Politics in the Renaissance: kingship in the writings of Skelton, Sidney, Sackville, Norton, and Shakespeare.
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Access changed 7/12/18.
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In the first chapter of “Politics in the Renaissance: Kingship in the Writings of Skelton, Sidney, Sackville, Norton, and Shakespeare,” I argue that Skelton’s Speculum Principis shows Skelton’s belief that education was the key to maintaining the hierarchy of the church, nobility, and king, and he continues to espouse these principles during his conflict with Wolsey. In my second chapter, I argue that through allusions to the previous succession crisis and his beliefs about monarchical power, Sidney uses the Arcadia to elucidate principles that could help England avoid another bloody succession. In my final chapter, I argue that Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton created an allusion to the historic John Stewart, Duke of Albany, in Gorboduc, but forty years later, Shakespeare took this character from Gorboduc and reinvented him as a character in King Lear that would appeal to King James VI & I.