Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Dixon, C. Scott
• Traninger, Anita
• Icks, Martijn
• Shiraev, Eric
• Keohane, Jennifer
• Samoilenko, Sergei A.

Titel

Character Assassination in Reformation Propaganda

Ist Teil von

• Routledge Handbook of Character Assassination and Reputation Management, 2020, p.337-351

Auflage

1

Ort / Verlag

Routledge

Erscheinungsjahr

2020

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Alma/SFX Local Collection

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• With the sudden surge in religious debate that followed from Martin Luther's posting of the Ninety-Five Theses in 1517, Germany became the setting for a war of words between the defenders of the Catholic Church and the exponents of the new theology of Wittenberg. While first sticking to the format of scholastic debate, Luther and his followers soon attacked their opponents using the range of media created by the print revolution, using texts and images as well as new hybrid forms of ridicule, satire, and slander that drew from the traditions of medieval anticlericalism and popular culture A masterpiece of character assassination written in the form of a play, Eckius dedolatus was an indicative of the humanist contempt for scholasticism. The humanists were quick to follow suit, though they were less concerned with defending Luther than lampooning Eck. The main innovation in evangelical discourse, and one that separated it from the ironic invective of the humanists, was the exploitation of popular forms of satire and ridicule. Early evangelical propaganda, particularly illustrated pamphlets, were saturated in the spirit of a vernacular irreverence, drawing on its content and using its forms. Numerous illustrations exploited the grotesque realism common to popular forms of humour and included scenes that played on the so-called "material bodily principle," the idea being that the act of defecation reduces all men to the same level. For this reason, many of the early illustrations of the movement have their fair share of excrement.