Commissioning Compassion and Staging Suffering: The Case of a Libel Found at Elizabeth I's Memorial at Westminster Abbey

Abstract:Finding its 'locus classicus' in the passion of Christ, the correspondence between suffering and compassion is deeply embedded in histories of the emotions. Less well charted, however, are the complex requirements these emotions place on representation, particularly literary modes of representation. This article examines two Jacobean verse libels that mobilize aspects of the Christian tradition of suffering and compassion for rhetorical and political effect. Associated with Elizabeth I's memorial site at Westminster Abbey, these verse libels illustrate how specific material conditions work to shape the reception of an emotional appeal, inflecting textuality, and in particular the verses' use of various literary, historical, and biblical representations of suffering and compassion.