Scholars and Poets Talk About Queens

Carole Levin is Willa Cather Professor of History and Director of the Medieval and Renaissance Studies Program at the University of Nebraska, USA. Her previous books include Dreaming the English Renaissance (2008) and The Reign of Elizabeth I (2003). She co-edits the Queenship and Power series with Charles Beem.Christine Stewart-Nuñez is Associate Professor of English at South Dakota State University, USA and author of five poetry collections: Snow, Salt, Honey (2012); Keeping Them Alive (2011); Postcard on Parchment (2008); Unbound Branded (2006); and The Love of Unreal Things (2005).

Evaluation of Scholars and Poets Talk about Queens, edited by Carole Levin with Christine Stewart-Nunez Kirilka Stavreva , Professor of English, Cornell College To start with, I am very excited about this book and believe that it will resonate with a wide reading audience. The range of the collection, from scholarly essays and creative work on mythological queens, to 18th-century reconstructions of the encounter of the 'Pirate Queen' Grace O'Maley with Elizabeth I is impressive, while the focus on women at the pinnacle of political power both unifies the book and is bound to entice readers. Most importantly, the book breaches the wall between scholarly and creative writing about early queens to initiate a long overdue dialogue among writers fascinated with these historical figures. The scholarly and creative writing is strong and innovative. I recommend this collection for publication in the strongest possible terms. This said, two of the clusters (on Cleopatra, and on Mary Tudor) are somewhat weak, especially in the company of such strong work as in clusters on Hecuba, Boudicca, and Elizabeth I. I would recommend possibly cutting out the clusters on Cleopatra and Mary Tudor. Stewart-Nunez's fine poem 'Granadas: Katherine to Her Daughter,' currently in the cluster on Mary Tudor, would be a good fit for the cluster on Catherine of Aragon. Medici's essay on Lady Jane Dudley would be a good fit for the last cluster, which is a bit unfocused at present. This cluster could be strengthened if it were to focus on the tools of political power wielded by and against queens, and include, in addition to Medici's essay, Eldridge Carney's essay on queens and poison, and Bauer's poem, which alludes to rhetoric and poison as vehicles for queenly power. Below is a summary of my evaluation of the individual essays and creative pieces, which also points out the connections within each thematic cluster. 1. Hecuba. Marguerite Tassi unpacks the emotionally charged representation of Hecuba in the rendition of her tale in Golding's 1567 translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses. She focuses on the effects of what she terms 'the feminine ethic of care': the empathy provoked by Hecuba's loss and voiced in the aural fabric of the poem without the aid of the so popular on the continent illustrations. The ratcheting up of empathy with Hecuba among readers common and aristocratic alike, Tassi argues in this finely wrought essay, secures her regal stature as 'Queen of mothers all.' When Hecuba wreaks her horrific revenge against Polymestor she functions as an allegory of moral and political justice, setting to rights a world rendered unlivable by 'careless men.' In 'Hecuba's Dream,' Tassi goes on to explore, in poetry and meditative prose, Hecuba's emotive state as both mother and victim of the heroes of the Trojan War. Darla Bielfeldt's poem, 'Hecuba's Lament,' adds a new dimension to the Trojan queen, who here claims the pain and responsibility of destructive motherhood. As was the case with Tassi's scholarly discussion, in this poem, Hecuba is rendered in terms far exceeding individual devastation. 2. Cleopatra. Andrea Nichols: Representations of Cleo in English drama of the late Elizabethan and the Stuart era mapped shifting attitudes toward Elizabeth I and the monarchy, from a strong critique of Elizabeth to more multivalent/ambiguous attitudes. Starting with the Countess of Pembroke's closet drama Tragedy of Antony (1590) and its companion, Samuel Daniel's Tragedy of Cleopatra (1594), Nichols analyzes representations of Cleopatra as ageing, unconcerned for her heirs, and worse, for her subjects. These plays, Nichols argues, critique the ageing Elizabeth's refusal to settle the succession question, the queen's international politics, and the discrepancy between a monarchic rhetoric of love and the lack of concern, on the part of the queen, for her people's welfare. Shakespeare's Jacobean tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra (1606) is similarly said to include barbed references to Elizabeth's vanity and perhaps even her 'sexual impropriety,' even though the play targets issues of the new regime, such as favorites and effeminate behavior. Last, Nichols suggests that Thomas May's 1626 Tragedy of Cleopatra continued with the tradition of the topical refashioning of Cleopatra's portrayal, this time voicing the theme of the subordination of women in view of the restriction of the French court of Queen Henrietta Maria. At the same time, May could afford to introduce a nostalgic vein, mourning of the death of a great queen, as Elizabeth's death belonged to the historical past. This may appear to be a compelling narrative, but throughout, Nichols' argument suffers from too facile connections between historical figures and the play's plots, with little attentiveness to the local and theatre history. The argument that the Cleopatra plays were barely veiled allegories of Elizabeth strikes me as downright naive. Why not allegories of Mary Stuart, for instance? Why would closet drama written by and for members of the Pembroke circle align with popular discontent about crop failures, etc. (38)? The essay could be much strengthened if the author were to focus on one or two of the plays (I'd suggest The Tragedy of Antony and The Tragedy of Cleopatra), but much additional research would be in order. This would give the author the opportunity to explore the dramas' political overtones with a more finely tuned awareness of the specific political allegiances and involvement of the playwright, explore the plays' connections to other work by their authors on issues of political governance, and attend to any evidence of performance and reception of the play(s). 3. Boudicca. In her insightful and meticulously researched essay on the ancient Iceni queen Boudicca, Kat Lecky analyzes the queen's visual and rhetorical representation in the 1577 edition of Holinshed's Chronicles as a model for an ingenious articulation of English identity in an era marked by divisiveness. Boudicca, Lecky argues, posits a wholly fictional ideal of 'naturalized citizenship,' one that allows for an expansive matrilineal accommodation of foreignness. British citizenship in the Chronicles is imagined as feminine and contrasted to Roman patriarchy. Lecky's essay offers admirable nuance of the analysis of the portrayal of Boudicca's gender. It also demonstrates effectively how useful an accommodating, expansive, matrilineal ideal for the English nation was for the Elizabethan imperialist expansion in Ireland. Contrasted to Holinshed's Boudicca who is uneasily construed as triumphantly Elizabethan in rhetoric/image and as ruthlessly brutal in action, the protagonist of M. Well's dramatic monologue, 'The Queen Iceni Seeks Andraste,' revels in battle frenzy, willing to name the land as British through an act of unfathomable destruction. Carole Levin's mini-play, 'The Heart and Stomach of a Queen,' rounds off this impressive cluster, offering a light-hearted, yet thought-provoking approach to questions of power, gender, historical memory, and rhetorical models of leadership in the Tudor era. 4. The Empress Matilda. Charles Beem offers a profound historical analysis of Empress Matilda's cultivation of the political image of the virtuous virago, acting at once as aggressive and uncompromising as she was pious and charitable, during her struggle against male contenders for the throne of her father, King Henry I of England. While this model of female political power was ultimately unsuccessful in winning her the crown, Matilda's political perseverance secured the English throne for her son, and enabled her to rule as de facto justiciar in Normandy, albeit in her son's name. And whereas historical documents, as Beem reminds us, remain silent about the way Matilda may have felt about her place in the word, Dennis Henry's historically informed mini-play, 'Maude and Ellie Play Chess' dramatizes wittily both Matilda's assured grip on political and maternal power, and her mentoring of another formidable queen, her daughter-in-law Eleanor of Aquitaine. 5. Queen Margaret. Carole Levin's exhaustive and engaging study of the medieval and early modern historiography of Queen Margaret traces the vagaries of Margaret's historical reputation, from an ensnaring beauty and covetous power-grabber, to a bloodthirsty 'tiger' and 'foul, wrinkled witch,' to a 'martiall Amazon,' better fit to rule than her weakling husband, and eventually, to an exemplum of valor and heroism. As counterpoint to the chroniclers', pamphleteers' and playwrights' integration of Margaret in assorted political and rhetorical narratives, Regina Buccola, in her poem, 'After Lives,' gives the ghost of the queen her own voice, French and English, at once bitter and powerful. 6. Catherine of Aragon. Theresa Earenfight's article on Catherine of Aragon's early life and education as influenced by her powerful mother, Isabel of Castille, and her mother in law, the Queen Consort of England Elizabeth of York promises to offer an important contribution to the study of this queen, largely neglected in recent historical studies. Especially exciting is the grounding of the article in Spanish and English archival sources. Taking cue from the historical events analyzed in the second part of Earenfight's article, Catherine Stewart-Nunez's deeply moving poem, 'Of Books and Bijou,' envisions a young widowed Catherine, her pen poised for diplomatic work and suppressing desire in writing. I'm not so sure about the choice to include, in this cluster, Regina Buccola's poem imagining Elizabeth of York's ghostly address to Elizabeth I. As effective as the poem is in showcasing Elizabeth I's unique freedom from the 'thorn' of dynastic marriages, it is only tenuously related to the rest of the cluster and furthermore, reads like a riddle. I would suggest that this poem be cut, as it provides a weak end to the cluster. 7. Mary Tudor. I recommend cutting this cluster completely. Jessica Walker's proposal is weak, while Stewart-Nunez's and Cannon's poems and Medici's essay can be included elsewhere, as described below. Jessica Walker proposes to explore the ways in which opponents of Mary's marriage to Philip II of Spain exploited the legacy of her mother, Catherine of Aragon, to incite dissent. It is not clear from the proposal how Walker plans to use her sources: in parts of the proposal she refers to Wyatt's rhetoric in justifying the rebellion against Mary, but in others the analysis of the impact of Catherine's historical legacy on Mary appears purely hypothetical. I recommend against including this essay in the collection. Stewart-Nunez has contributed another brilliant poem of luscious imagery in the voice of Catherine addressing her daughter Mary, which would fit perfectly in the previous cluster. 8. Catherine Medici's biographical study of Lady Jane Dudley, Countess of Northumberland, offers a new angle to the study of English queenship, through the vantage point of a court lady of exceptional political will and savviness, who not only served five queens, but was also deeply involved in English-Spanish relations. While the essay is certainly important reading, I would recommend that the author cut the extended historiographical section that appears tacked on at the end, and does little to advance the argument. The essay's poetic partner, Megan Cannon's poem 'On the Revolutions of Space,' dramatizes the political acumen of Lady Jane Dudley through remarkable imagery drawn from Renaissance dance, costuming, and cosmology. Along with Medici's essay the poem can work well in a final cluster on the practical tools used by and against women rulers. 9. Mary Stuart. I am intrigued by Alyson Alvarez's proposal to examine the political consequences of Mary Stuart's performance as widow after her first and second marriages. Mary Ruth Donnelly's poetic fantasy of Mary Stuart's exile into a Scottish hell of treason is as powerful as it is beguiling. The cluster looks promising. 10. Elizabeth I. Paul Strauss's article on the variations of Elizabeth's image as a spiritual nurse of the English nation developed in court sermons offers important insights into the power dynamics among the queen and court preachers - men of learning all who served under the patronage of highly placed courtiers. While the essay can benefit from structural streamlining, especially in its first part, it showcases brilliantly the thin line between praise of the godly queen and admonishment for what the preachers perceived as ineffective or half-hearted religious policies. Sonja Drimmer has contributed arguably the collection's strongest essay, 'Questionable Contexts,' at once captivating and methodologically daring. She masterfully deploys the tools of material history - a detailed study of an unusual pedigree book and a set of 'instruments for the teeth' that Queen Elizabeth received on New Year's Day, 1567 - to throw light on the queen's growing interest in abstract, disembodied representational strategies. Amber Harris Leightner's poems 'For My Eyes,' likewise revel in material images of Elizabeth's enchantment with Robert Dudley rendered into blazoned abstractions. 11. Grace O'Malley. Brandie Siegfried's proposed essay on a 1793 engraving of an undocumented encounter between the Irish 'Sea Queen of Connaught' and Elizabeth I, and Heidi Czerwiec's poem on the same event both bring forth a form of enabling nostalgia, reconstructing a meeting of two women rulers of wit and acumen. 12. [Gifts and poison, whispers and letters] The ending cluster features at present a (proposed) essay by Jo Eldridge Carney on the early modern gendered stereotype of poison as a queenly tool of power and Grace Bauer's poem on the 'what if's' of female royal performances. Here, I would suggest, is a good place for Medici's study of Lady Jane Dudley and Cannon's poem 'On the Revolutions of Space.' I hope that my suggestions will strengthen this already impressive book and help it instruct and inspire its readers.

• HecubaMarguerite Tassi, Tears for Hecuba: Empathy and Maternal Bereavement in Golding's Translation of Ovid MetamorphosisMarguerite Tassi, Hecuba's DreamDarla Biefieldt, Hecuba Laments CleopatraAndrea Nichols, 'I was not I?' Tracing the Representations of Cleopatra in English DramaErika Stevens, Grand Unified Theory BoudiccaKatarzyna Lecky, How the Iceni Became British: Holinshed's Boudicca and the Rhetoric of NaturalizationM. Wells, The Queen Iceni Seeks Andraste Carole Levin, The Heart and Stomach of a Queen The Empress MatildaCharles Beem, The Virtuous Virago: The Empress Matilda and the Politics of Womanhood in Twelfth Century EnglandDennis Henry, Maud and Ellie Play Chess Queen MargaretCarole Levin, Queen Margaret in Shakespeare and Chronicles: She-Wolf or Heroic SpiritRegina Buccola, After LivesCatherine of AragonTheresa Earenfight, Regarding Catherine of Aragon Christine Stewart-Nuñez, Of Books and Bijou: The Poet's Letter to Katherine Christine Stewart-Nuñez, Granadas: Katherine to Her Daughter Mary StuartAlyson Alvarez, The Widow of Scots; Examining Mary Stuart in her Widowhoods Mary Ruth Donnelly, Mary Queen of Scots in HellElizabeth IPaul Strauss, The Virgin Queen as Nurse of the Church: Manipulating an Image of Elizabeth I in Court SermonsSonja Drimmer, Questionable Contexts: A Pedigree Book and Queen Elizabeth's TeethAmber Harris Leichner, For My Eyes, Part 1Amber Harris Leichner, For My Eyes, Part 2Regina Buccola, The First of That Name Grace O'MalleyBrandie Siegfried, Notorious Irish Queen: Gráinne Ní Mháille, Graven Memory, and the Making of Legend Heidi Czerwiec, Grace: O'Malley meets the English Queen Gifts and Poison, Whispers and Letters Catherine Medici, More Than a Wife and Mother: Jane Dudley, the Woman Who Bequeathed a Parrot and Served Five Queens.Jo Carney, Poisoning Queens in Early Modern EnglandMegan Gannon, On the Revolutions of SpaceGrace Bauer, The Kingdom if I can