The Complete Works of Gerrard Winstanley

Abstract

Modern editions of the works of the seventeenth-century English radical writer, Gerrard Winstanley, who, with his ‘Digger’ followers, established two communal settlements in Surrey in the spring and summer of 1649, have long been available. The standard scholarly edition was George Sabine's collection, first published in 1941. Cheaper selections of his works were later produced by Leonard Hamilton (1945) and then Christopher Hill (1973). Valuable as Hill's and Sabine's collections in particular were, they had clear shortcomings. Sabine's edition contained only two of the five ‘spiritual’ tracts that Winstanley produced between May 1648 and January 1649. Hill's selection omitted these works completely. For some historians, notably Lotte Mulligan, John K. Graham and Judith Richards, the exclusion of Winstanley's early writings was a deliberate ploy, by Hill especially, to present the Digger leader as primarily a political thinker and activist. This new, two-volume set of Winstanley's works, then, provides scholars for the first time with a comprehensive collection of his published writings, as well as offering selections from manuscripts attributed to him, and writings by him which appeared in other publications. However, this edition has much more to offer than simply its inclusiveness. A lengthy introduction not only synthesises much important recent research on Winstanley and the Diggers but also incorporates new archival findings regarding his early life: it should be essential reading for anyone interested in the Digger movement or the radicalism of the English Civil War in general. There is also a full textual introduction to the works, giving comprehensive bibliographic details and a full explanation for the editions chosen: Corns, Hughes and Loewenstein have opted to use the text of Winstanley's first five works given in Several Pieces Gathered into One Volume, rather than employ separate editions on the basis that this text incorporates his later authorial corrections.

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