Idealising Labour from Deloney to Milton

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For many thinkers in the early modern period, the emergence of capitalism, bureaucracy, and increasingly mechanised industry prompted questions about how people were to find dignity, security, and value in work in the light of radical change. The growing shift from the country to the city as the centre of labour, and from the guilds to individual enterprise, brought with it an interrogation not just of what work is, but of what work should be.My project will address this question by tracing various imaginings of idealised labour - historical, theological, ethical-political - across four literary case studies between the 1590s and 1660s. I use the term 'idealised labour' to describe not how writers idealise work, but how they use imaginative literature to explore what workmight be. My thesis will be the first detailed, full-length study of such imaginingsin this period. I will approach my primary texts with a set of related questions: how are ideal workplaces imagined? What types of work are being carried out?Does idealised labour manifest inindividuals, specific genders, families, communities,ornations? How doesthe labouring individual fit within broader socio-economic enterprises?What does the text say about the division of labour? How is technology and automation shown to affect work? Where is the text optimistic and pessimistic about work and technology? Where is there pride, dignity, and satisfaction in work?