METASCIENCE: PILOT ISSU E conributions to Metascience are welcome and should be sent to the editor.If you havc a book inpress orhave authored arecently-published book, please encourage your publisher to send areview copy to the editor. Ifyou would like to write for the joumal, contact the editor or a mernber of the editorid board. SUBSCRIPTIONS This joumal is published by the Ausralasian Association for the History, philosophyandsocial studiesof Science; membersof theAssociationreceiveMetascience free ofchrge. Thispilotissue is designedto introdtrceMetascierce to newreaders.Ifyoubelieve that the journal is useful and has a role to play, please take out a subscription and encourage your lib'rary and colleagues to do so. Subscription rates are Australian 925 per annum (hro issues) for individuals and Australian $50 for institutions. Bank drafts in Australian dollars are acceptable, but it will be more convenient for you to pay by credit ccd (in Australian dollars). This may be done in Britain, the USA and elsewhere with VISA andMASTERCARD. Please complete and return the subscription form enclosed with this pilot Issue of Metascience. [New forms will be sent to you upon request]. To take out a subsctiption or for further information, please write to: Dr. David Miller, School of Science and Technology Studies, University of New South Wales, Kensingtor4 Sy&rey, NSW 2033. Australia FAX 5l-2_313_7994. EDITOR An editorid correspondence should be addressed to the editor: Dr. Michael Shortland, Unit for the History and Philosophy of Science, University of Sy&rey, sydney, Nsw 2006, Australia. F AX 6l -2-692-3329. EDITORIAL BOARD Dr. John Forge, School of Science and Technology, Gritrith University, NatharL Brisbang Queensland 41 1 1, Ausralia. [Philosophy of Science]. Dr. Stephen Gaukroger, Departnent of Traditional and Modern philosophy, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Ausnalia. [Rhysical Science]. Dr. Rosaleen[ove, DeparhrentofHumanities, swinburnelnstituteofrechnology. PO Box 218, Hawthom,Yicntia3l2?, Australia- [Science and Culture]. Dr. Michael Shortland. [Life Sciences]. Dr. David Turnbull, Departnent of Humanities, Deakin University, Geelong, Victoria 3217, Australia- [Social Snrdies of Science and Technology]. I'rlntcd on 100% Australian Recycled Paper by thc University o! Sydncy lJnbn Pilot lssue 1991 EDITOR: MICH AEL SHORTLAND EDITORIAL BOARD: /OHNFORGE (Philosophy of Sciencd, STEPHEN G AUKROGER ( Phv sical S c i e ncd, ROSATEEN LOVE (Science arid Culture), MICHAEL SHORTLAND (Life Scienced, D AVID TURNB ULL (Social Studies of Science). (i)ssAYREvrEW v emphasized in the book, explicitly because it is more familiar and better understood than the forms of political engagement of science that are addressed extensively, and also because I had nothing very original to add to the available literature. But the bookrepeatedly emphasizes that ideology is important, and only objects to a common tendency to limit potitiCal assessments of science 0o considerations ofideology alone (cf. pp. 17-19, 190, and especially 253-55).I see no difficulty wirh Krips' extended criticism of ideological misrepresentations of breast-feeding as "unnatural," and am only perplexed as to why he believes that such criticism is inconsistent with theconcems Ido emphasizein thebook. This isnotto say that there are not important and controversial issues at stake in the book concerning the scope and character ofpolitical criticism and the place of ideology critique within it. Readers interested in a sustaintd and Philosophically sophisticated criticism of the book on precisely these issues, including its resources for accommodating the critique of ideology, should consult Steven Vogel'srecentess ay review in Social Epistennlo g!.3 1 . Ian Hacking , Represerting and Intervening.camt'ridge: cambridge university Press, 1983. 2. Nancy cartwright, How the Lows of Phlsics Lie. oxford: oxford universiry kess, 1983. 3. Steven Vogel, 'Science, Practice, and Politics,' Social EpistemoloLvj (1991), in press. Department of Philosophy, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut, USA. ftIEIASCIENGE. Planned for our next issue: ssay reuiew on the history of experiments. Qouna Table on science and religinn. Eric Korn's books column. Dozens ofEleurews and, (T)or;"r, . And,Iots more... (^lssAYREVIEW Shakespeare, Science and Magic By John Sutton John S. MebanerRenaissance Magic and the Retum of the Golden Age: The Occult Tradition and Marlowe. .fonson. and Shakespeare. Lincolnfl-ondon: University of Nebraska Press, 1989. Pp. xviii + 309. US$29.95 HB. cholarly and readable, this provocative book covers a rich array of themes,living up to its brief of forging "symbiotic ratherthan predatory" relations between lterature, history and philosophy (p. xi). Mebane's complex arguments are based on thorough res@rch, attention to details of text and interpretation (with many original nanslations frrom primary sources), and confidentpaths through ttre secondary literature of diverse disciplines. The discussion ranges easily from early Renaissance Herme.ticlCabalist magic o the politics of the Stuaft court, and from English dramatic practice o radical utopian reformism. Afteran inroductory chapter, the book falls into two main parts. Chapters on Ficino, Pico and Agrippa are followed by a careful transitional section on magic, science and witchcraft in Renaissance England. This study ofEnglish responses to the occult radition pr€pares the ground for criticalexaminationsinthesecondhalfofthebookoflvlarlowe'sDr.Faustus, J onson' sThe Al c hemistand courtmasques, and Shakespe are' sThe Tempe st. While closely following Frances Yates' work, particulafly The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age, in both scope and content, Mebane develops and extends many of her views, applies them to some new material, and answers a number of her critics. Full documentation and an extensive bibliography add to his book's usefulness. The author is not shy of suggesting morals for our time from the study of the Renaissance: as a .^.I SSAY REVIEIil result readers unconvinced by his forthright defence of what he sees as the Renaissance vision of human potential may find, as I did, that the book induces considerable impatience. So afterabrief skerch of someof its major themes and contentions, I focus on points of disappointment and disagreement. The early chapters, with well-chosen quotations and neat summaries, settheintellectual agendaforthelaterliterarystudies: Marlowe, Jonson, and Shakespeare, Mebane argues, "were consciously aware that philosophical occultism had given impetus to the burgeoning enthusiasm of the period about humanity and its powers" (p. 3). He uses Ficino's Hermetic writings on art, the perfection of the cosmos, man as microcosm, alchemy, the procedures of good magic, the use of talismans, Orphic singing, and medicine to introduce basic occult doctrines. The chapter on Pico, a convincing defence of Yates againstWilliam Craven's relegation of magic to a subsidiary place inPico's system, adds the elements of Christian Cabala, hopes of self-perfection and contemplative ascent, and the aim of redemption in society as in the self, all leading to a vision of the magus as a free agent in control of life. Agrippa's more heterodox views, his abundance of numinous influences, his instructions on advantageous uses of occult powers, and his stress on thefiro r and passio of the seeker, helped to spread the occult tradition through Europe. An interesting treatment of Agrippa's sceptical work De vanitate,which criticises secular, intellectual and religious authorities as well as the occult doctrines and practices his other writings expound, completes the background sections of the book. Following Yates' later work, Mebane sees humanism as progressiveratherthanconservative(pp. 10,20),sothattheocculttradition, in developing "the humanists'affirmation of thepowerof human beings to control both their own personalities and the world around them" (p. 3), was a logical extension of humanism rather than a revolt against it. This extreme humanism stressed the human soul's potential divinity (p. 27) . Neoplatonic inlluence encouraged the idea that the true selfis eternally saved (p. 33), and that Christ's divinity was not unique: humans too are responsible for the providential care of God's world (pp. 34, 38). The Cabalist tradition allows for "the restoration of humanity to is prelapsarian state"(p. 38) . TheFall is not irrevocable: each human has the free will "either to repeat the Fall or to overcome it" (p. 43). Despite the absorption of gnostic infl uences into the occult tradition, God's benevolence could not be doubted, if the seeker's intentions iue pure. The "widespread feeling" of the approachof "an age of spiritual, cultural, and political rebirth" identified by Mebane was based on the possibility of self-determination through spiritual transformation (often {^lssAYREvrEvyvexpressed in alchemical terms, and mocked inThe Alchemist)regeneration and self-perfection. The self, for the Renaissance occultist, waJa work of art; and art had, as a result" a dangerous tendency t0 compete with grace as "the shaping force in human life and destiny" tp. frl. The iltimate individual goal of such self-creation was the poisitility oi ranscendence, of union with God (pp. 18-19). Its sociat counterpart was a belief in the possibility of the return of a prelapsarian Golden Age, expressed more concretely in a wish to assist God with the urgent reformation of the world. This desire had greatest appeal for the radical mystical sects of sixteenth c"ltl.y northern Europe, among anti-authoriarian paracelsian reformers, and in seventeenth century revolutionary England: but it was present, as Mebane.shorvs, tfuoughout the occult tradition, and was promulgated by Elizabethan Englishmen like Dee and Ralegh whose support of theiadition bolstered nationalist imperial ambitions. It was questioned by lvlarlowe and satirized by Jonson, both aware that the rhetoric of reformist idealism is easily undercut by the elrysure of underlying ruthless powermongering. Important intellectuar and ideological parallels are drawn Gnveen Jonson and Bacon. The satires on and deflations of occult self-seekers in The Alchemist are tempered by dwareness of the limitations of human idealism,.and a consequent moderation which emphasizes ..the concrete possibilities of the here and now" (p. 173). Jonson's attack on stylistic obscurity and intellectual self-deception, like Bacon's on the idols'of the mind, is part of a general suspicion of overemotional faith in the individuar mind' Accoding to Mebane, Jonson's restrained neoclassicism turns, in Bacon's vision, into the cooperative enterprise of science. while it would be_-misleading to think of later seventeenth-century science as wholry differenl' as entirely empirical, devoid of excessive enthusiasms, and free ofambitious virtuosi, this is aplausiblereadingofJonson and..the scientific frame of mind". This brings me toa firstdisappointmentaboutthe book. Mebane's treatment of science is skerchy. with no specific discussion of particular scientific ideas or traditions, and only incidenal reference to individual scientists (Gilbert, Flarriot), his concern is rather to indicate the conditions of possibility for the development of modem science. Humanism and its occult extensions, when "purged... of the grandiose self-centeredness which. so often comrpted" its vision of human porential (p. 35) and of esoteric mathematical mysticism, became, in Biconian aid ..advanced forms of rational inquiry" o. 37), a cooperative endeavour less reliant on individual inspiration and so more appealing to traditional authority. But, as the prevalence of the somewhat disconcerting phrase "genuine ,i"n"a,' throughout the book suggests, Mebane, while overtry acfnowledging the tis^tr** complexities involved in racing stimurations of scientific advance, implicitlyfollows vickers and orhers in accepting a oi.t otorny u"i**" pi"gi.rri* modem science and retrograoe.occult aisciplines of alch*ry, ^'oor'ogy -olatural magrc. In Bacon's lifetime, fo;instance, ..only'a t_O?if ofEnglishmen could distinguish between controlled e*p"rir*taiion; anaoccultist claims that "genuine knowledge of nature was a combination ofexperience anddivine rwelation" (p. 6).it is, itseems, a source ofregret thatin the English matrematician and as-tronomernouertnecoro", . p.ofiJrri"" and enlightened anitudes exist side by side with a p-,ni*nt'inil.o, i"astrology" (p. 76). For Mebane, magic, in certain forms, did contribute to ,.the emergence of genuine science" (p. 3) partly through the optimistic assertionsof the occulrists that the perfectedirurin ,our .- ,.p"rr."i, i"ior*Lo amend" the natural world (p. 24 quoting Ficino). Their vision orr,u,n-ity yul .3 necessary parr of an atrnospherJconducive ro the ninn of ,.ii,o.*" (p^. 24). Ru1 surely, as patrick Curry and many ott e., f,une.g""O, n" p.f",of tr.acing rheconceptual and iausat connections uenvin ir," srur,tradition and the ideas of the scientific revorution i. not,or"-rti, ,demarcate the line between science and pre-science but t ""a"roiroalternative categories fo_r knowledge wnfon predate our classificatoryframeworks. It is not at all.obvious, i. Cu..y oUr"*es, ..tha[ i;;r;;;"y 11cf saU]e a{ enduringgpistemological entiies as . . .,sci.n J _O ,"eij,,,.Mebane has litrre m add ro the hisririan of science's uno".r*oin;Tl'rh" background !o seventeenth-century science. In this and otherrespects, Mebane revears considerable confidence ln -r4"* perspecrives on the issues raised bv Renaissan." *.i"ii *oindeed in the conrinuity benveen tr,"i, "onl-s and ours. It is ..the perennial, unanswerable qrrestions concerning the essence of human nature,, o. 136) wirh which they oeat: ttre connics ottheir tivesano am-uG"ir* "rtheir works are minors of our o*n 1pp iiz,l6bl. n menrions briefly burdoes not exprore the role of the rhetoric of "genuine scien."', -o utop#ii,in later British imperialist propaganda: butlhe does, tellingry, conclude with a characterisation of "genuine sclience" as "tt" toor tr"*Eri ;i;h ;;gr;*towards a chastened version of the dream of the return oln" coro"n"eg"would actualry be accomprished"(p. 200). cooperative empirical science,the eventual resurt of ttre trumaniit ""t"rwiir*y rater have had somedestructive consequences; but they ,r. "-tt i6ut"fr" t" ne' *ri_;;il;"confusions of sincerity. and open-minoeoness with dogmatism andself-vindication alreadydiscemiUi"*ittri"n""Jrsanceoccultism. Science,then, is an insti[rtionarised extension of the [n"iron." idea of the freeagent's intervention in thenatural order: andwedowell tonoticeRenaissance .4. ()ssnv REVIEtl/ awareness of the etlr.ical_l1g:^ of ..daring to assert control over our owndesdny" 0).lll). But, in M-ebane's ".rul *" driving humanisr idea ofindividuar ana socialresllil;;-,ht";;rr ser-pe.reciio", *ir""i,np"r*by a Jonsonian ..affirmation of rarionaiiiv'u"O discipline,, (p. rZg) unOpurgedof ambidon' rust,greeoano otherefiects of thebaserparts of humannature, is basically beneficial. Further dispray of these same humanist convictions induces inme a corresponding unease about Meban",. t;;;;;;;o-i;;;:*""wrrers' wh'e overrry y3rcor1rng atngisutrv and paradox in wrirers likeAgrippa' Marrowe and Jonson uofi witrrii unt ...or, ,"xts, he nevertheressseems to impose dichotomols moral and-aesthetic frameworks on theirideas and work. Retigious beri"ri, .jn* *r,"rry sincerq o.-is iriiiil*o u,ambidon, tusr., and iesire for po;;;:"il';il of Agrippa,s pe occuttanhilosophia, Mebanc judgcs, .Irh" l;r;; i;q"G;ilt;n,o-*i*;,r,J.*i*;;;-#ffi #,ruii"nX"T:f :(p. 55). Because Agrippa *u, u, ,ir", uiirl"or tr,is unfortr.inate ,"nJ.n.ytowards the comrpdon -of rerigious *.J,irr, he "mus[ have lived inconstanr spirituar rurmo'" 1p. zil: so hisattack on *ffin;."rt".il,,"De vanitate must be a' sinceie d;;;;;;:ion of inretectuar pride andselfish ambidon" g. 93]_ so'i"oregJipuii,nr, on rhe possible uses oft'arrsmans and potions perven *re trrie Lroti" irug".y of union with thedivine and "read rike aemoni. p*ooi"r LiriJno.'s doctrine of Eros,, (p. 57).This suggests to Mebane nut rnorJ*n.rrii aoout tr,e easy confusion ofthe occurtists' wish to transcend mofial u*io'uy perfecting the soul withdelusions fostered ..by egocentric ambition and by lust,, (p. 5g) werejustifiable It is useful, no_ doubt, a fi"[,t" overstepping of appointedbounds for which popular attacts ;;itf"d Agnppa (and which wasdramadzed in Dr Faustis),witr, r*.tionJ"iifear of reformers like Brunoand Dee' whose idearist utopianism ris un."riry, from our perspective atleast, with nationalism and poriti*r "pp.n"fr,n. But Mebane,s confidence:lii:lTT"i1g. tltr n^iou. e""a rIfu fr* .*orur uses of the occurt rogralrtypersonar desires forpowerisdiioncening. similarry in theaestrreticrealm: we are told that,rvhile DE;t;r;;", * * ambivalent rexr, irscomprexides must be "rrr" proouct oGiscioirsly conrroiled artistry,, (p.I l6)' consonant with a prefutory rurmi*tion"J me possib'ity and criricarretevance of reconstruiting.uuir,t ial;;;;;, @. xii_xiii), Mebane isconcerned at a numhr of^noiit" ,,,g*i*J.,n readings which attributeambiguity and conflictin Ri""ir*"."'""o rJiiyning ori,", than deliberarcand skilful aesthetic desrgn. This policy results in some suggestive but rhin psycholoticalanalyses' James I, for instan.", *,e ,,igorou1',iiilorder of rtre penecuti6n of €tt^tr** .^.()suvnrvr \tz--witches-who could yet identify with the benevolent occult rurer porrayed in T.lte Tempest, was, Mebane argues, torn between defending t i, o*n intellecnral curiosity and prowess, and a fear that knowleoge nui gained is forbidden. so he "apparertly projecs onto learned o,aiici-r"rrir-o*n feelings.of guilt" (p. 107). Moreconvincing to some will dMebane's brief alternative explanation of the king's approral: "one couro r"rir" upr"y "uou,a magician so long as ttre pnoper authorities were reaffirmedo. i odi. mi,is unforhrnately about as close as Mebane gets to ne oeailei poriticar or historical contexts of dramatic and philosoptri."r texts: one often r""i, n" literary.critic -ffing precedence over the historian and the philosopher.In9g"9 hi9 only minor criricism of yares is that hêtuar.'in or.irti. criticism "ultimately become lostin opical speculation ran", tr,ro"uring ury.n 9" spirit of the plays as a whole', @. 249 n. l9). Meban;,r-;;;;"*with ttre continuities between earry and rate Renaiisance and uetween Renaissance and twentieth century renders him perhaps ou"r-i-pr"rr"o, for some tastes, with the spirit of things as a whole. The chapter on-Thp Temryst, "Magic as love and Faith,,, is aclimactic concrusion o Mebane'i boot, aio will serve to elicit my reservations abouthis approach. The "mostintricate" of the works discussed, The Tempest is said tooffer a "paradoxical and yet coherent.orp-rir" between the intensified quest for riberation and trre traditional ueiier tt ar self-fulfilment derives from participation in a larger community,, (p. xiv). Itis as if ambiguity,alr verywell asiongas itis ultimarerycot "r*til sor"grander frame of reference, must, to be acceptable, be h artifice r,.ut o consciously to tease out the implications of a unifying uision. so ilsp"io, the "supra-rational and. visionary" ..holy magici;" -(pp. US-A,n,S-,i'.+) x the end of a long line of Renaissance sages, r6veats inlrt to or, tiioulnii, alignment with "the cosmic order" (p. rg0), "the validity of tho* i"rigr,o, attitudes, and values which confer upon huran nre ia aeep"ri ,ignin-."il.." (p. -198) . His magical art is not ambi.valeltly poised benveen nt or_"y and sincere religious occultism, but is wtrotiy uenevolent from the outsel The Tempe st, argues Mebane, is largely.,a dramatic deb"t" *", whether humanity is bestial or godlike, Calibari or Ariel,, (p. fS6), _O Prospero's role is as an "agentof a beneficent providentiar oriel(p. iiol. In its. questioning of the excessive self-assertion common in thd occult tradition, the play accepts the limiations of the physicar and ,ocial ;;; of humanity in a more realistic way than did pico, Agrippa, or euurn r;"if is ineliminable, and cariban, Mebane tells us, is s-haiiespeare;;;i"d* "thaf there are some creaurres on whose nature nurture wiil neu"r rd.r; ip.176): the intemrptions endemic to the momenrs of grea&ert h*,n""y i" ri.play remind us that "not all mortars will choose to assume their rightful Ely places within the natural or$rl(o. 1g7) . But art, when it meers true fairhin its audience, can ''reveal.whicrr inrirprration or rrurityii""'"i".,,(p.189). If we are prepared, even with--significant qualifications,,, to"affirrn the reveratory ano reoemptir" po*"l"or n" pdy, ir-,nii,rii." ,r,"occultists' alchemicar process, 't-.rni6* i" a magical transformadon ofourperception of ourselves and the worrd around u;" (o. rggt. i;r" ."yfind Mebane rather too trusting of easv n"*i.r-"r dichotomies, discord/na3o11,-ueast/ spirit, nanre/ nurture, storn/ catr, uroiry ir"pJr"'ril""yrational tibefty, unrulr sexuatity/ oro"rJ ciastity, reriri_d/ "onoriry,gabble/ language, enol goetialprne rrwgi ngr";",;;; il;&*"arguably breaks Oo11 ,nrgugtr tlre piay,s rncessanr foregrounding ofslructrlal prrlern, plor device-ano ttreatrica mechanism. fi"t gi"",i r,i,srongly positive valuation.of the oignity oi nospero,s ..riberal arrs,, (TheTemfest,I ii.73), no other interprea--tin" ,t ut"gyis really ;;;.-* . For the whole vision of the Renaissance presenbd in humanistcriticism of ttris kind is deriberately r.rotiur. Mebane links to the occurttradition none of the more uncomfortabreJacobeans rikeManton, websterand Grevilte, and prefers ,o examine u -r_* in *r,l.r,;Iih;r"**reaffirms the faith in humanity wrricrr rre permr$ us to question in the .hasedles" (p. 175). There is no refererrce tJ n" ,n-y sophisticated anti_humanist critiques of free-wilI, r-n, cari"ists or from philosophers likePomponazzi. Indeed rhe onry referen"" io c.tuin i, r"ui"i. prio[0"';, iirr,descriprion of cariban, as 'iA,bhorred rr"*lq/hi.t -riri"t or gii".r,will not hke" reminds us, says Mebane, of balvin,s view of fallen humanytye; but her response to'ibeauteous'runtino,' in the ..brave form,, of f"rdlAq, imagining !i1 firs1. ,pi.ir, dr;;;u thing divine,, in conrrasr*recalls Pico's oration" (p. lgcl). veine iunoamental conflict berweencalvinist predestination ino humaniri-d "s;.v is otherwise erased inMebane's texr God is gmd after a', .no?uiiou, ,";;-ir-;;;,"*insrument of reactionarysocial controi So even as Mebane tolerantly acknowledges that Caliban,scharacter "eludes complete "ut"g*irut-Jn'i rre ctassines cariban as ..in part,. . . a reminder of wlyrl nlqanbeings may become if our baser elemenmarc unconrrolled" (p.197). Caliban,,en *ty in n*"r;fy *U"ra'#"relation to thepoweful humanist magi.iun, i, t"ni"a " r"pu.u,t"pful;;;.reading, as he has UeenjejeO.fri, ";;il;" (.This island,s mine,,: TheTempest, I.ii.33 l) in prospero'r. Coo"ipo'Ai:"g1, "il;;"" ;li, ;C"shrift to modem anti-humanist". wr,il"."'noi"g w.B.yeats, lament aboutthe marcrialism of modern utopian ,o""rn"nl, he wholly ignores newhistoricist and materialist criticiim, srrctr as ttre iort orrrancis Barker andPerer Hurme 2, paur Brown' ana rererrce H.;*. na"i" i*""rry:Gt"" .^.I SSAY REVIEII'J Greenblatt5 and Graham Holdemess6 have also offered contextual readings of The Tempest in considerable tension with Mebane's. The many novel interpretations and finely-drawn connections in Mebane s learned and stimulating work, then coexist with a number of easy closures and controversial assumptions which its veneer of careful tolerance might render invisible to the unwary. The book closes, as, according to Mebane, does Prospero when he points to and claims Caliban as his, "with an admonition ttr,at our better selves can be liberated only if we remember those aspects of ourpersonalities which mustbe controlled if they are o be fulfilled and perhaps, Eanscended." O. 198). It is as if we should expect Caliban, a "thing of darlness" acknowledged and subjugatedby a chastened BaconianProspero, !o welcome the opportunify of working forthe imperialist magician/ scientist of the future industrial Golden Age. As the humanist magician says, in spite of Caliban's membership of a "vile race": "We cannot miss him. He does make our fire,/ Fetch in our wood, and serves in offices,/ That profit vs" (fug-I!,upg.S!, I.ii.311-3). Mebane's view that "genuine awareness of one's spiritual potential" in the play "leads not to the desire to dominate, but to *te desire to serve" (pp. 193-4), rings hollow. I hope many find his book a rich and challenging source on the multiform texts of the Renaissance. 1. Patrick Curry, "Revisions of Science and Magic', History of Science, 23 1985, pp.299-325 2. Francis Barker and Peter Hulme, 'Nymphs and Reapers Heavily Vanish: the Discursive ConEexts of The Tempest', in John Drakakis (ed.), Alterrntive Shakespeares, [.ondon" Methuen, 1985. 3. Paul Brown ""This Thing of Darkness I Acknowledge Mine' : The Tempest and the Discourse of Colonialism", in Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield (eds), P o lit ic al S hake spe ar e, Manchester: Manchester Univosity Press, 1 985. 4. TerenceHawkes, 'Playhouse-Worklrouse',nTlntSlwkespeherianRag,l,ondon: Methuen, 1986. 5. Stephen Greenblatt 'Martial Law in the Land of Cockaigne', tnShalcespearean Negotiations. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988. 6. Graham Holderness, 'TheTempest: Spectacles of Disenchantrnent', in Graham Holdemess, Nick Potter and John Tumer (eds), Shalcespeare: Out of Court. l,ondon: Macmillan, 190. Department of Traditional and Modern Philosophy, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Ausralia. {issAYREVIEIvvResponse By John S. Mebane ohn Sutton's review of. Renaissance Magic and tltc Return of the Goldcn Age is a thoughtful and serious engagement with my work. All oo often scholan and critics of differing theoretical persuasions appear unable c unwilling !o strive to undenand or appreciate each other's positions; Sutton, in contrast, graciously offers positive comments on many aspects of my research and, for the most part, succeeds in providing an accurateaccountof my intentions. Hisreview thusprovides a welcome occasion for a genuine exchange of ideas. One central difference between John Suson's view and my own is that I choose to defend wittr substantial qualification the humanist tradition, whereas Sutton appears o share the view of many cultural mabrialists that humanismperse is misguidedor oppressive. The following paragraphs take up this andotherdifferences, suggesting at some points that the conflicts are not as absolute as tlrey might appear. Sutton's point concerning my use of the lerm "genuine science" is well taken. While I believe that one may often distinguish between myth or fan[asy (such as the belief in animating statues with daemons) and knowledge which has been validated by scientific method, many claims to knowledge such as alchemy cannot easily be categorized. I concede that at some points my classifications are subject to qualification or revision. Sutton is correct that my allegiance to some aspects of the humanist tradition enhils a belief that one may sEive to reconstruct and ap'preciate the author's purposes. I would stop far short" however, of affirming individual or auttrorial au0onomy: I regard the self as a locus of biological, social, and economic forces. I would add, however, that those forces interact at different poins in different ways, so that it is still meaningful to speak of an individual. One valid perspective upon a text is to approach it as the expression of an author whose responses to cultural and historical currents may involve passive reflection, active subversion or other responses. My readingof Dr Faustus thus argues thattle ambiguities of the text might well be a conscious artistic strategy through which Marlowe sought to question imperialist propaganda and other aspects of Renaissance culture while purposely leaving the text open to other interpretations. €tt.r,u* {issAYREr,rElvvIn my treatm€nt of Jonson (especially in the chapter on the masques) I stress psychological conflicts and self-ionnadictionr ror"*hut more than sutton's revl^ew sugg€sts. My interpretation of rni-iintpest strives to attain a kind of aestnlric appdiationwhich i, uu*"-frffi on seeing some of the work's conflicts as resolved into a harmonious-vision which was purposely created by the author. I regard tt ese approact es asneither more nor ress speculative than the new historicisi'or cutturat materialist ones which sutton feers I have neglected. In my prerac"inot" that "different kinds of critical.endgavour miy be valid, evLn when they seem to arrive at conflicting, rather than complimenary, interpretations of the same texts. This is not to assert that ali interpretations 'are oi *q"a standing, nor to abandon entirely the quest for a degree or ouj""ii"iiy;lt i,simply to admit that knowledge is contingent upon the contexts in wtlictr interpretation occurs, and there are practiJal as well as rheoretical ,**n, why none of us can claim to have arrived at certainty" (p. xii) -wit"..,Sutton asserts that I believe that the comprexities of br Faustus..ruri u"'the product of consciously controned aristry", o, ttitGil-uig"ii", "rThe T'empest "must, to be acceptable, be an artifice created *"*'i"*iy ," rease our the implicatiol. gf u unifying vision," I wourd chang" n" ptî" "must be" to "may welr be," and, in aciordance with thepruraiism r'ariirm in the preface, omit the phrase ..to be acceptable." t ,"g."i th"t ;t ffi&,theoretical assumprions are not arways as expricir tri.ugtooiiri" ;tir"U*I u: they are in the preface, and I welcome this "pp;";iy ;;;;"again that many differing readings of these texts are iime, co*pr"r!r,tu.y to my own or valid altematives. It is true, for example, that critiq ues ofllekmBe$which stress its complicity with British imperialism are valio. ns annaEt putt".*n hu.recently demonsrrared in shakespeare and the popurar voti.i irqgtl,however, such readings are no more certain than many ottre, possiuitities. In my chapter on rhe play i n Rgneissance Magicl srove to bri"g tr," rruo". to enhanced aesthetic appreciation of rhrdntpert by approaciing ii in a pood of empathy and appreciation. Hence I6ncentrated on the work,s intricate symbolic structure and on certain attitudes and values which I confess I find congenial. when I teach rhe Tempest I begin with such appreciation, and subsequently I raise questions conce_ing the play,s complicity in curtural assumptions which support imperialisi. p*td. rshould also have juxtaposedthese two t rponr"r - *t ict rigttt *eiiL regarded not as antithetical so much as different levels of critiJi., in *yqpk.] am deeply concerned, however, that political ;d.il:;;;I often find stimulating and important not bar us or our students enrirely from aesthetic appreciation. sutton's assertion that my Eeatrnent of the occult tradition is"deliberately selective, ' omiuing "the,n*" on.o*rortubre Jacobeans likeManton, webster andGreville"-<roes not sufficientry take i"a u..*",,n"extent ro which I treat Marrowe as uncomfortabr". rv"iJ""rlr-0":"J"" ,"my criticism of John Dee's imperiaist propaganda or my ai*"r.io" orwihhcraftpenecutions asameans of social and intellectual control. Amoreaccurare criticism, in r{iuggrenr, mighr be that,tilrtil;;io'gi""Marlowe, Jonson, and Shak-speare as" sympatfretii _ app."ci;il; ",possible, to praise what Ifind worttry orrespeJt "u"n if I am aware of otherelements in their works, leads to anin.ons'.r*"y in the focus of the bookas a whole, wirh a critiqy of imperialism becoming explicit il;"chaprers and nor deart wirh suffiiientry in tt" conc"tuai"g-*.ii#'"" Shakespeare. Finaily, sutton complains about my finding "nrorals for ourtirne" in the works I discuss, and he criticires my view that there is a"continuity between [Renaissance] aonc"-t-and ours.,, First, whire Iacknowledge thedifficulty ofhistoricarandculturalrecon.ou"rion, i'oo no,regardourworrds and those of theElizabethans as soradically differentthat there can be no communication or continuity or.on.an,. second, I believeexpressions of commihent to be imporant to lit"rury und curtural criticism,and I would prefer to appear ingenuous nan io abandon altogether anyexpression of my own varueswhat I appreciate most about the work ofmany cultural materialists is the sincerity and intensity of their sociar andmoral commitments. unfortunalery, o* airursions of our theoreticaldifferences sometimes obscure ttre iact *rut o,riro"i"r ug"no". ,nuy o?i"nbe quite similar. The consideration and acuity wrricrr characterize JohnSutlon's.review are qualides which should t "tp u, p.ogress loward furtherrecognition of our common ground. Department of English, University of Alabama, Huntsville, Alabama, USA.