A Reputation History of John Dee, 1527-1609: The Life of an Elizabethan Intellectual

This work argues that the Elizabethan polymath John Dee was not the influential intellectual he was purported to be. Dee's scientific works were anachronistic and in no way heralded the new age of experimental science. This book traces the course of Dee's life showing how he was a marginal figure and his works had little lasting value. It also provides a useful historiographical summation of Dee's life and career. The life and career of John Dee, Elizabethan polymath and scholar of diverse and sundry pursuits, is an enigmatic one. Much of Dee's own writings place him at the cutting edge of the Elizabethan intellectual world. Dee saw himself as a scholar involved in all aspects of mathematics and the application of scientific endeavours to the pursuit of both personal and national goals. Dee would have his readers believe that he was the leading light of his age, consulted by all the key players on the Elizabethan national stage. This work also maps the trajectory of Dee's posthumous reputation to the present day showing how Dee has been understood, and misunderstood, for the past four hundred years. In short this work provides a useful historiographical summation of Dee's life and career.