Building on the latest groundbreaking research into the adaptive origins and functionality of the brain, “Infinites of Worlds There May Be Found”: Renaissance English Culture through a Scientific Lens offers fresh, eye-opening ways to understand its subject better. The modern synthesis in evolutionary biology and the cognitive revolution in psychology are giving us nothing less than the tools to generate an empirical, consilient science of human nature; explored herein are significant implications of these discoveries for work in the humanities. This book argues that our capacity to interpret early modern British literature and the society that sustained it can be substantially enhanced by making use of this emerging knowledge in the life sciences. At a moment when traditional scholarship in English and history seems largely desiccated, trivial, unoriginal, and marginalized, the biopoetic approach modeled and applied here advances perhaps the last, best hope for reinvigorating these fields and making the study of this fascinating period worthwhile and interesting again.
Part One investigates, from a Darwinian perspective, fundamental, timeless matters of love, friendship, and jealousy as they are presented in Shakespearean drama. Part Two focuses on the Tudor monarchy. It includes a chapter about Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall trilogy about Thomas Cromwell and his rise and fall at the Henrician court, which is examined with recourse to cognitive narratology, something that is revealing how people actually read and why immersion in storyworlds is so indispensable and beneficial. Next, in following chapters, the fortunate reign of Queen Elizabeth I is treated from the perspectives of primatology, anthropology, deep history, and probability—showing that ingrained, hardball Machiavellian politics predate humankind, and that a great deal of good luck ultimately underpinned her achievements. Part Three examines Metaphysical and Cavalier poetry, including verse by John Donne and Andrew Marvell. In light of recent findings in neuro-linguistics about how the brain processes figurative language, it considers their sublime ability to dream up memorable metaphors. Also pursued are profound, unexpected connections between scientific and poetic ways of seeing. The conclusion contends that analyses along such biocultural, interdisciplinary lines can help fulfill the project of Renaissance humanism and can help restore the liberal arts to their squandered flagship position in education, and beyond.