In a book which brings together language, text and context, Patricia Canning synthesizes models of contemporary stylistics with both critical and literary-historical theory. In doing so, the author maintains a specific and sustained stylistic focus on the religious, political and ideological issues that animated and defined Reformation England. Each chapter interrogates the dichotomous concept of 'word' and 'image' by considering the ways in which writers of this period deal with these contentious subjects in their dramatic and poetic works.'Representation', Canning argues, 'is not just as a matter of semiotics but of ideology'. Whereas stylistics enjoys extensive application in the analysis of contemporary texts, it has, until now, been markedly under-used in the exploration of the historical literary genre. Addressing this shortcoming squarely and robustly, Canning's book is a showcase for the stylistic method. Among its many insights, this book shows how stylistics can enrich our understanding and critical interpretation of a particular literary genre in its ideological and historical context.

Patricia Canning is a Teaching Assistant at the School of English, Queen's University, Belfast, Northern Ireland. She is currently developing a 'reading for well being' project (Get Into Reading) across Northern Ireland on behalf of The Reader Organisation. She runs projects in the university as well as with female prisoners in Hydebank Prison, Belfast.

Acknowledgements
Introduction: In the Beginning was the Word
Chapter One: Constructing Plausible Stories: Ideology, Conceptual Integration Theory and the Politics of Representation in George Herbert's 'JESU'
Chapter Two: 'A Deed Without a Name': Murder and the Linguistics of Agency in Shakespeare's Macbeth
Chapter Three: 'Bit-Part' Actors: Metonymy in Thomas Middleton and William Rowley's The Changeling
Chapter Four: Picturing Words: Ekphrasis and the Word-as-Image in Early Modern Poetry Conclusion: 'Being Nothing': The value of the W/word
Notes
Bibliography
Index