Gerard B. Wegemer - Böcker

The first comprehensive one-volume collection of St. Thomas More’s writing  “[A] tremendous scholarly undertaking. . . . Accessible and transparent to both scholars and the general audience.”—Renaissance and Reformation  In this book, Gerard B. Wegemer and Stephen W. Smith assemble, for the first time in a single volume, the most important English and Latin works of Thomas More (1478–1535). This collection reveals the breadth of More’s writing—key works on theology, political philosophy, and law, as well as his poetry and prose—and includes a rich selection of illustrations and artwork. The book provides the most complete picture of More’s work available, serving as a major resource for early modern scholars, teachers, students, and the general reader.

What does it mean to be a free citizen in times of war and tyranny? What kind of education is needed to be a 'first' or leading citizen in a strife-filled country? And what does it mean to be free when freedom is forcibly opposed? These concerns pervade Thomas More's earliest writings, writings mostly unknown, including his 280 poems, declamation on tyrannicide, coronation ode for Henry VIII and his life of Pico della Mirandola, all written before Richard III and Utopia. This book analyzes those writings, guided especially by these questions: Faced with generations of civil war, what did young More see as the causes of that strife? What did he see as possible solutions? Why did More spend fourteen years after law school learning Greek and immersed in classical studies? Why do his early works use vocabulary devised by Cicero at the end of the Roman Republic?

The term ""statesman"" entered the English language during the Renaissance as a result of the widespread return to the Greek and Roman classics. Sir Thomas More, who brought his careful study of Plato and Aristotle, Cicero and Augustine to bear upon his political life, contributed most to the recovery of the ancient Greco-Roman concept of the statesman. Throughout More's writings and his actions one finds a consistent and principled approach to statesmanship that emphasizes the free character of the human person and integrates classical and Christian thought with the best of England's common law tradition of self-rule. This study is the first to examine More's complete works in view of his concept of statesmanship, and, in the process, link More's humanism, his faith, and his legal and political vocations into a coherent narrative. In Part One Gerard B. Wegemer sets forth More's theory of statesmanship, drawing heavily from the entire corpus of his work. In the second part he presents More's understanding of literature and applies this understanding to his book Utopia. In Part Three he investigates the two most controversial events in More's life: his treatment of heretics and his refusal to obey his king. More presented a consistent defense of institutional arrangements now taken as basic to all democratic government: rule of law, division of power, separation of church and state, elected representation, and protected forms of free and public deliberation. He believed that the essential work of the statesman is to draw upon the nation's deepest and longest-standing consensus, as expressed in its literature and its laws, in order to govern with the people's consent. More was convinced that law, not individual persons, should rule.This book, which integrates the literature, philosophy, history, and politics of the Renaissance, will appeal across disciplines to scholars of early modern England and to anyone fascinated by the life and times of St. Thomas More. Gerard B. Wegemer is the author of Thomas More: A Portrait of Courage (1995) and has written about More and his times for such journals as Renascence, Philosophy and Rhetoric, Moreana, and The Review of Politics. He holds master's degrees in political philosophy and literature from Boston College and Georgetown respectively, and a doctorate in English literature from Notre Dame. He is associate professor of literature at the University of Dallas, and he teaches and lectures regularly on St. Thomas More. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ""Professor Wegemer's book is an extraordinary work of interpretation. The key to its success is a comprehensive grasp of More's life and work, rooted in a profound sympathy for the man and his goals. With a calm and confident hand, Wegemer sheds new light on More's views of statesmanship and its requirements, on the inner structure of his enigmatic and playful masterpiece Utopia, and on the guiding conceptions of his practical political life. Rarely do authors show such a capacity for leaping across the chasm of culture and years to understand the vision that makes sense of a man's life and thought.""-- Professor Christopher Wolfe, Department of Political Science, Marquette UniversityTable of ContentsIntroductionI. More's Understanding of the Statesman's Work1. Can Reason Rule the Free?2. First, Self-Rule3. Ruling Citizens: What Is Needed?II. Utopia: A Statesman's Puzzle4. Literature and the Acquisition of Political Prudence5. Utopia 1 and 2: Dramatizing Competing Philosophies of Life6. Utopia 1: Ciceronian Statesmanship7. Utopia 2: Augustinian RealistIII. Issues in More's Career as Statesman8. The Limits of Reason and the Need for Law9. Reform over Revolution: In Defense of Free

This source book brings together texts by and about Thomas More - poet, scholar, statesman, family man, educational reformer, philospher, historian and saint. In addition to serving as an introduction to More's life and writings for the general reader, this collection is a companion to the study of 16th-century history, literature, philosophy or politics. The writings focus upon More's views of education, political theory, church-state relations, love and friendship, practical politics and the vexing issue of conscience. They shed light on the distinctive Christian humanism that More expresses and embodied. Also included in the book are three famous 16th-century accounts of More's life by Erasmus, Roper and a team of London playwrights including William Shakespeare.

What does it mean to be a free citizen in times of war and tyranny? What kind of education is needed to be a 'first' or leading citizen in a strife-filled country? And what does it mean to be free when freedom is forcibly opposed? These concerns pervade Thomas More's earliest writings, writings mostly unknown, including his 280 poems, declamation on tyrannicide, coronation ode for Henry VIII and his life of Pico della Mirandola, all written before Richard III and Utopia. This book analyzes those writings, guided especially by these questions: Faced with generations of civil war, what did young More see as the causes of that strife? What did he see as possible solutions? Why did More spend fourteen years after law school learning Greek and immersed in classical studies? Why do his early works use vocabulary devised by Cicero at the end of the Roman Republic?

This book challenges the recently established consensus that the trial was a carefully prepared and executed judicial process in which the judges were amenable to reasonable arguments.Thomas More's treason trial in 1535 is one of history's most famous court cases, yet never before have all the major documents been collected, translated, and analyzed by a team of legal and Tudor scholars. This edition serves asan important sourcebook and concludes with a 'docudrama' reconstructing the course of the trial based on these documents. Legal experts H. A. Kelly and R. H. Helmholz take different approaches to the legalities of this trial, and four experienced judges [including Justice of the Queen's Bench Sir Michael Tugendhat] discuss the trial with some disagreements - notably on the meaning and requirement of 'malice' called for in the Parliamentary Act of Supremacy. More's own accounts of his interrogations in prison are analyzed, and the trial's procedures are compared to and contrasted with 16th-century concepts of natural law and also modern judicial practices and principles. The book is a 'must read' not only for students of law and Tudor history but also for all concerned with justice and due process. As a whole, the book challenges Duncan Derrett's conclusions that the trial was conducted in accord with contemporary legal norms and that More was convicted only on the single charge of denying Parliament the power to declare Henry VIII Supreme Head of the English Church [testified to by Richard Rich] - a position that has been uniformly accepted by historians since 1964. HENRY ANSGAR KELLY is past Director of the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, UCLA.LOUIS W. KARLIN is an attorney with the California Court of Appeal and Fellow of the Center for Thomas More Studies, University of Dallas.GERARD B. WEGEMER is Director of the Center for Thomas More Studies.