Lecture Notes, Thursday, June 26: Unfortunate Traveller Part Deux

26 June 2008

English 3I06 / The Age of Elizabeth

The Unfortunate Traveller part deux

Outline
*anti-homage to the sonnet
*anti-allegory
*travel and anti-travel
*the Jews
*women and feminity
*revenge

Anti-homage to the sonnet
*Surrey and Jack Wilton in jail; Diamante also jailed because of her jealous husband (305)
*Surrey’s “wooing” (307): “This was all the injury he would offer her: sometimes he would imagine her in a melancholy humour to be his Geraldine, and court her in terms correspondent.”
*307-308 the terrible sonnet
*Jack Wilton’s response (308): “I should, if I were a wench, make many men quickly immortal….my silly jailor” – Diamante’s vengeance
*(312 top paragraph): Castaldo dies (allegorically?); Jack and Diamante leave Surrey on a sumptuous adventure


Anti-allegory
*Surrey battles his challengers in Florence, 316-322

Travel and anti-travel
*Jack Wilton as tourist in Rome, 324-330
*”Roman superstition”, 325 (bottom) to 326
*cultural differences, 326
*replica of the earthly paradise, 327-330 – note slippage between that place and the garden of Eden in the description
*homage to Rome, 330
*upon his rescue by the Englishman in exile, the discourse against travel, 341+
*Cain as the first traveller
*the humiliations of travel
*the bad habits of other countries
*the benefits of one’s own country (346: “The sea is the native soil to fishes…”)

The Jews
*Jews present in England after the Norman conquest (1066)
*flourished there during the next two centuries, including building the “Great Synagogue” in London
*massacre in 1264
*Jews expelled from England in 1290
*relationship of Christian Europe to Jews very negative; to Judaism, quite positive
*concept of supersession
*representation in Unfortunate Traveller
*captivity by Zadoch, 347
*sold to Dr. Zacharie, 348
*beating Diamante, 353
*vengeful, 354-355
*weirdly resilient – see Zacharie’s poisoning (351) and apparent resurrection (354)
*meeting a gruesome end, 359

Women and feminity
*the rape of Herclide, 331-336
*her suicide: 338 she examines her image in the glass; 339, her suicide
*Juliana the Pope’s courtesan, 350-ish+

Revenge
* “strange and wonderful are God’s judgements” 363
*Cutwolfe’s story; vengeance against Esdras, 368