Political Theory.
- Author/Editor
- Rigby, Stephen H.
- Title
- Political Theory.
- Published
- Rigby, Stephen H. "Political Theory." In Historians on John Gower. Ed. Stephen H. Rigby, with Siân Echard (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2019), pp. 381-424.
- Review
- Rigby replaces the traditional distinction between absolutist and constitutional theories of kingship with a parallel but a somewhat more discursive distinction between "royal" and "political" kingship theories (394). Exploring "the nature of Gower's political views" (383) in light of this spectrum, Rigby surveys the fundamental concern in Gower's works with the necessity of moral virtue in a king, and clarifies notions of just governmental action in late-medieval England, particularly focused on ideas of tyranny, treason, uses of violence, the proper role of counsel, and the voice of the people. Rigby reviews recurrent, even persistent, tensions between the forms of political theory and instances of political action during Gower's life and in his works, and he rejects arguments that Gower was inconsistent or opportunistic when shifting loyalty to Henry after Richard's deposition. The "poet's view that divine providence could employ human agency to strike down evil tyrants," Rigby argues, "had always possessed the potential to be used in support of a 'political' conception of the king's relationship with his subjects." After the deposition and particularly in "Cronica Tripertita," Gower drew upon this "potential" and he "welcomed the fact that Henry Bolingbroke had replaced Richard II on the throne . . . as part of the workings of divine providence." In Rigby's argument, the "tractability of Gower's political principles and language" (424) is of a piece with the subtleties of late-medieval political theory and the flexibility of their applications, obviating censure of the poet as an opportunist. [MA. Copyright. The John Gower Society. eJGN 39.1]
- Date
- 2019
- Gower Subjects
- Backgrounds and General Criticism
Biography of Gower
Cronica Tripertita