Lancelot Andrewes: Selected Sermons and Lectures

This is the first annotated critical edition of works of Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626), a writer recognized by literary critics, historians, and theologians as one of the most important figures in Elizabethan and Jacobean England. Peter McCullough, a leading expert on religious writing in the early modern period, presents fourteen complete sermons and lectures preached by Andrewes across the whole range of his adult career, from Cambridge in the 1580s to the courtof James I and VI in the 1620s. Through a radical reassessment of Andrewes's life, influence, and surviving texts, the editor presents Andrewes as his contemporaries saw, heard, and read him, and asscholars are increasingly recognizing him: one of the most subtle, yet radical critics of mainstream Elizabethan Protestantism, and a literary artist of the highest order.The centuries-old influence of William Laud's authorized edition of Andrewes (1629) is here complicated and contextualized by the full use for the first time of the whole range of Andrewes's works printed before and after his lifetime, as well as manuscript sources. The edition also showcases theaesthetic brilliance of Andrewes's remarkable prose, and suggests new ways for scholars to carry forward the modern literary appreciation of Andrewes famously begun by T. S. Eliot. A full introductory essaysets study of Andrewes on a new footing by placing his works in the context of his life and career, surveying the history of responses to his writings, and summarizing the history of the transmission of his texts. The texts here are edited to high modern critical standards. The exhaustive commentary sets each selection in its historical context, documents Andrewes's myriad sources, glosses important and unfamiliar words and allusions, and translates his frequent quotations from the ancientBiblical languages.

“"This splendid volume, with its authoritative introduction, exemplary selection, and voluminous notes, is worth every penny of its...price."--The New York Sun”

...artfully constructed and deeply illuminating Diarmaid MacCulloch, The Tablet This splendid volume, with its authoritative introduction, exemplary selection, and voluminous notes, is worth every penny Eric Ormsby, New York Sun Andrewes fascinated them by his style. It is incomparable. Colloquial yet learned, in Peter McCullough's analysis it uses "curt syntactical units" to build up something that marches on pleasingly, like a Bach fugue" ... His sermons might have been the Sunday theatre of his day, but inside the rhetoric Andrewes has something to say ... Christopher Howse, The Telegraph Peter McCullough, an Oxford don, gives 200 pages to 250 of text. Every word, in its original spelling, is checked, every comma and colon. Christopher Howse, The Telegraph McCullough's greatest achievement is not so much to take apart Andrewes as to present a whole picture of him in a new light...the edition provides not only an essential resource for the study of Andrewes, but also a model of how studies of early modern literature, history, and theology can profitably interact. Early Modern Literary Studies Peter McCullough's splendid selection from the sermons, with its exemplary notes and scholarly apparatus, is the first attempt to go behind XCVI Sermons to recover a sense of the complexity and range as well as the controversial character of Andrewes's preaching. London Review of Books ...there has been nothing, in either quantity or editorial quality, of the magnitude of the selections of sermons and other writings now offered by Peter McCullough. Sixteenth Century Journal

Since completing his PhD at Princeton, Peter McCullough has held positions at Princeton University and Trinity College, Oxford. He is currently Fellow and Tutor at Lincoln College and a Lecturer in the Faculty of English at the University of Oxford.

This is the first annotated critical edition of works of Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626), a writer recognized by literary critics, historians, and theologians as one of the most important figures in Elizabethan and Jacobean England. Peter McCullough, a leading expert on religious writing in the early modern period, presents fourteen complete sermons and lectures preached by Andrewes across the whole range of his adult career, from Cambridge in the 1580s to the court of James I and VI in the 1620s. Through a radical reassessment of Andrewes's life, influence, and surviving texts, the editor presents Andrewes as his contemporaries saw, heard, and read him, and as scholars are increasingly recognizing him: one of the most subtle, yet radical critics of mainstream Elizabethan Protestantism, and a literary artist of the highest order.The centuries-old influence of William Laud's authorized edition of Andrewes (1629) is here complicated and contextualized by the full use for the first time of the whole range of Andrewes's works printed before and after his lifetime, as well as manuscript sources. The edition also showcases the aesthetic brilliance of Andrewes's remarkable prose, and suggests new ways for scholars to carry forward the modern literary appreciation of Andrewes famously begun by T. S. Eliot. A full introductory essay sets study of Andrewes on a new footing by placing his works in the context of his life and career, surveying the history of responses to his writings, and summarizing the history of the transmission of his texts. The texts here are edited to high modern critical standards. The exhaustive commentary sets each selection in its historical context, documents Andrewes's myriad sources, glosses important and unfamiliar words and allusions, and translates his frequent quotations from the ancient Biblical languages.

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