Truth and tales : cultural mobility and medieval media / edited by Fiona Somerset & Nicholas Watson.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Somerset, Fiona, editor.

Watson, Nicholas, editor.

Series:

Interventions: new studies in medieval culture

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

English literature--Middle English, 1100-1500--History and criticism.

English literature.

Civilization, Medieval.

Literature and society--England--History--To 1500.

Literature and society.

Mass media.

History.

England.

Mass media--Great Britain--History.

English literature--Middle English.

Great Britain.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

History.

Physical Description:

xiv, 294 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Columbus : The Ohio State University Press, [2015]

Summary:

"In the medieval period, as in the media culture of the present, learned and popular forms of talk were intermingled everywhere. They were also highly mobile, circulating in speech, writing, and symbol, as performances as well as in material objects. The communication through and between different media we all negotiate in daily life did not develop from a previous separation of orality and writing, but from a communications network not unlike our own, if slower, and similarly shaped by disparities of access. Truth and Tales: Cultural Mobility and Medieval Media, edited by Fiona Somerset and Nicholas Watson, develops a variety of approaches to the labor of imaginatively reconstructing this network from its extant artifacts. Truth and Tales includes fourteen essays by medieval literary scholars and historians. Some essays focus on written artifacts that convey high or popular learning in unexpected ways. Others address a social problem of concern to all, demonstrating the genres and media through which it was negotiated. Still others are centered on one or more texts, detailing their investments in popular as well as learned knowledge, in performance as well as writing. This collective archaeology of medieval media provides fresh insight for medieval scholars and media theorists alike"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Part 1 The Truth of Tales 1

1 "The Vanishing Leper" and "The Murmuring Monk": Two Medieval Urban Legends / Richard Firth Green Green, Richard Firth 19

Part 2 Repetition and Continuity: The Claims of History

2 Don't Cry for Me, Augustinus: Dido and the Dangers of Empathy / Thomas Hahn Hahn, Thomas 41

3 The New Plow and the Old: Law, Orality, and the Figure of Piers the Plowman in B 19 / Stephen Yeager Yeager, Stephen 60

4 The Exegesis of Tears in Lambeth Homily 17 / M. J. Toswell Toswell, M. J. 79

5 Mingling with the English in La3amon's Brut / Fiona Somerset Somerset, Fiona 96

Part 3 Cultural Divides and their Commond Ground

6 Unquiet Graves: Pearl and the Hope of Reunion / Alastair Minnis Minnis, Alastair 117

7 Mercantile Gentility in Cambridge, University Library MS Ff.2.38 / Michael Johnston Johnston, Michael 135

8 Resident Aliens: The Literary Ecology of Medieval Mice / Lisa J. Kiser Kiser, Lisa J. 151

9 Toward the Common Good: Punishing Fraud among the Victualers of Medieval London / Barbara A. Hanawalt Hanawalt, Barbara A. 168

Part 4 New Media and the Literate Laity

10 The Ignorance of the Laity: Twelve Tracts on Bible Translation / Nicholas Watson Watson, Nicholas 187

11 York Merchants at Prayer: The Confessional Formula of the Bolton Hours / Robyn Malo Malo, Robyn 206

12 A London Legal Miscellany, Popular Law, and Medieval Print Culture / Kathleen E. Kennedy Kennedy, Kathleen E. 223

13 Tourists and Tabulae in Late-Medieval England / Michael Van Dussen Dussen, Michael Van 238

Part 5 The Truth of Tales 2

14 Oral Performance and the Force of the Law: Taillefer at Hastings and Antgulilibix in Simmers / Andrew Taylor Taylor, Andrew 257.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780814212714

0814212719

OCLC:

892879079