Instinct, Knowledge and Occult Science on the Early Modern English Stage
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€102.99
A01=Katherine Walker
Author_Katherine Walker
Category=DSBC
Category=DSBD
Category=DSG
drama
early modern literature
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
forthcoming
instinct
knowledge
magic
science
the occult
Product details
- ISBN 9781399548120
- Dimensions: 156 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 31 Jul 2026
- Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
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In Instinct, Knowledge and Occult Science on the Early Modern English Stage, Katherine Walker focuses on embodied experiences in the theater and the debates within the sciences that eventually fell out of favor but interlaced “gut feelings” with observational practice. She examines understudied occult sciences, looking to genres such as almanacs, witchcraft pamphlets and demonologies. As Walker argues, the early modern discourse of instinct registers shifting appraisals of the body’s role in making new knowledge. Unlike reason, instinct allowed anyone—a witch, an animal or a queen—to interpret a complex, animate environment. This knowledge was not only a seductive idea, but also opened up a range of debates on the limits of human cognition, the rights of marginalised individuals to offer new understanding, and the contours of what we can know about the environment.
Katherine Walker is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She is the author of Shakespeare and Science: A Dictionary and co-editor of the forthcoming The Handbook to Christopher Marlowe. Her work appears in journals such as English Literary History, Shakespeare and English Literary Renaissance, among others.
