Data di Pubblicazione:
2025
Abstract:
The current chapter aims to offer a stylistic analysis of Richard
Barnfield’s poem The Encomion of Lady Pecunia or The Praise
of Money (1598), a sardonic ode to wealth. It has been defined
by critics as a ‘paradoxical encomion’ on wealth (Miller 1956), ‘a
tongue-in-cheek disquisition on wealth and the dangers of forgery’
(Massai 2004). To my knowledge, the present study is the first
stylistic analysis of the poem.1
The analysis will focus primarily on the original 1598 edition,
which comprises fifty sixains.2 A revised second edition (bearing the
modified title Lady Pecunia, or The Praise of Money) was published
in 1605, including an additional six stanzas and some slight lexical
and syntactical modifications to the pre-existing stanzas, as well as
the orthographical and punctuation variance which is typical of the
period. Many of these lexical and syntactic modifications consist in
substituting present tense descriptions of the, since deceased, Queen
Elizabeth I with past tense and present perfect forms and including contemporary references (to James, to political and economic issues in Ireland etc.). For a comprehensive comparison of the two editions, see Fabio Ciambella’s chapter in this volume (xxx). It is beyond the scope of the present chapter to undertake an exhaustive philological analysis of the variants between the editions. Instead, I aim to consider the original 1598 poem as an aesthetic text in its own right, worth investigating in terms of its creative, ironic and humorous use of language.
Barnfield’s poem The Encomion of Lady Pecunia or The Praise
of Money (1598), a sardonic ode to wealth. It has been defined
by critics as a ‘paradoxical encomion’ on wealth (Miller 1956), ‘a
tongue-in-cheek disquisition on wealth and the dangers of forgery’
(Massai 2004). To my knowledge, the present study is the first
stylistic analysis of the poem.1
The analysis will focus primarily on the original 1598 edition,
which comprises fifty sixains.2 A revised second edition (bearing the
modified title Lady Pecunia, or The Praise of Money) was published
in 1605, including an additional six stanzas and some slight lexical
and syntactical modifications to the pre-existing stanzas, as well as
the orthographical and punctuation variance which is typical of the
period. Many of these lexical and syntactic modifications consist in
substituting present tense descriptions of the, since deceased, Queen
Elizabeth I with past tense and present perfect forms and including contemporary references (to James, to political and economic issues in Ireland etc.). For a comprehensive comparison of the two editions, see Fabio Ciambella’s chapter in this volume (xxx). It is beyond the scope of the present chapter to undertake an exhaustive philological analysis of the variants between the editions. Instead, I aim to consider the original 1598 poem as an aesthetic text in its own right, worth investigating in terms of its creative, ironic and humorous use of language.
Tipologia CRIS:
2.1 Contributo in volume (Capitolo o Saggio)
Keywords:
stylistics, early modern poetry, irony, pragmastylistics, pragmatic literary stylistics, mock-encomion
Elenco autori:
Beville, Aoife
Link alla scheda completa:
Titolo del libro:
Richard Barnfield's Poetics: Early Modern English Poetry Beyond Shakespeare
Pubblicato in: