Middle English

by Paul Strohm

Overview

These original essays mean to provoke rather than reassure, to challenge rather than codify. Instead of summarizing existing knowledge after the fashion of the now-ubiquitous literary 'companions,' these essays aim at opening fresh discussion; instead of emphasizing settled consensus they direct their readers to areas of enlivened and unresolved debate. Although 'major authors' such as Chaucer and Langland are richly represented, many little-known and neglected texts are considered as well. Analysis is devoted not only to self-sufficient works, but to the general conditions of textual production and reception. Contributors to this collection include some recognized and admired names, but also a good many newer faces: younger scholars whose groundbreaking research is just coming into full view, and whose perspectives will influence the terms of literary discussion in the decades to come. Encouraged to speculate, they have addressed topics that unsettle previous categories of investigation. Each is oriented toward the emergent, the unfinalized, the yet-to-be-done. Each essay stirs new questions and concludes with suggestions for further reading and investigation that will allow readers to extend their own research into the questions it has raised.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199559398
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	04/25/2009
Series:	Oxford 21st Century Approaches to Literature
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	536
Product dimensions:	6.70(w) x 9.60(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Paul Strohm is Anna S. Garbedian Professor of Humanities at Columbia University. He was previously J.R.R. Tolkien Professor of English Language and Literature at the University of Oxford, and, before that, taught at Indiana University for many years.

Table of Contents

Introduction, Paul StrohmI: Conditions and ContextsManuscript Matrix, Modern Canon, Carol SymesMultilingualism, Robert M. SteinMultilingualism on the Page, Chistopher BaswellTranslation, Michelle R. WarrenAurality, Joyce ColemanBooks, Alexandra GillespieII: VantagepointsTemporalities, Carolyn DinshawSymbolic Economies, Diane CadyAuthority, Emily SteinerInstitutions, D. Vance SmithForm, Christopher CannonEpisodes, Elizabeth AllenBeauty, Maura NolanImaginative Theory, Nicolette ZeemanFeeling, Sarah McNamerConflict, Marion TurnerIII: Textual Kinds and CategoriesGenre Without System, Alfred HiattLiturgy, Bruce HolsingerVision, Image, Text, Jessica BrantleySaintly Exemplarity, Karen A. WinsteadSpeculative Genealogies, Matthew GiancarloIncarnational (Auto)biography, Nancy Bradley WarrenDrama as Textual Practice, Sheila LindenbaumVernacular Theology, Vincent GillespieHeresy and Humanism, Andrew ColeIV: Writing and the WorldAuthorial Work, Kellie RobertsonLearning to Live, Stephanie TriggGossip and (Un)official Writing, Susan E. PhillipsThe Poetics of Practicality, Lisa H. Cooper