Mytho-poetics at Work

Download or read book Mytho-poetics at Work written by Rengenier Rittersma and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2018-01-03 with total page 430 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Mytho-poetics at Work Rengenier Rittersma offers an account of the posthumous fame of the Count of Egmont (1522-1568), whose public decapitation triggered the Dutch revolt. Drawing from numerous European sources – pamphlets, chronicles, and literature – this monograph tries to unravel why and how the alleged freedom fighter became an icon in European thought. It demonstrates that Egmont unfurled an evocative power over several centuries and cultural regions, as his name could be deliberately instrumentalized by different groups of people in order to corroborate their own confessional and political programs. In addition, this book offers the very first systematic study of the phenomenon of mytho-genesis and provides a conceptual model that can be applied to analogous historical myths.