Romance Rewritten
The Evolution of Middle English Romance. A Tribute to Helen Cooper
Corinne Saunders editor Elizabeth Archibald editor Megan G Leitch editor
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Boydell & Brewer Ltd
Published:19th Oct '18
Should be back in stock very soon
New approaches to the everlasting malleability and transformation of medieval romance. The essays here reconsider the protean nature of Middle English romance. The contributors examine both the cultural unity of romance and its many variations, reiterations and reimaginings, including its contexts and engagements with other discourses and forms, as they were "rewritten" during the Middle Ages and beyond. Ranging across popular, anonymous English and courtly romances, and taking in the works of Chaucer and Arthurian romance (rarely treated together), in connection with continental sources and analogues, the chapters probe this fluid and creative genre to ask just how comfortable, and how flexible, are its nature and aims? How were Middle English romances rewritten toaccommodate contemporary concerns and generic expectations? What can attention to narrative techniques and conventional gestures reveal about the reassurances romances offer, or the questions they ask? How do romances' central concerns with secular ideals and conduct intersect with spiritual priorities? And how are romances transformed or received in later periods? The volume is also a tribute to the significance and influence of the work of Professor Helen Cooper on romance. Elizabeth Archibald is Professor of English Studies at Durham University; Megan G. Leitch is Senior Lecturer in English Literature at Cardiff University; Corinne Saunders is Professor of English andCo-Director of the Centre for Medical Humanities at Durham University. Contributors: Elizabeth Archibald, Julia Boffey, Christopher Cannon, Neil Cartlidge, Miriam Edlich-Muth, A.S.G. Edwards, Marcel Elias, Megan Leitch, Andrew Lynch, Jill Mann, Marco Nievergelt, Ad Putter, Corinne Saunders, Barry Windeatt, R.F. Yeager
With its variously sophisticated and insightful analyses [this collection] makes a worthy and welcome contribution. * REVIEW OF ENGLISH STUDIES *
There is not a single weak link in this excellent collection. All contributions share an interest in romance, generic transformation, and rewriting more broadly, while displaying a rich diversity of approaches and preoccupations. Romance Rewritten is easy to recommend not only to scholars of romance, but to students of Chaucer, Gower, Malory, sixteenth-century printing, or nineteenth-century medievalism as well. * STUDIES IN THE AGE OF CHAUCER *
This edited collection is a well-rounded contribution to the field of medieval literary studies and offers some interesting finds and analyses of works that have been upheld as the best of medieval literature. * PARERGON *
This consistently engaging collection is a fitting and deserved tribute to Helen Cooper, confirming the importance and sustained influence of her work. It offers a variety of detailed analyses that will surely be essential reading for specialists, while still remaining accessible to students. * ANGLIA *
These scholars, who share with Helen Cooper an unflagging interest in the genre, have produced an outstanding volume of essays, each of which probes facets of its protean and, it must be stressed, inexhaustible nature. * ARCHIV *
The thirteen essays in this volume are testament to the range and depth of her [Helen Cooper's] contributions to the field. Collectively, the chapters highlight the multifarious connections between romances, the "family resemblances" that link texts, and the sociopolitical forces that interact with romance impulses to form innovative narratives and critical commentaries on their historical moment, all the while confronting readers with the nebulousness of the very definition of romance. * Speculum *
ISBN: 9781843845096
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: 636g
310 pages