Paul Strohm, England's Empty Throne: Usurpation and the Language of Legitimation, 1399-1422.

Strohm, Paul. England's Empty Throne: Usurpation and the Language of Legitimation, 1399-1422. New Haven: Yale UP, 1998. Print.

Strohm's text considers the various rhetorical strategies employed by the "Lancastrians," a term which could include the kings and their political allies or a general group's rhetorical mode during the Lancastrian monarchies. Strohm never quite pins this term down, to the frustration of several book reviewers, but his overall intent is to demonstrate how the Lancastrians and other figures in this period use revisionist strategies. In his first chapter, Strohm discusses how the kings and their supporters use these tactics, pointing to the re-population of a French town with English settlers. In doing so, the rhetorical strategies employed, both in action and writing, suggest that the English immigrants are the rightful holders of the lands and that the original French occupants are outsiders infringing on others' legal holdings. These acts included both written documents making that case and acts such as burning the French deeds in the village square to make their point. Despite the short lived success of this particular example, Strohm argues that a willingness to revise history through words and deeds falls into a general Lancastrian rhetoric that turns the current situation to the monarch's political advantage. 

Reading Strohm's text, I can better understand the commentary on Nuttall's book being heavily dependent on this monograph (a matter even better understood considering that Strohm was her adviser). Like Strohm, Nuttall argues for a revisionist rhetoric, although she employs a linguistic model to explore the matter. Regardless, Strohm's text is an interesting use of both literary and historical models to consider how rhetoric employed both directly by and to the monarchy was willing to navigate careful reinterpretation of history, status, and tone. In particular, the chapter discussing Hoccleve and Lydgate shows how these poets use self deprecating rhetoric in order to create a specific rhetorical space between themselves and the monarch, casting themselves as less than they may actually be in order to offset potential royal displeasure. Thus, rather than seeing Hoccleve's complaints as solely biographical, it is possible that the poet emphasized his suffering position in order to better ingratiate himself with the monarch and, hopefully, counterbalance the critiques he offers.