 |
Spring 2009 Course |
|---|---|
Middle English |
|
Hannah Johnson |
Where can you encounter a glittering fairy lover, an orphan set adrift
in a boat, and a 'knight' who eats table scraps off the floor? These
figures are to be found only in the world of medieval romance. This
section of "Middle English Literature" will highlight a number of
these quirky tales of adventure and magic from the later Middle Ages,
with a few contributions from Chaucer. Students will read literature
in the original Middle English and learn about the history of the
language as they ponder questions such as: What kinds of experience
are signified by accounts of marvelous creatures and fated events? How
are problems in the social world negotiated through stories of
impossible love, painful redemption, or domestic quarrels gone wrong?
We will ask how romance becomes a space for thinking about the
problems of the 'real world,' and how ordinary experience comes to
take on the aura of enchantment.