British Romanticism and the Catholic Question

MICHAEL TOMKO Assistant Professor of Literature in the department of Humanities at Villanova University, USA. He holds degrees in English literature from Swarthmore College, Oxford University, and the University of Notre Dame. His writing on the intersection of politics, religion, and romantic literature has appeared in Eighteenth Century: Theory and Interpretation, European Romantic Review, Victorian Studies, and The Wordsworth Circle.

• List of Illustrations Acknowledgements List of Abbreviations Introduction: The Spirits of the Age The Purgatorial Politics of the Catholic Question History, Sympathy, and Sectarianism in Elizabeth Inchbald's A Simple Story Wordsworth and Superstition Shelley's Conflicted Campaign for Catholic Emancipation Scott's Ivanhoe and the Saxon Question Conclusion: 'The Anxious Hour'— England in 1829 Works Cited Notes Index

'The meticulous research and probing readings in Michael Tomko's book show how unsettling the issue of Catholic Emancipation was for the major writers of the Romantic periods. It is a stunning contribution to our larger sense of the complexity surrounding issues of toleration and secularization; still more, it makes the most convincing case yet for Catholicism's centrality in Romantic politics and literary production.' - Professor Mark Canuel, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA 'This is a rich and rewarding study...The reader comes away with a refreshed, more complicated picture of nineteenth-century romanticism, a thorough understanding of the "Catholic Question" and its controversial nature, and much encouragement to consider the role of religious identity in the formation of nation-states.' - Maria Lamonaca, New Books on Literature 19 '...thoughtful study...' -True Principles 'Though not the final word on the subject, Tomko's book has the clear merit of persuading readers of its importance. It will also provide them with a strong encyclopaedic basis and with possible reading strategies on which to base their own investigations into an unduly neglected aspect of British Romantic culture.' - Raphael Ingelbien, University of Leuven