Author: FERGUSON, Margaret W.
Title: Trials of Desire: Renaissance Defenses of Poetry.
Description: Yale University Press, 1983. Hardcover. Ferguson's study includes a theoretical discussion of the implications of studying the defense as a genre, and makes a case that literary defense should be considered a special class of writing. The author analyses exemplary defences by three 16th century Renaissance poets with a comparison and case studies of the art of rhetorical defence by: Joachim Du Bellay : La Défence et illustration de la langue françoyse (1549);Torquato Tasso: Apologia in difesa della Gerusalemme (1585);Sir Philip Sidney: The Defence of Poesy (1595). Attention is focused on the peculiarities of defense as a mode of discourse, and the book examines the desires of power and recognition that motivate the defenses. Discussion encompasses the social and psychological nature of the prosecution arising from individuals, cultural institutions as well as the Freudian super-ego.Margaret Ferguson (Ph.D. Yale University) is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of California Davis. A touch of foxing to top edges, otherwise very good condition in good dj. 257pp., ISBN 0300027877.

Keywords: Margaret Ferguson theoretical english comparative literature defense defence genre 16th century Renaissance poets poet poetry Freudian Freud prosecution criticism literary