The Scottish legendary : towards a poetics of hagiographic narration / Eva von Contzen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Contzen, Eva von, author.

Series:

Manchester medieval literature and culture.

Manchester medieval literature and culture

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Scottish literature--To 1700--History and criticism.

Scottish literature.

English literature--Scottish authors--History and criticism.

English literature.

Scottish poetry--To 1700--History and criticism.

Scottish poetry.

Saints in literature.

Religion in literature.

Christian hagiography in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (268 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Place of Publication:

Manchester : Manchester University Press, 2016.

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

The first book-length study of the Scottish Legendary (late 14th c.), the only extant collection of saints' lives in the vernacular from medieval Scotland, scrutinises the dynamics of hagiographic narration, its implicit assumptions about literariness, and the functions of telling the lives of the saints. The fifty saints' legends are remarkable for their narrative art: the enjoyment of reading the legends is heightened, while didactic and edifying content is toned down. Focusing on the role of the narrator, the depiction of the saintly characters, their interiority, as well as temporal and spatial parameters, it is demonstrated that the Scottish poet has adapted the traditional material to the needs of an audience versed in reading romance and other secular genres. The implications of the Scottish poet's narrative strategies are analysed also with respect to the Scottishness of the legendary and its overall place in the hagiographic landscape of late medieval Britain.

Contents:

Cover; Half-title; Series information; Title page; Copyright information; Dedication; Table of contents; List of illustrations; Acknowledgements; List of abbreviations; Introduction The Scottish Legendary and narrative art; Introducing the Scottish Legendary; Saints lives as narratives; Transcending genre: the Scottish Legendary and romance; Notes; 1 Towards a narrative poetics of medieval saints' lives; Narrative theory and the Scottish Legendary: a pragmatic approach; Narrative 'communication' and the open text: performing saints' legends; Notes.

2 Teacher and poet: the narrator in the Scottish LegendaryThe Prologue of the Scottish Legendary; Metanarrative and narratorial roles; Digressions and prayers; Narrating the Scottish Legendary: conclusions; Notes; 3 Words and deeds: character depiction and direct discourse; Disruptive speech: female martyrs and pagan rulers; Holy and hollow? Narrating the saint; Mary of Egypt: how to talk without conversing; Theodora: the saint, the witch, and the adulterer; Andrew: a conversation postponed; Conclusions: gender, miracles, and the spoken word; Notes.

4 Putting the saint in perspective: ideology and hagiographic narrationParameters of perspective: narrating the Other; Foregrounding and the miraculous; Conclusions: authorising the hagiographic narratives; Notes; 5 Saintly interiority: narrating conscience and consciousness; The representation of consciousness; Limiting the point of view; Conclusions; Notes; 6 The past, a foreign country: time, space, and the Scottishness of the Scottish Legendary; Salvation history and the suspension of time; Sanctifying space(s); How Scottish is the Scottish Legendary?; Notes.

Conclusion A poetics of hagiographic narrationNotes; Appendix: the Scottish Legendary: authorship, dialect, and arrangement; Scribal practice; Dialect and dating; Dedications to the saints; Arrangement of the legends; Bibliography; Primary sources; Secondary sources; Online databases; Index.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 29 Apr 2026).

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781526109675

1526109670

9781526100269

1526100266

OCLC:

1414457114