John Donne and the Theology of Language ed. by P.G. Stanwood, Heather Ross Asals (review)

HUMANITIES I I I pretive richness of this approach, however, is Patricia Parker's fine essay on 'dilation' and 'delation' in Othello. Other kinds of formalism are represented as well, in Rene Girard's elucidation of the patterns of 'mimetic desire' in Troilus and Cressida (a reading which collides interestingly with Freund's), and in Thomas Berger 's perceptive (though oddly anti-theatrical) psychoanalytic reading of the opening scenes of Richard II. But a rhetorically sophisticated criticism must move as well as provoke its reader, or be convicted of a failure to set its own precepts into motion. For this reader at least, the most moving of these essays are those in which theoretical distinctions are grounded in worldly as well as textualist concerns. I refer to Nancy Vicker's powerful feminist reading of Lucrece, and more particularly to Elaine Showalter's brilliant demonstration in 'Representing Ophelia' of the power of literary interpretations to shape our constructions of lived reality; to the key theoretical move of Robert Weimann's proposal that the Marxist term 'appropriation' offers a means of transcending 'the unacceptable alternative between discursive and nondlscursive definitions of mimesis' (p 279); and to Stanley Cavell's discussion of Coriolanus not as a political play but as a play 'about the formation of the political, .. . about what it is that makes a rational animal fit for conversation, for civility' (p 262). As Terence Hawkes shows, this worldly, engaged criticism can be playfully engaging as well: his delightful reception study of Telmah (I leave the reader to discover his reasons for spellingit backwards) is at oncetheoretically acute and wickedly funny. Most impressive of all is Stephen Greenblatt 's 'Shakespeare and the Exorcists: a wonderfully illuminating exploration of the relationship between theatricality and ideology in King Lear. The analytical economy of this essay is breathtaking, as are its scope and its explanatory force. We have every reason to be grateful for the invasion, the irruption of theory that has made work of this quality possible. (MICHAEL H. KEEFER) John Donne and the Theology ofLanguage. Edited by P.G. Stanwood and Heather Ross Asals University of Missouri Press. viii, 376. us $32.00 John Donne is reported to have written a critical treatise on poetry which has not survived. The present volume might be seen as an attempt to compensate partially for this loss. It gathers together in an appropriate arrangement passages from the sermons in which Donne discusses language , imagery, and other aspects of critical theory and literary practice. The main divisions include, among others, 'The Speech of the Trinity: 'Grammar and Theology: 'Names and Typology: 'Hermeneutics: Inter- 112 LETIERS IN CANADA 1986 pretation and Revelation: and 'Genre.' The text, as one would expect, is based on the great Potter and Simpson edition of the sermons. While the selection and arrangement of the passages have been doneby Heather Asals, the editors jointly have provided a General Introduction and introductions to each main section of the book; P.G. Stanwood's separate contributions include annotations and a glossary. Both introductions and annotations are succinct and lucid, and helpful especially in providing relevant theological and Patristic contexts, although they may occasionally leave questions in the reader's mind. In the annotation on Donne's sermon on Deuteronomy 12:30, references to Smithfield and faggots are explained simply as having the sense of a vulgar market and bundles of sticks. Would not a generation brought up on Foxe's Book of Martyrs have been certain to see this passage as an allusion to the persecution of heretics and the burning of the Marian martyrs? In a note on the sermon on Canticles 3:11, Donne's criticism of 'Idolatrous Chappels' and 'schismaticall Conventicles' is explained as condemnation of 'nonconforming Protestants on one side and dissenters on the other.' This is surely a conventional Anglican attack on the false extremes of Roman Catholicism and Puritanism, and its meaning is much betterindicated in a discussion of Donne's adherence to the Anglican via media in the General Introduction. A larger question is raised by a statement in the introduction to the section on 'Genre: where the editors in considering Donne's literary achievement comment: 'the sermons include...