Prince Henry Revived: Image and Exemplarity in Early Modern England

There can be few examples of more intensive fashioning and self-fashioning of a Renaissance figure than that of Prince Henry (1594-1612). This collection of essays re-examines the extraordinary artistic and cultural response to Prince Henry and presents many new findings in the context of recent scholarship.

The investment of great hope in Prince Henry, and the extreme importance attached to the creation of a fitting image for him extending even to its posthumous development, indicate that early modern society regarded its leaders very differently than we do now. Essays illuminate the cultural program to which Prince Henry was subjected, an impossibly demanding role requiring such strenuous efforts that he became exhausted, took ill, and died young. His younger brother who survived him went on to become Charles I of England.

Timothy Wilks is a member of the Faculty of Arts and Media, Southampton Solent University. Other contributors include Malcolm R. Smuts, Aysha Pollnitz, Michelle O'Callaghan, John A. Buchtel, Gilles Bertheau, Alexander Marr, Gail C. Weigl, Greogory McNamara, Elizabeth Goldring, Michael Ullyot, and David Trim.