How do the formal properties of early modern texts, together with the materials that envelop and shape them, relate to the cultural, political, and social world of their production? Formal matters: Reading the materials of English Renaissance literature answers this question by linking formalist analysis with the insights of book history. It thus represents the new English Renaissance literary historiography tying literary composition to the materials and material practices of writing. The book combines studies of familiar and lesser known texts, from the poems and plays of Shakespeare to jests and printed commonplace books. Its ten studies make important, original contributions to research on the genres of early modern literature, focusing on the involvement of literary forms in the scribal and print cultures of compilation, continuation, translation, and correspondence, as well as in matters of political republicanism and popular piety, among others. Taken together, the collection’s essays exemplify how an attention to form and matter can historicise writing without abandoning a literary focus.

Today's Latino poetry scene is incredibly vibrant. With original interviews, this is the first meditation on the thematic features of such poetry. Looking at how Julia Alvarez, Rhina Espaillat, Rafael Campo, and C. Dale Young use structures such as meter, rhyme, and line break, this study identifies a poetics of formalist Latino poetry.

This book brings together research that makes use of tasks to examine oral interaction, written production, vocabulary and reading, lexical innovation and pragmatics in different formal language learning contexts and in different languages (English, French, German, Italian and Spanish). It will be of interest to professionals and students working in SLA research and language pedagogy.