ABSTRACT

The exciting thing about early modern women's writing for the researcher is the possibility of discovering something new and this fact means that our knowledge is in a continual state of flux and requires constant modification. Work remains to be done on women as readers and on the topic of women's language, and whether there are specific formal and linguistic features or registers which we can identify in early modern women's writing. Innovative work is currently being done on manuscript culture as practised by Renaissance women who will unsettle the print bias of much criticism and alter the focus from largely noble or upper-class women. In many senses this is at best a Utopian project, and runs the risk of closing down access to an interesting body of material. In short, the author has tried to suggest ways in which women writers might be placed more securely in the Renaissance.