Early Modern Crime Literature: Ideology, Emotions and Social Norms
From Firenze University Press Journal: Journal of Early Modern Studies (JEMS)
Maurizio Ascari, University of Bologna
Gilberta Golinelli, University of Bologna
Crime is a litmus test that diagnoses the state of society at multiple levels, a complex phenomenon that can be studied from a variety of vantage points. Already in 1984, in his seminal investigation of the early modern period, social historian J.A. Sharpe set out to trace the connections between ‘patterns of crime, patterns of punishment, the attitudes of ruling groups to such matters, and broader socio-economic change’ (1999, 240).
In the following decades, numerous articles and book-length studies have investigated both the domains of early modern crime and punishment, and their contemporary literary representations, for crime is not only ‘constructed’ and perceived according to the moral and social codes of specific societies, but it also stimulates imaginative transpositions and even disrupting forms of creativity.Establishing a dialogue with this extraordinary wealth of scholarly investigations, the present issue of JEMS aims at further exploring this fascinating social, ideological and imaginative territory, combining a literary approach — with its focus on the symbolising power of texts — and a socio-historical contextualisation.
This mode of analysis — which follows in the footsteps of New Historicism, Cultural Materialism, Gender and Postcolonial Studies — is conducive to a critique that effectively interrogates literary works, achieving a kind of ‘thick description’ (Geertz 1993, 6) — an awareness of texts in their relatedness to the societal coordinates that witnessed their birth.Since literary texts play a role ‘in shaping as well as reflecting social realities’ (Classen and Scarborough 2012, 5), this form of analysis enables us to perceive the formation and circulation of ideas, prejudices and judgements, the pervasiveness of which ultimately translates into their acquiring the solidity of norms and facts. By investigating the conflicting social energies that in the early modern period concurred to a changing perception of crime, the articles collected in this issue of JEMS aim to further our understanding of a transitional age that was marked by deep faultlines and sweeping changes.
Comprehending the complex socio-cultural dynamics that underlay those ‘class, religious, gender and ethnic divisions’ which ultimately contributed to engender new perceptions of crime and criminals (Reynold and Seagul 2004, 68) is vital to this critical enterprise.While exploring the connection between recorded crime and the literary imagination at various levels (from street literature to Shakespearean theatre), this collection delves into the ideological import of crime narratives intended as preventive of crime, a form of psychological ‘policing’ that compensated for the absence of organized police forces by reasserting the certainty of mundane and supernatural punishment. Far from being simply a passive tool in the service of power, a loudspeaker that amplified its voice, early modern crime literature is rather revealing of social fissures, a mirror of the self-conflicting kaleidoscope of society. Criminals were routinely stigmatized, but they were also portrayed as flamboyant thanks to their daring, and could even acquire a heroic status, due to the popular sympathy for those who transgressed a social order that was perceived as unjust.
Their status was ambivalent also in other respects, as Hayley Cotter argues in her contribution, where she studies the early modern fascination with maritime crime, as shown by a number of pamphlets, ballads and plays which are paradoxically indebted, for their concrete knowledge of piracy, to the royal proclamations that circulated at the time. This apparent contradiction is mitigated when we think of the pirates’ liminal position, as illustrated by the case of Henry Mainwaring, a figure who straddles the boundaries between piracy, privateering and even sea policing. These ambivalences testify to the complexities of both early modern crime and its literary representations, which became a vehicle for the discourses of power but also catered for the needs of a variety of audiences, addressing their divergent worldviews.While approaching early modern crime narratives, we should not forget that they reflect a lack of professionalization in the pursuit of crime.
Thus, instead of pivoting mainly on detection, they revolve around criminal lives and criminal minds, not to mention self-appointed justice seekers. They testify to a form of social organization in which the state had but imperfectly asserted its monopoly of justice, and punishment was still levied also by common citizens — although the custom of revenge was increasingly condemned — or circumvented through private transactions. On a literary level, the ensuing emphasis on both the plight of victims and the inner turmoil of offenders and revengers partly explains the highly emotional nature of these fictions.
Analysing early modern crime and punishment, and their representations, proves a mind-opening intellectual exercise precisely due to their otherness with respect to our present.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.13128/jems-2279-7149-12537
Read Full Text: https://oajournals.fupress.net/index.php/bsfm-jems/article/view/12537