Queen of Heaven

Lilla Grindlay

Description

The belief that the Virgin Mary was bodily assumed to be crowned as heaven’s Queen has been celebrated in the liturgy and literature of England since the fifth century. The upheaval of the Reformation brought radical changes in the beliefs surrounding the assumption and coronation, both of which were eliminated from state-approved liturgy.

Queen of Heaven examines canonical as well as obscure images of the Blessed Mother that present fresh evidence of the incompleteness of the English Reformation. Through an analysis of works by writers such as Edmund Spenser, Henry Constable, Sir John Harington, and the writers of the early modern rosary books, which were contraband during the Reformation, Grindlay finds that these images did not simply disappear during this time as lost “Catholic” symbols, but instead became sources of resistance and controversy, reflecting the anxieties triggered by the religious changes of the era.

Grindlay’s study of the Queen of Heaven affords an insight into England’s religious pluralism, revealing a porousness between medieval and early modern perspectives toward the Virgin and dispelling the notion that Catholic and Protestant attitudes on the subject were completely different. Grindlay reveals the extent to which the potent and treasured image of the Queen of Heaven was impossible to extinguish and remained of widespread cultural significance. Queen of Heaven will appeal to an academic audience, but its fresh, uncomplicated style will also engage intelligent, well-informed readers who have an interest in the Virgin Mary and in English Reformation history.

She was an overbearing figure who emasculated and infantilised Christ, and who encouraged disruptive and disorderly female behaviour. Long after the figure of the Queen of Heaven was eradicated from the liturgy, evocations such as this ensured that she remained a frequent, powerful presence in the pulpit and within printed religious tract. This chapter takes as its theme this often vitriolic debate. It has at its core the printed versions of sermons that were delivered in high-profile pulpits throughout the country. The many different, often disparate, characters that will air their views are an indication of the widespread continued cultural significance of the Queen of Heaven in Elizabethan and Jacobean England. Their words reveal how the image of the Virgin functioned within the ideological framework both of early modern secular anxieties about queenship and authority, and of a demonising of the Catholic Church that frequently used gendered language. I will first explore how the use of the phrase ‘Queen of Heaven’ as part of a string of titles in medieval litanies was subverted by Protestant polemicists who repeated these lists in mocking form. I will then examine invective against the Queen of Heaven as an authoritative figure, showing how this often translated to assertions about the papistical image of the Virgin as a mother who many Protestant commentators deduced was overbearing towards her son. From the Queen of Heaven as a mother I turn to the Queen of Heaven as a woman, and an exploration of an Old Testament prophetic reference that polemicists often mined to support their cause. This is the story of the disobedient women of Pathros of in the Book of Jeremiah, whose idolatrous worship of a pagan queen of heaven brought about God’s wrath. In spite of the directness of tone of this polemic, pejorative representations of the Virgin as heaven’s Queen are often complex and nuanced, as commentators take pains, sometimes unsuccessfully, to disentangle appropriate levels of respect and veneration for the Virgin as a humble handmaid from their vitriol and loathing of her elevated form. The balance struck is frequently an uneasy one.

The Reformation’s privileging of both the Word and the individual faith of a believer led, inevitably, to a transformation of the role of the preacher, and an increased emphasis on the significance of the sermon. To a certain extent, the initial drive for this was in fact the growth of humanism; pre-Reformation humanist scholars such as Desiderius Erasmus and Bishop John Fisher expanded the preacher’s role, highlighting the importance of preaching in emulation of Christ’s ministry. During the Reformation, this aspect of humanism was retained, and the priest – whose principal role had formerly been one of celebrator of Mass and hearer of confessions – became preacher and interpreter of the Word. An Elizabethan or Jacobean sermon was often a big event: at St Paul’s Cross in the heart of London, an outdoor sermon was delivered every Sunday which was attended by thousands of people and lasted between two and three hours. Patrick Collison has described St Paul’s Cross as ‘the nearest thing that the age offered to broadcasting.’ Visiting London in 1599, the Swiss humanist Thomas Platter recalled how ‘the congregation is so vast that the aforesaid big church will not hold it, so that the sermon is delivered before the church.’ John Donne, who frequently preached at St Paul’s Cross, observed that the place buzzed with noise, and that a sermon could be met with ‘periodicall murmurings and noises’, describing these as ‘impertinent Interjections’ which ‘swallow up one quarter of his houre.’ In spite of the undisputed significance of early modern sermons, they have as a genre been traditionally regarded as a worthy but rather dull area of study, with many earlier monographs wanting to discourage the enthusiast from further investigation. The work of Arnold Hunt, Lori Anne Ferrell and Peter McCullough has thankfully served to disabuse us of this notion, making a concerted effort to free sermon literature from what Ferrell and McCullough describe as ‘an indulgent, even condescending, neglect.’ My own investigations have come about largely as a result of this re-energised academic approach. The historical context of a sermon’s delivery and reception is integral to its cultural significance. The topics of an early modern sermon were often interwoven with key events: sermons, for example, were used as a reiteration of national strength after the Armada and the Gunpowder Plot. As Ferrell and McCullough have commented, sermons were not just words on a page, ‘but instruments of policy, documents of religious change, and expressions of public life.’ Ferrell’s aptly entitled monograph Government by Polemic, is a convincing demonstration of how James I recognised ‘the remarkable power of the word’, highlighting that the sermon was a mouthpiece for the King’s policies. The sermon also had an important role to play within what Tony Claydon has termed the ‘public sphere’, where preaching and the dissemination of news and public thought were viewed as intertwined. The views expressed in sermons were frequently echoed in pamphlet literature. The Antichrist's Lewd Hat, Peter Lake and Michael Questier’s lively review of sermon campaigns against the theatre has explored the overlap between pamphlet and pulpit culture, revealing how the lowbrow of Grub Street (the literary underground of London) were often promulgating similar ideologies to those of the preacher in the pulpit.

There is something of an irony about any academic study which has the printed words of a sermon at its core. A sermon was a performance which often packed a hefty rhetorical punch. Bryan Crockett’s 1995 study The Play of Paradox emphasises the theatricality of the seventeenth-century sermon, observing that the orators of stage and pulpit often used similar rhetorical techniques. Arnold Hunt has described a sermon as ‘specific to the moment of spoken delivery’, and because of this, many preachers were actually reluctant to see their work appear in print. Ultimately, however, the thirst for the printed word won out; as James Rigney has observed, the sermon has an important place in the history of the printed book, and became ‘a public space for the inscription and exchange of views.’ The move from oral delivery into print, however problematic, indicates the long afterlife of a sermon, one which is accentuated by the structured way in which a sermon was heard, from regulated note-taking by schoolboys during its delivery, to fragments appearing in commonplace books and spiritual autobiographies. The topography of the area around the pulpit at St Paul’s Cross itself is compelling evidence of the printed sermon’s popularity, as in close proximity to this preaching venue were a number of booksellers offering prints and reprints of sermons. The same booksellers also sold a variety of other religious books, an indication that sermons were just one of an extensive genre of religious publications that included tracts, biblical commentaries and devotional books. Researching this chapter has been rather like stepping into one of these booksellers’ shops and sampling their wares: my analysis of representations of the Queen of Heaven comes in the main from sermon literature, but I also draw examples from this wider genre of printed religious discourse.

(excerpted from chapter 2)

Acknowledgements

Notes on the text

Introduction: The Vanishing Virgin?

1. The Virgin’s Assumption and Coronation through the Ages

Part 1. “Some out of Vanity Will Call Her the Queene of Heaven”

2. The Queen of Heaven in Protestant Religious Discourse

3. Sham Queens of Heaven: Iconoclasm and the Virgin Mary

Part 2. Voices from the Shadows

4. The Virgin Mary and the Godly Protestant Woman

5. The Queen of Heaven and the Sonnet Mistress: the Sacred and Secular Poems of Henry Constable

6. A Garland of Aves: The Queen of Heaven and the Rosary

7. The Assumption and Coronation in the Poetry of Robert Southwell

Epilogue

Bibliography

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Literary Criticism
• Idioma inglés
• Idioma galés
• Protestantism
• Catholicism
• Mary (mother of Jesus)
• Protestant Reformation
• Irish
• English
• Church of England
• Christianity
• Réformation
• European
• Welsh
• History
• Scottish
• Musique irlandaise
• Anglais
• Renaissance

Informations

• Publié par: University of Notre Dame Press
• Date de parution: 30 septembre 2018
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780268104122
• Langue: English

Extrait

Queen of Heaven
MEDIEVAL AND EARLY MODERN
Series Editors:
David Aers, Sarah Beckwith, and James Simpson
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QUEEN of  HEAVEN
The Assumption and Coronation of the Virgin in Early Modern English Writing
LILLA GRINDLAY
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana 46556
undpress.nd.edu
Copyright © 2018 by the University of Notre Dame
All Rights Reserved
Published in the United States of America
Library of Congress Control Number:  2018036114
ISBN-13: 978-0-268-10409-2 (hardback)
ISBN-13: 978-0-268-10410-8 (paper)
ISBN: 978-0-268-10411-5 (WebPDF)
ISBN: 978-0-268-10412-2 (epub)
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For Bruce, Jess, and Sam
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Notes on the Text
Introduction: The Vanishing Virgin?
1 The Virgin’s Assumption and Coronation through the Ages
Part I. “Some Out of Vanity Will Call Her the Queene of Heaven”
2 The Queen of Heaven in Protestant Religious Discourse
3 Sham Queens of Heaven: Iconoclasm and the Virgin Mary
Part II. Voices from the Shadows
4 The Virgin Mary and the Godly Protestant Woman
5 The Queen of Heaven and the Sonnet Mistress: The Sacred and Secular Poems of Henry Constable
6 A Garland of Aves: The Queen of Heaven and the Rosary
7 The Assumption and Coronation in the Poetry of Robert Southwell
Epilogue
Notes
Bibliography
Index
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book began its life as a doctoral thesis at University College London, where I had the immense privilege of being supervised by Helen Hackett. Helen’s support, friendship, and guidance have been immea­surable. I am also indebted to Alison Shell, who as secondary supervisor went way above and beyond and whose expertise has considerably shaped my research.
Many of the chapters I have written have grown out of papers given at conferences. I am grateful for the comments and suggestions from a range of scholars who have heard me air my views, particularly Robert Miola, Arthur Marotti, Susannah Brietz Monta, Susan Signe Morrison, and Gary Waller. Anne Dillon, René Weis, Gerard Kilroy, Jeanne Shami, and Alexander Samson have also offered invaluable advice. Fr. Peter McGeary, Serenhedd James, and Fiona Porter generously gave their time to proofread sections of the book, while Tristan Franklinos provided expert help with Latin translations. I also owe a debt of thanks to the University of Notre Dame Press, especially Ste­phen Little and Matthew Dowd, for their support. Particular thanks must go to Elisabeth Magnus for her sharp-eyed and sensitive copy editing and to the anonymous readers of the manuscript, whose invaluable corrections and suggestions have vastly improved the finished product. Any remaining errors are entirely my own.
I have also been fortunate to have many friends and colleagues who have lifted me out of the solitude of writing. There are too many names to mention them all, but particular thanks go to Lorna Dolan and Catherine Mangan for the interest they have shown. As always in my life, I owe a huge debt to Alice Merino for her intellectually stimulating conversations and emotional sustenance, given in equal measure over tea and cake in venues across London. My parents, Julie and George Ruck, and in-laws, Pat and Colin Grindlay, have also shown immense support throughout the project.
My final—and biggest—thank-you is to my husband and children, whose love and belief in me have made writing and researching possible. My children, Jess and Sam, have dealt patiently with my mental and physical absences. I have written this book over a number of years, during which they have grown into young adults, and throughout this time their wit and spark have dragged me—just occasionally—out of Elizabethan and Jacobean England and back to reality. My husband, Bruce, is the busiest person I know and yet has still found the time to read my work, discuss ideas, and offer unerring support. He is my rock, and I could not have completed the book without him.
NOTES ON THE TEXT
When referencing early modern editions, I have retained original spell­ings, with the exception of i/j and u/v , which have been modernized.
All biblical references have been taken from the Geneva Bible, unless stated otherwise: The Geneva Bible , introd. Lloyd E. Berry, facs. of 1560 ed. (1969; repr., Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007).
All biographical information is from the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography Online , unless stated otherwise, http://www.oxforddnb.com , which is abbreviated as ODNB in the text.
All references to the works of Shakespeare are from The Complete Works of Shakespeare , ed. Stanley Wells, Gary Taylor, John Jowett, and William Montgomery (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986).
All references to The Faerie Queene are from Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , ed. A.C. Hamilton with Hiroshi Yamashita and Toshiyuki Suzuki, 2nd ed. (Harlow: Pearson Longman, 2007).
In bibliographical references, ESTC refers to the English Short Title Catalogue, http://estc.bl.uk .
A&R refers to A.F. Allison and D.M. Rogers, The Contemporary Printed Literature of the English Counter-Reformation between 1558 and 1640 , vol. 2, Works in English (Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1994).
Introduction
The Vanishing Virgin?
In the wrackes of walsingam
Whom should I chuse,
But the Queene of walsingam,
to be guide to my muse
Then thou Prince of walsingam
graunt me to frame,
Bitter plaintes to rewe thy wronge,
bitter wo for thy name. 1
The opening lines of “The Walsingham Ballad” take the reader to a deso­late landscape. In the Middle Ages, the Shrine of Our Lady of Wal­singham was a popular English pilgrimage site, visited by countless pilgrims who sought assistance from the Virgin Mary. The shrine was despoiled by Henry VIII in 1538, and “The Walsingham Ballad” powerfully evokes its ruined state. Attributed to the Catholic nobleman Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, the poem is a plaintive, melancholy elegy to a lost world, in which the speaker is guided through the “wrackes of walsingam” by the Virgin Mary. Theirs is a mournful pilgrimage with a tearful, bleak destination:
Weepe weepe o walsingham
Whose dayes are nightes

Blessinges turned to blasphemies
Holy deedes to dispites,
Sinne is wher our Ladie sate
Heaven turned is to Hell.
Sathan sittes wher our Lord did swaye
Walsingam oh farewell.
The Virgin’s presence within this poem is as evasive as it is alluring. As “Queene of walsingam,” she is regal and powerful, the glorious, triumphant figure of medieval iconography. She is also described as a guide to the poet’s muse, an allusion to Mary as the mesmerizing idealized beloved of the courtly love tradition, and the inspiration of myriad sacred love poems. We soon realize, however, that hers is an impotent queenship. Her realm is the barren landscape of the ruined shrine; she is an elusive, disembodied presence who by the poem’s end appears to have vanished away, usurped by the “Sinne” of the Reformation. The poem seems to be an elegy to a vanishing Virgin.
Does “The Walsingham Ballad” truly encapsulate the effect that England’s Reformation had on perceptions of the Virgin Mary? As statues were torn down, shrines despoiled, and walls whitewashed, did the influential, devotional symbol of Mary really vanish from the nation’s incipient Protestant consciousness, just as she vanishes from the poem? The answer cannot be an unequivocal yes. Even within this one ballad, the Virgin’s representation is one of tensions and contradictions. My initial reading looked on the poem’s surface to find a vanishing Virgin: a usurped queen and a lonely speaker who weeps over her absence. An image of the Virgin is conceptualized that is bound to a sense of loss and regret. Yet it is also possible to see the Virgin Mary as a figure of protest, a muse who guides the poet as he frames “bitter plaintes” to the “Prince of walsingam.” If the prince in question is read as Henry VIII, Walsingham’s despoiler, the reactionary nature of the poem intensifies. The lines “Bitter plaintes to rewe thy wronge, / bitter wo for thy name” can be interpreted as an ominous prediction of Henry’s ruin—either earthly or spiritual. 3 The frequent repetition of the word bitter shifts the tone of the poem, and i