Legalizing Love

Many recent studies have investigated the significance of early modern marriagebut none consider divorce and the debates it generated although bothwere of central importance to the period. This work demonstrates thatProtestant debates about divorce following Henry VIII's annulment and subsequentreligious break from Rome facilitated England's larger negotiationbetween medieval and modern values institutions and attitudes toward thestate. The book considers poems plays and courtly and religious literature byMore Sidney Shakespeare Jonson and others to demonstrate how the earlymodern debate over divorce became a vehicle for exploring both the role ofmarriage in the state and the freedom of individuals within marriage.Through imagining the possibility of divorce early modern English writersfurther explored questions about the individual's relation to God lawgovernment and society. Legalizing Love fills a gap in scholarly discussionsof early modern marriage and the book is addressed to scholars and researchersin early modern literary studies history religious studies and legalstudies.