Reading English Verse in Manuscript c.1350-c.1500

Reading English Verse in Manuscript c.1350-c.1500 PDF

Author: Daniel Sawyer

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2020-05-21

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13: 0192599593

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Reading English Verse in Manuscript, c.1350-c.1500 is the first book-length history of reading for later Middle English poetry. While much past work in the history of reading has revolved around marginalia, this book consults a wider range of evidence, from the weights of books in medieval bindings to relationships between rhyme and syntax. It combines literary-critical close readings, detailed case studies of particular surviving codices, and systematic manuscript surveys drawing on continental European traditions of quantitative codicology to demonstrate the variety, vitality, and formal concerns visible in the reading of verse in this period. The small-and large-scale formal features of poetry affected reading subtly but extensively, determining how readers might move through books and even shaping physical books themselves. Readers' responses to one formal feature, rhyme, meanwhile, evince a habitual but therefore deep-rooted formalism which can support and enhance close readings today. Reading English Verse in Manuscript sheds fresh light on poets such as Geoffrey Chaucer, John Lydgate, and Thomas Hoccleve, but also shows how their works were read in manuscript in the context of a much larger mass of anonymous poems that influenced canonical poems, in a pattern of mutual influence.

Reading English Verse in Manuscript c.1350-c.1500

Reading English Verse in Manuscript c.1350-c.1500 PDF

Author: Daniel Sawyer

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2020-05-21

Total Pages: 223

ISBN-13: 0192599607

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Reading English Verse in Manuscript, c.1350-c.1500 is the first book-length history of reading for later Middle English poetry. While much past work in the history of reading has revolved around marginalia, this book consults a wider range of evidence, from the weights of books in medieval bindings to relationships between rhyme and syntax. It combines literary-critical close readings, detailed case studies of particular surviving codices, and systematic manuscript surveys drawing on continental European traditions of quantitative codicology to demonstrate the variety, vitality, and formal concerns visible in the reading of verse in this period. The small-and large-scale formal features of poetry affected reading subtly but extensively, determining how readers might move through books and even shaping physical books themselves. Readers' responses to one formal feature, rhyme, meanwhile, evince a habitual but therefore deep-rooted formalism which can support and enhance close readings today. Reading English Verse in Manuscript sheds fresh light on poets such as Geoffrey Chaucer, John Lydgate, and Thomas Hoccleve, but also shows how their works were read in manuscript in the context of a much larger mass of anonymous poems that influenced canonical poems, in a pattern of mutual influence.

Writing Under Tyranny

Writing Under Tyranny PDF

Author: Greg Walker

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2005-10-20

Total Pages: 572

ISBN-13: 0191536199

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Writing Under Tyranny: English Literature and the Henrician Reformation spans the boundaries between literary studies and history. It looks at the impact of tyrannical government on the work of poets, playwrights, and prose writers of the early English Renaissance. It shows the profound effects that political oppression had on the literary production of the years from 1528 to 1547, and how English writers in turn strove to mitigate, redirect, and finally resist that oppression. The result was the destruction of a number of forms that had dominated the literary production of late-medieval England, but also the creation of new forms that were to dominate the writing of the following centuries. Paradoxically, the tyranny of Henry VIII gave birth to many modes of writing now seen to be characteristic of the English literary Renaissance.

Trinkets & Charms

Trinkets & Charms PDF

Author: Eleanor R. Standley

Publisher: Oxford University School of Ar

Published: 2013

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781905905300

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Gold signet rings, jet pendants or simple lace ends - all dress accessories were highly significant and meaningful objects used in everyday life in later medieval Britain. This study of archaeological finds, artistic depictions and literature reveals the intricate uses and life-histories of dress accessories from two regions of Britain.

So Long a Letter

So Long a Letter PDF

Author: Mariama Bâ

Publisher: Waveland Press

Published: 2012-05-06

Total Pages: 113

ISBN-13: 1478611235

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Written by award-winning African novelist Mariama Bâ and translated from the original French, So Long a Letter has been recognized as one of Africa’s 100 Best Books of the 20th Century. The brief narrative, written as an extended letter, is a sequence of reminiscences —some wistful, some bitter—recounted by recently widowed Senegalese schoolteacher Ramatoulaye Fall. Addressed to a lifelong friend, Aissatou, it is a record of Ramatoulaye’s emotional struggle for survival after her husband betrayed their marriage by taking a second wife. This semi-autobiographical account is a perceptive testimony to the plight of educated and articulate Muslim women. Angered by the traditions that allow polygyny, they inhabit a social milieu dominated by attitudes and values that deny them status equal to men. Ramatoulaye hopes for a world where the best of old customs and new freedom can be combined. Considered a classic of contemporary African women’s literature, So Long a Letter is a must-read for anyone interested in African literature and the passage from colonialism to modernism in a Muslim country. Winner of the prestigious Noma Award for Publishing in Africa.