Department of History
Sam Dominy
Research
My thesis examines descriptions and experiences of despair in seventeenth-century England, especially as it was understood in the contexts of religion. It moves beyond the Puritan-centric discussion of despair, looking at writings on despair from the perspectives of varying communities and individuals both Catholic and Protestant. Doing so reveals that long-standing notions of early modern despair have been steeped in the polemic of the period, often influenced by Whiggish and Weberian narratives that have continued to portray puritanism as despair-inducing. This thesis argues that exploring early modern despair through multiple denominations and categories of writing demonstrates how the term was used to construct narratives and negotiate experience.
This project uses a range of printed texts and manuscripts across the genres of polemic, scholarship on the passions and melancholy, life writing, consolation literature, conversion narratives and narratives of apostasy and suicide. These texts unveil the often ambiguous nature of despair, as well as its connection with other passions as well as melancholy and suicide. Central to the thesis is an examination of how individuals interpreted their own afflictions, especially through religious belief and external diagnoses.
