Ars aeterna and other essays on literary structure

With passionate energy and great learning these essays expound the poetics, and explore the practice, of Renaissance and early modern writers who structured their work in ways that reflect the divine order then regularly attributed to the text of the Bible, to a God created universe, and to a providential conception of history. Maren-Sofie Røstvig (1920-2014) demonstrates how literary structure was perceived as not just the business of organizing material in craftsman-like fashion, but as a vital component of meaning that requires and repays our closest attention. The thirteen challenging and pioneering publications conveniently reprinted here have been gathered from a wide variety of sources, some of which are not readily found even in major libraries. All the chosen items come from the final thirty years of the author's productive career when her thinking was at its most developed. The volume is supplemented by a full list of Røstvig's many publications, and by an overview of her life in scholarship.