The Ashgate Research Companion to The Sidneys, 1500-1700

'The Ashgate Research Companion to The Sidneys not only brings the reader up-to-date with current scholarship about the principal members of this talented family, but offers as well new analysis of what is known, new insights into their lives and works, and suggestions for further study. This is an invaluable compendium of current understanding about all major aspects of Sidney research.' Steven W. May, Emory University, USA

Margaret P. Hannay, Professor of English (Emerita) at Siena College, is the author of Mary Sidney, Lady Wroth and Philip's Phoenix: Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke, editor of Silent but for the Word: Tudor Women as Patrons, Translators, and Writers of Religious Works, and editor, with Susanne Woods, of Teaching Tudor and Stuart Women Writers. With Noel J. Kinnamon and Michael G. Brennan, she has edited The Collected Works of Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke; Selected Works of Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke; Domestic Politics and Family Absence: The Correspondence (1588-1621) of Robert Sidney, First Earl of Leicester, and Barbara Gamage Sidney, Countess of Leicester; The Correspondence of Dorothy Percy Sidney, Countess of Leicester; and The Letters (1595-1608) of Rowland Whyte. Michael G. Brennan, Professor of Renaissance Studies at the University of Leeds, is the author of Literary Patronage in the English Renaissance: The Pembroke Family, and has edited Lady Mary Wroth's Love's Victory: The Penshurst Manuscript. With Noel Kinnamon he has published A Sidney Chronology: 1554-1654 and has published extensively on Renaissance travel writings, Graham Greene and Evelyn Waugh. With Margaret P. Hannay and Noel J. Kinnamon he has edited The Collected Works of Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke; Selected Works of Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke; Domestic Politics and Family Absence: The Correspondence (1588-1621) of Robert Sidney, First Earl of Leicester, and Barbara Gamage Sidney, Countess of Leicester; The Correspondence of Dorothy Percy Sidney, Countess of Leicester; and The Letters (1595-1608) of Rowland Whyte. He is also the author of The Sidneys of Penshurst and the Monarchy, 1500-1700. Mary Ellen Lamb is Professor of English (Emerita) at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, USA. She is the author of Gender and Authorship in the Sidney Circle (1990) and The Popular Culture of Shakespeare, Spenser, and Jonson (2006); co-editor of Oral Traditions and Gender in Early Modern Literary Texts (2007) and Staging Early Modern Romance: Prose Fiction, Dramatic Romance, and Shakespeare (2009). She is General Editor of the seven-volume reference library Ashgate Critical Essays on Women Writers in England, 1550-1700 (2009). She has also authored numerous essays on women writers and on Shakespeare in such journals as English Literary Renaissance; Shakespeare Quarterly; Shakespeare Survey; Review of English Studies; and Criticism, as well as in numerous collections. She is currently on the Editorial Board of English Literary Renaissance and is the editor of the Sidney Journal. She is collaborating on an edition of poetry by William Herbert, third Earl of Pembroke, for the Renaissance English Text Society.

Contents: Preface. Part I Overview: Family networks: The Sidneys, Dudleys, and Herberts, Michael G. Brennan. Part II Biographies: Sir Henry Sidney (1529-1586), Valerie McGowan-Doyle; Mary Dudley Sidney (c. 1531-1586) and her siblings, Carole Levin and Catherine Medici; Philip Sidney (1554-1586), Alan Stewart; Mary Sidney Herbert (1561-1621), Countess of Pembroke, Margaret P. Hannay; Those Essex girls: the lives and letters of Lettice Knollys, Penelope Rich, Dorothy Perrott Percy, and Frances Walsingham, Grace Ioppolo; The life of Robert Sidney (1563-1626), first Earl of Leicester, Robert Shephard; Barbara Gamage Sidney (c. 1562-1621), Countess of Leicester, Elizabeth Sidney Manners (1585-1612), Countess of Rutland, and Lady Mary Sidney Wroth (1587-1651), Margaret P. Hannay; Robert Sidney (1595-1677), second Earl of Leicester, Germaine Warkentin; A triptych of Dorothy Percy Sidney (1598-1659), Countess of Leicester, Lucy Percy Hay (1599-1660), Countess of Carlisle, and Dorothy Sidney Spencer (1617-1684), Countess of Sunderland, Nadine Akkerman; Algernon Sidneys life and works (1623-1683), Jonathan Scott; Henry Sidney (1641-1704), Earl of Romney, and Robert Spencer (1641-1702), second Earl of Sunderland, Michael G. Brennan. Part III The Sidneys in Ireland and Wales: The Sidneys in Ireland, Thomas Herron; The Sidneys and Wales, Willy Maley and Philip Schwyzer. Part IV The Sidneys and the Continent: The Sidneys and the continent: the Tudor period, Roger Kuin; The Sidneys and the continent: the Stuart period, Michael G. Brennan. Part V The Sidneys and the Arts: The Sidneys and public entertainments, Arthur F. Kinney; The Sidneys and literary patronage, Lisa Celovsky; Penshurst Place and Leicester House, Susie West; The Sidneys and the visual arts, Elizabeth Goldring; The Sidneys and music, Katherine R. Larson. Index.