4:00 pm - 5:30 pm Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries 285 Contact: Jennifer Sonenberg 706-542-2244 "Muckworm Wordlings, Scarlet Stains and Glorious Lovers: the Varieties and Uses of Dissenting Verse, 1600-1700," George Southcombe, Oxford University.The lecture examines the ways in which those who dissented from the Church of England sought to use poetry in late seventeenth-century England. It stresses that verse was used as a form of political action and as a way of strengthening nonconformist communities. It also points to some of the more surprising features of dissenting poetry, including its robust, satirical humour and its engagement with libertinism.Southcombe is a lecturer in Early Modern History at Brasenose and St. John’s Colleges, Oxford University.  His research interests focuses on the religion, politics, and literature of early modern England.  He has a particular interst in late seventeenth-century religious nonconformity, and he is currently investigating the uses dissenters made of historical writing in polemical debates.  He has published on Restoration poetry, co-authored an article on Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew in its historical context, and sought to explain how early modern literature can be read historically.  His current co-authored book Restoration Politics, Religion and Culture focuses on key themes in Restoration history in Britain and Ireland from 1660-1714 using artistic and literary sources as well as more traditional texts of political history to illustrate and illuminate arguments.     UGA at Oxford