Laughter, jestbooks, and society in the Spanish Netherlands

Description:

In the late Middle Ages and the early sixteenth century people of high and low extraction alike split their sides with laughter at scenes of trickery and deception, when somebody inadvertently showed his bottom, or when their senses were misled by a cunning hero such as Ulenspieghel. Yet, throughout Europe from the sixteenth century onwards - in visual and theoretical representations of laughter, in the prohibition of comic manifestations of political and religious conflicts, as well as in civilization manuals based on Erasmus - moderation and restraint of laughter were imperative. In the Spanish Netherlands of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries this is supposed to have led to a strict culture with little laughter. This book contradicts this view. It pleads for the laughing body to be taken seriously as an influence on culture and society in its own right.

subjects: Civilization,  Dutch literature,  Dutch wit and humor,  Dutch wit and humor, Pictorial,  History,  History and criticism,  Humor,  Laughter,  Literature and society,  Pictorial Dutch wit and humor,  Popular literature,  Social aspects,  Social aspects of Laughter,  Spanish influences,  Dutch literature, history and criticism,  Popular literature, history and criticism,  Netherlands, history

Places: Netherlands

Times: 1500-1800,  Wars of Independence, 1556-1648