Literatures of Alchemy in Medieval and Early Modern England.
- Author/Editor
- Bentick, Eoin.
- Title
- Literatures of Alchemy in Medieval and Early Modern England.
- Published
- Bentick, Eoin. Literatures of Alchemy in Medieval and Early Modern England. Rochester, NY : D.S. Brewer, 2022.
- Review
- Bentick explores the conceptualization of vernacular English poetry depicting alchemy during the medieval and early modern period, arguing that alchemy's mystical reputation lingers because "its literature is not only read by . . . those who have the chemical acumen to decipher its operations, but it is also read by . . . interested readers who would not have the faintest idea how to [interpret the art]" (2). In Chapter 2 he claims that Gower's understanding of alchemy was influenced by the ideologies of late medieval alchemists such as Roger Bacon and pseudo-Ramon Lull (64). In his analysis of "Mirour de l'omme," "Vox Clamantis," and the "Confessio Amantis," Bentick further suggests that Gower's image of alchemy is "rooted in ideas of the microcosm/macrocosm and inextricably linked to social improvement" (64). According to Bentick, the CA in particular "sits in a tradition that sees a template for social reform in the transformative power of the alchemical promise" (16). For Gower, human sin is entangled with the mutability of the sublunary world, and both division and change emerge as symptomatic of this postlapsarian decline (67). In Gower's time, successful and noble alchemists are of a bygone era, and "it is the degenerated wits of his age that abuse the 'trewe' science of alchemy with their ignorance and fraudulence" (73). As Bentick puts it, "Gower was interested in how alchemists could rid the world of impurities and imprint something more noble onto raw materials," which he links to the notion of humankind as microcosm (76). Despite its failings in contemporary times, however, "alchemy proves to Gower that if people were as intellectually busy as those who preceded him, then the world could be improved" (82). Bentick concludes that "Gower did not think himself up to the task of understanding alchemy and yet his belief in the possibility of doing so gave him [ . . . ] hope in the possibility of reform" (169), which in turn helped to popularize vernacular poems about alchemy among lay communities in the late medieval and early modern period. [CR. Copyright. John Gower Society. eJGN 43.1]
- Date
- 2022
- Gower Subjects
- Backgrounds and General Criticism
Mirour de l'Omme
Vox Clamantis
Confessio Amantis