Cotton Famine Poetry - Functions of Emotion in British and American Verse 1861-65

This book represents the first substantial text examining the nature of Cotton Famine poetry, which responded to the severe economic downturn in the cotton trade in Lancashire and elsewhere precipitated by the Union blockade of Confederate exports during the American Civil War (1861-65). The poetry, largely collected from Lancashire newspapers and American periodicals, is featured on the Poetry of the Lancashire Cotton Famine database. The poems offer a unique opportunity to engage with the opinions and feelings of ordinary Victorians reacting to extraordinary circumstances, and a chance to re-assess Anglo-American relations during the Civil War through the lens of transatlantic poetic discourse.
After a general introduction the book is split into two sections. The first section contains chapters examining the literary and historical context of the poetry, while the second offers interpretation through a blend of close analysis and critical approaches relating to the function of emotion in political discourse.

List of contents

Introduction.- Part One Poverty, Poetry, Cotton, and War.- The Poetics of Poverty in the 1860s.- Transatlantic Poetic Discourse during the American Civil War.- Part Two - Cotton Famine Poetry and Emotion.- Pride.- Anger.- Shame.- Grief.- Amusement.

About the author

Simon Rennie is Associate Professor in Victorian Poetry at the University of Exeter, UK.

Product details

• Authors: Simon Rennie
• Publisher: Springer, Berlin
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Release: 12.12.2025
• EAN: 9783032019622
• ISBN: 978-3-0-3201962-2
• No. of pages: 322
• Illustrations: XI, 322 p. 7 illus., 6 illus. in color.
• Series: Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies; Sozial- und Kulturgeschichte, Literaturwissenschaft: Lyrik und Dichter, Social History, economic crisis, History from below, Poetry and Poetics, Nineteenth-Century Literature, Labor History, American Civil War, industrial literature, Literature and Class, Transatlantic discourse, Poetic affect, Lancashire Cotton Famine, Local newspaper poetry, The poetry of poverty, Political verse, Labor Movements, Labouring-class poetry