Plagiarism in Early Modern England

What Is plagiarism? How was it understood and judged in early modern England? This interdisciplinary study sets out at once to theorize and historicise plagiarism. The first part launches a vigorous debate about the ethical, philosophical, artistic, and legal implications of plagiarism. Individual essays in part two provide historical case studies. Variously centred on translations of the Bible, historiography, drama, poetry, dance treatises, sermons, and colonial grammars, the essays show how a nexus of concepts developed between the Renaissance and the early nineteenth century - plagiarism, imitation, forgery, copyright, and intellectual property - and how they have been defined and contested.

All-star cast of contributors including Christopher Ricks, Stephen Orgel, Harold Love and Ian Donaldson

Preface Notes on Contributors List of Illustrations Introduction: Historicising Plagiarism; P.Kewes PART ONE: APPROACHES TO PLAGIARISM Plagiarism; C.Ricks Plagiarism: Hammond versus Ricks; B.S.Hammond Plagiarism and Original Sin; S.Orgel Forgery, Plagiarism, Imitation, Pegleggery; N.Groom PART TWO: CONTEXTS OF PLAGIARISM Plagiarising the Word of God: Tyndale Between More and Joye; A.Hope Plagiarism and Imitation in Renaissance Historiography; L.Richardson 'The Fripperie of Wit': Jonson and Plagiarism; I.Donaldson The Medium of Plagiarism: Rogue Choreographers in Early Modern London; B.Ravelhofer Originality and the Puritan Sermon; H.Love Theft and Poetry and Pope; P.Baines 'In Pleasing Memory of All He Stole': Plagiarism and Literary Detraction 1747-1785; R.Terry Lone Travellers: The Construction of Originality and Plagiarism in Colonial Grammars of Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries; R.Steadman-Jones Afterword; B.A.Golgar Index