Ben Jonson's Walk to Scotland

An Annotated Edition of the 'Foot Voyage'

James Loxley, Anna Groundwater, Julie Sanders

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9781107003330
• eBook ISBN: 9781316190494
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: English Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

At the heart of this book is a previously unpublished account of Ben Jonson's celebrated walk from London to Edinburgh in the summer of 1618. This unique firsthand narrative provides us with an insight into where Jonson went, whom he met, and what he did on the way. James Loxley, Anna Groundwater and Julie Sanders present a clear, readable and fully annotated edition of the text. An introduction and a series of contextual essays shed further light on topics including the evidence of provenance and authorship, Jonson's contacts throughout Britain, his celebrity status, and the relationships between his 'foot voyage' and other famous journeys of the time. The essays also illuminate wider issues, such as early modern travel and political and cultural relations between England and Scotland. It is an invaluable volume for scholars and upper-level students of Ben Jonson studies, early modern literature, seventeenth-century social history, and cultural geography.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half title page
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Contents
• Illustrations
• Acknowledgements
• A Note on Names
• Abbreviations
• Introduction: Jonson’s ‘Foot Voyage’ and the Aldersey manuscript
• My gossip Jonson his Foot Voyage and mine into Scotland
• Appendix One: Brief additional passages
• Appendix Two: Canesco
• Appendix Three: Notes on Bothal and York
• Contextual essays
• 1. The genres of a walk
• 2. Jonson’s foot work
• 3. Scenes of hospitality
• Printed works cited
• Index