate the need to study the history of the Reformation in terms of a series of wider contexts than that of a straightforward Protestant versus Catholic model. Two important pieces follow on the work of Edmund Spenser. Julia Major re-examines the well-known incident in The Faerie Queene when Serena is nearly sacrificed by the savage cannibals. Major argues that Spenser has deliberately employed debates over the status of the eucharist to show what is at stake in his poem, and what problems poor reading practices will cause.
A note by James Conlan on Spenser's The Shepheardes Calender sees the debate between Piers and Palinode as more balanced than has previously been thought, and the outcome more ambiguous, showing Spenser to have been a much more mainstream Protestant - or Anglican - than has usually been considered.
- ISBN10 075464104X
- ISBN13 9780754641049
- Publish Date 13 December 2004
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 7 March 2009
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
- Imprint Ashgate Publishing Limited
- Format Paperback
- Pages 324
- Language English