Afterword: Reinterpreting Lyric

Abstract

eneralizations about developments in one’s discipline both require and repay substantial caution. Evaluating the status and influence of our own specialties and subfields can readily engender an overestimation of their significance or, in contrast, an exaggerated representation of oneself and one’s fellow travelers as a disrespected minority, a narrative written by and about the slippage between embattled and embittered. Moreover, for all the widespread commitment to transhistorical global analyses, such generalizations still too often representwhat happens in one’s own country or circles or favorite texts as typical. But even attempts to adduce global perspectives more fully entail their own risks, notably observations based on limited knowledge of the languages and cultures in question. And Jahan Ramazani, one of the leading lights in transhistorical and transcultural analyses, has cogently demonstrated that neglecting the local when studying the global can obscure much of what it claims to illuminate. The essays in this cluster generally meet such challenges successfully, and I attempt to do so as well. Yet these potential problems remain clear and present dangers in this and similar academic work. If the literal bottom lines in this response enumerate recommendations for future studies of lyric, this initial paragraph launches that list with a recommendation adapted from Spenser: be bold, be bold, be not too bold. Without ignoring such risks, however, one can confidently assert that these five authors are apt choices for reexamining lyric, that this is an apposite juncture for that project as well as for advancing many related issues, and that Spenser Studies is a surprisingly appropriate venue for such endeavors. To begin with, the qualifications of these five scholars for this project are