임정인.  근대 초기 항해 모험 드라마가 전유하는 기사도 로맨스의 현재적 의미.
        (Chung-in Im.  The Proto-Colonial Implications in the Early Modern Dramatic Appropriation of Medieval Knight-errantry)

Abstract

This paper aims to read closely how John Fletcher’s The Island Princess (1619-21) tunes up such motifs as knight-errantry and courtly love from medieval romance, as he dramatizes the contemporary social aspirants engaged in oversea exploitations. The paper first examines the ways in which medieval romance, with its inherent connection between personal achievement and courtly membership, provides a rich tradition for early modern English plays, and then introduces the specific ways in which The Island Princess utilizes the generic features of chivalric romance in order to renegotiate the contemporary social mobility in proto-colonial terms. The paper in doing so pays particular attention to how the play offers one of the most revealing examples where a knight errant bound for a sacred quest in an enchanted forest is changed into a vagabond merchant looking for profits on South Asian islands. The paper then goes on to conclude that the play’s fantasy about Armusia’s adventure in fact means a downright promotion of mercantile empowerment, in which one could foresees the imperial nationhood in making from outside of England.


Key Words
chivalric romance, errant merchant-knight, mercantilism, colonialism, imperialism, Nationhood