Literature and the Law of Nations, 1580-1680
Christopher N. Warren
Reviews and Awards
Winner of Roland H. Bainton Prize for Literature, Council of the Sixteenth Century Society and Conference
"Christopher Warren has made the sensible and helpful decision to put the two together and write about the relationship between the establishment of international law in the seventeenth century and the development of literary forms and types... A rewarding book." -- Andrew Hadfield, The Seventeenth Century.
"A major achievement. Warren offers a magisterial account of how early modern literary genres inflected the discourses of modern international law." -- Studies in English Literature: 1500-1900
"This brilliantly conceived and executed study of the principles and function of the ius gentium demonstrates how it has contributed to what we now recognize as the basis for our present international law - the law that binds together all people generally in civil units. Given the present challenges to a peaceful order in regions throughout the globe, Warren's history could hardly be more timely." --Constance Jordan, Renaissance Quarterly
"A study to which the expression 'groundbreaking' truly applies...." --Jus Gentium: Journal of International Legal History
"Christopher Warren journeys adventurously and authoritatively back into the early modern world, interpreting it anew as a contemporary Humanist scholar. With agility and perspicuity, he penetrates fields of inquiry from genre studies to nationalism studies, and to the history of international law, which ranges from public international law to private international law, international legal personality, and human rights. In seven learned, densely packed, and assiduously referenced chapters, Warren offers a literary genealogy for the law of nations by considering the place of the imagination and literary evidence in the legal and philosophical life of early modern England." -- The Review of English Studies Advance Access
"This book is a welcome development in law and literary studies, or law and humanities scholarship more broadly...Warren makes a persuasive case for literature's formative role in the development of international law, a role that has thus far been neglected by literary scholars and international lawyers alike." -- Renaissance Studies
"...highly recommendable to anyone who would like to understand the exact philosophy shaping the early modern communities within the New World..." - US Studies Online
"...detailed and tightly-reasoned...hugely successful..." - SHARP News