Jonson's Imaginary Library: "An Execration upon Vulcan" and Its Intertexts

Abstract

abstract:Ben Jonson's 1623 poem "An Execration upon Vulcan" responds to a fire in his house, which seemingly destroyed some books and papers. Scholarly interest in this work has largely been confined to what biographical information it reveals. Yet this poem is in dialogue with Cervantes's Don Quixote, Rabelais's Pantagruel, and Donne's The Courtier's Library, and it engages with the genre of the mock library catalogue. By bringing together these works, the essay not only contributes to ongoing study of such Jonsonian concerns as censorship, interpretation, and the value of learning but also highlights his interest in contemporary European comic literature and the closeness of his association with Donne. It sheds light on early modern literature's self-consciousness about the library as a malleable concept, a self-consciousness with important methodological implications for critics and historians of the period.