'My Cheefest Work': The Making of the Spiritual Autobiography of Elizabeth Isham
Author: Stephens, Isaac1
Source: Midland History, Volume 34, Number 2, Autumn 2009 , pp. 181-203(23)
Publisher: Maney Publishing
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Abstract:
Until recently, Elizabeth Isham, a never-married gentlewoman hailing from seventeenth-century Northamptonshire, was an obscure historical figure. Fortunately, the discovery of her 'My Book of Remembrance', a 60,000-word spiritual autobiography housed in the collections of Princeton University, has brought her into full scholarly view. Written around 1639, the autobiography covered the first thirty years of her life, and was the product of a number of interrelated influences and purposes. Largely an act of spiritual meditation, repentance and memory, Elizabeth's account was a testament of intense puritan self-examination, a practice shaped by her upbringing in the godly household of Lamport Hall, Northamptonshire. The autobiography also served as a defence of her marital status, allowed her to provide religious instruction to later generations of Isham women and was a memorial to her mother, Lady Isham. For its literary style and structure, the reading of devotional literature proved important, for Elizabeth modeled her writing on Augustine's Confessions when producing an account of her life. One of the most remarkable ego-documents to have survived from the early Stuart period, her 'Book of Remembrance' broadens our understanding of women's writing and the genre of spiritual autobiography in early modern England.Keywords: AUTOBIOGRAPHY; ELIZABETH ISHAM; MEMORY; NORTHAMPTONSHIRE; PERSONAL PIETY; WOMEN'S WRITING
Document Type: Research article
DOI: 10.1179/175638109X417350
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