Women Writers of the English Renaissance (review)

Reviews 207 appearance, and speculates on the nature of Harold's private life, from his long-term de facto union with Edith 'Swanneck' to his supposed concern for the unity of his family. The reader is left with an attractive, but hollow and somewhat predictable, image of a handsome and loyal hero; of a man skilled with the sword and statecraft, yet desirous of peace and mindful of his religious duty; and of a king possessed equally of a passion for hunting and a great love of his kingdom and people. Indeed, Walker's choice of subheading to the chapter title, a quotation from the Vita Edwardi Regis, is indicative of the way in which he shapes his description of Harold: 'a true friend ofhis race and country.' Although this chapter is immensely readable, must be relegated to the realms of conjecture: there is little or no evidence upon which to base a critical study of Harold's personality. One might be inclined to feel, moreover, that the author is too eager to subvert the traditional, unfavourable view of Harold at the cost of the some of the impartiality crucial to so shadowy an historical figure. At times he gives too much credence to the 'English' version of an event, dismissing the 'Norman' except where it corroborates the more positive view, and occasionally resorts to conjecture to serve his purpose. Perhaps, too, he ought to have given greater consideration to the many later sources of the Conquest, particularly to the twelfth-century Anglo-Norman historians William of Malmesbury, Henry of Huntingdon and Orderic Vitalis, who made their own vital contribution to the historiography of the Norman Conquest. It is from these later sources that much of the modern interpretation of Harold Godwineson derives. Nevertheless, Walker has dealt admirably with a difficult task. Harold is essential reading for all historians of the Norman Conquest, and does indeed demonstrate that Harold Godwineson deserves a 'rightful place among the eleventh-century kings of England and a central role in the events of 1066' (p. xxix). Emma Cavell Department of History University of Tasmania Walker, Kim, Women Writers of the English Renaissance (Twayne's English Authors Series 521), N e w York, Twayne Publishers, 1996; cloth; pp. xv, 260; 10 b/w illustrations; R.R.P. US$28.95. Kim Walker's book for the Twayne English Authors series is a model of its kind—suggestive and informative, lucid and scholarly. In a field somewhat overcrowded with introductory discussions it is notable for its acuity and incisiveness. Noting that 'in the not too distant future w e will see the publication of Twayne texts on individual w o m e n writers of the 208 Reviews period' (p. ix), Walker focuses here on a broadly defined survey of the literary writings of English w o m e n 1560-1640, including print and manuscript sources, tombstone engraving and calligraphy. Indeed, one of the strengths of Walker's materialist and contextual analysis is the confidence with which she engages the contingent status and pedagogical implications of what can be claimed as 'literary'. She is alert to the technological complexity of Renaissance practices of reading, writing and representing, bringing a sophisticated attention to bear on the text as object, the book as commodity and the overlap between them. Walker's book is organised around historicised questions of gender and genre, ideology and agency as they interact with the pedagogical constitution of Early Modern women's writing as a field of study. She discusses the 'productive contradictions' and 'potential loopholes for the w o m a n writer' in the always gendered but not univocal discourses of humanist education and conduct. She argues that the figure of the silent woman, 'a signifier of male sovereignty in a secular world' (p. 12), could be turned to promote the textual agency of w o m e n as 'wise virgins', both marking and 'marked by the problematic relationship between wisdom, sex, and sexuality' (p. 1). Walker is a skilful compiler and careful reader of both well-known and less familiar citations. Of Vives' injunction, 'A w o m a n shulde be kepte close ... for hit is a token...