《缪斯的花园》中的早期现代英国文学经典建构

An Early Modern Canon Formation of English Literature in Hesperides,or the Muses' Garden

手稿札记书《赫斯珀里得斯,或缪斯的花园》是由17世纪英国最重要的文学作品出版商汉弗莱·莫塞莱委托,16世纪50、60年代由约翰·埃文斯编纂而成的。埃文斯广泛征引了177部剧作,包括莎士比亚、本·琼生以及博蒙特与弗莱彻所著的1647年对开本。在剧院遭到关闭的情况下,《缪斯的花园》将戏剧确立为一种文学体裁,而非舞台表演体裁。埃文斯还将莫塞莱提倡的另外两种体裁——传奇和诗歌——经典化了。三种文学体裁——戏剧、传奇和诗歌——占据了该札记书引用的355部(篇)作品的大多数,埃文斯之完全排斥布道文和强烈的文学倾向使得《缪斯的花园》成为英国文学经典建构历史上的早期里程碑。出版商和编纂者共同建立了一个英国文学的早期现代经典。而且,该经典的政治性很强,它明显是男性的和保王主义的。

The manuscript commonplace book Hesperides,or the Muses＇ Garden was compiled by John Evans in the 1650s and 1660s under the commission of Humphrey Moseley,arguably the most important literary publisher in seventeenth-century England.Evans＇s extensive extracts from 177 plays,including Shakespeare,Ben Jonson,and the most notable Moseley title,the 1647 folio of Beaumont and Fletcher,establish drama as a genre of the page rather than the stage in a period when the theater was forced to be closed.Romances and poems,two other genres promoted by Moseley,are also canonized in Hesperides.The three literary genres—plays,romances,poems—account for a majority of the 355 titles cited in Hesperides;Evans＇s exclusion of sermons and his heavy literary inclination make Hepserides an early milestone in the history of canon formation.The publisher and the compiler work together for the foundation of an early modern canon of English literature.Moreover,this canon is politicized in that Hesperides is distinctively masculine and royalist.