Once again, the Sidney-Spenser list proves it worth. Many thanks for all your helpful suggestions. At the moment, I happen to be particularly interested in commas, but all of this is useful. And, for the record, I too have my trusty copy of The Spenser Encyclopedia, reports of whose demise seem to have been greatly exaggerated!
Hannibal
----- Original Message -----
From: Jane Hedley <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Saturday, September 30, 2006 11:46 am
Subject: Re: Renaissance Punctuation
> Dear Bert:
> I am continually referring my students colleagues to the
> Encyclopedia, with a sense of real pride that Spenser studies has
> such a
> resource. Sometimes I forget at first because it seems too easy--
> there's a
> moment of head scratching about whatever the question might be,
> and then I
> think, "Of course--it'll be in the Encyclopedia." So--no dust on
> our
> library's copy, that's for sure. I never lend my own--it's too
> heavy,
> fortunately, to leave my office.
>
> Huzzah from the hinterlands!
> Jane Hedley
>
>
>
> At 06:20 PM 9/30/2006 -0700, you wrote:
> >Dear Bert. It is not forgotten, believe me. Tell Anne to dust
> off her
> >copy. tpr
> >
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: "A.C. Hamilton" <[log in to unmask]>
> >Date: Saturday, September 30, 2006 5:08 pm
> >Subject: Re: Renaissance Punctuation
> >To: [log in to unmask]
> >
> > > For a study of Renaissance punctuation, one might well begin with
> > > the
> > > entry by Fred Nichols on Punctuation in the now forgotten Spenser
> > > Encyclopedia. In his brief bibliography, he cites three studies.
> > > Bert
> > >
> > >
> > > At 02:11 PM 30/09/2006, you wrote:
> > > >I know that the late Fred Nichols was an authority on 16th
> century> > >punctuation as well as on Neolatin, but I'm not sure
> if he wrote
> > > much. I
> > > >once asked him about the comma after "perfecte paterne of a
> > > Poete" (so
> > > >often misread by my students as meaning a pattern of a perfect
> > > poet)--the
> > > >sentence would make better sense to me if that's an early modern
> > > comma, or
> > > >in other words one that indicates a nanosecond of breathing and
> > > not a
> > > >syntactic pause of the sort we would make. Elizabethans would use
> > > commas>where we wouldn't. In this case, the sense would be "a
> > > perfect pattern of
> > > >a poet who's pissed off because he isn't getting funded." Fred
> > > said he
> > > >thought I might have a point in not having a comma, so to
> speak, but
> > > >didn't direct me to anything he had written. Anne.
> > > >
> > > > > I don't know of such a study, but I know a little about
> possible> > > > sources for it. The TCP transcriptions of EEBO let
> you, if you
> > > are so
> > > > > inclined, find out about the punctuation habits of particular
> > > texts.> > I read somewhere that Sidney was inordinately fond of
> > > parentheses in
> > > > > the Arcadia and wondered what facts this was based on. I
> > > happen to
> > > > > have a lot of those texts in a database environment and
> ran a
> > > test on
> > > > > the Arcadia. It turns out that the Arcadia is in the 99th
> > > percentile> > of texts in its use of parentheses. The average
> > > across the TCP is
> > > > > something like 4 per 10,000 words, the figures for the
> Arcadia are
> > > > > close to 30.
> > > > >
> > > > > As often with digital analyses, you don't really learn
> > > anything new.
> > > > > But you get much firmer and more precise evidence of what you
> > > sort of
> > > > > knew. In Sidney's case, this seems to me genuninely
> > > interesting. The
> > > > > parenthetical style is clearly indicative of pretty deep
> narrative> > > > habits, and a look at parentheses or m-dashes
> might bring out some
> > > > > stylistic properties of a text very clearly.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > On Sep 30, 2006, at 12:46 PM, HANNIBAL HAMLIN wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > >> Dear Learned Colleagues,
> > > > >>
> > > > >> Does anyone know of a study of punctuation in the English
> > > > >> Renaissance? Something discussing what exactly (or
> > > inexactly) a
> > > > >> comma or colon or exclamation mark means? I may be missing
> > > > >> something, but I don't recall ever seeing such. Perhaps
> it's so
> > > > >> remote from being a hot topic that no one has done it.
> Are there
> > > > >> Renaissance works that treat punctuation, in and amongst
> other> > > >> rhetorical matters? Hmm.
> > > > >>
> > > > >> Many thanks,
> > > > >>
> > > > >> Hannibal
> > > > >>
> > > > >>
> > > > >> Hannibal Hamlin
> > > > >> Associate Professor of English
> > > > >> The Ohio State University
> > > > >
> > >
>
>
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