The Protestant Whore : : Courtesan Narrative and Religious Controversy in England, 1680-1750 / / Alison Conway.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter UTP eBook-Package Backlist 2000-2015
• VerfasserIn: Conway, Alison,
• Place / Publishing House: Toronto : : University of Toronto Press, , [2016]; ©2010
• Year of Publication: 2016
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource

After the restoration of the English monarchy in 1660, Protestants worried that King Charles II might favour religious freedom for Roman Catholics, and many suspected that the king was unduly influenced by his Catholic mistresses. Nell Gwyn, actress and royal mistress, stood apart by virtue of her Protestant loyalty. In 1681, Gwyn, her carriage surrounded by an angry anti-Catholic mob, famously declared 'I am the protestant whore.' Her self-branding invites an investigation into the alignment between sex and politics during this period, and in this study, Alison Conway relates courtesan narrative to cultural and religious anxieties.In new readings of canonical works by Aphra Behn, Daniel Defoe, Henry Fielding, and Samuel Richardson, Conway argues that authors engaged the same questions about identity, nation, authority, literature, and politics as those pursued by Restoration polemicists. Her study reveals the recurring connection between sexual impropriety and religious heterodoxy in Restoration thought, and Nell Gwyn, writ large as the nation's Protestant Whore, is shown to be a significant figure of sexual, political, and religious controversy.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Illustrations -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- 1. The Invention of the Protestant Whore -- 2. 'No Neuters in Treason': Aphra Behn's Love-Letters between a Nobleman and His Sister -- 3. The Secret History of Women's Political Desire, 1690-1714 -- 4. 'A House Divided': Defoe's Roxana and the Protestant Body Politic -- 5. A World of One's Own: Clarissa, Tom Jones, and Courtesan Authority -- Afterword -- Historical Glossary -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index