Early Modern treatises on the topic of ideal friendship stress the central importance of equality between friends, often describing the ideal friend as ”another self”, or as one part of a single soul split between two bodies. Through its central emphasis on likeness, Early Modern friendship rhetoric enabled a daring vision of parity and consent: Friendship was seen as a voluntary and intensely affective relationship between equals that was, at least in theory, capable of transcending familial and other societal bonds, and in some cases even social rank. However, friendships that grew too close, especially those bridging a significant difference in social standing, could easily come under suspicion of opportunism, flattery, and even homosexuality.
This seminar aims at examining the complex nature of Early Modern friendship and the tensions inherent to this ideal. We will engage with contemporary ideas about friendship and investigate their significance for the conception of both public and private selves. For the first half of this seminar, we will focus on friendship in the realm of politics, examining the complicated relationship between kingship and friendship in Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II and Shakespeare’s Hamlet. For the second half, we will investigate the conflict between homosocial bonds and heterosexual relationships, as portrayed in Shakespeare’s Sonnets, The Merchant of Venice, and Twelfth Night.
Texts: Christopher Marlowe, Edward II (New Mermaids), William Shakespeare, Hamlet (The Arden Shakespeare), The Merchant of Venice (The Arden Shakespeare), Twelfth Night (The Arden Shakespeare). All other texts will be made available via GRIPS.