Ad Putter

An Introduction to The Gawain-Poet

• Broschiertes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Longman Medieval and Renaissance Library Series Editors: Charlotte Brewer and N H Keeble Longman Medieval and Renaissance Library is a major new series of critical introductions to key literary and cultural topics from Old English to the late seventeenth century. Volumes draw on original research and are sensitive to current critical concerns, but they are designed particularly to meet the needs of students and the general reader. The key feature is the breadth and variety of coverage, providing authoritative studies on a range of subjects from individual authors and works to genres, periods and contexts. The late fourteenth century produced a crop of brilliant writers: Chaucer, Langland and Gower. Their achievement was rivalled only by a series of four works generally agreed to have been written by a single northern author, known as the Gawain-Poet. This book introduces the reader to the Gawain-poet's four surviving works: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Patience, Pearl and Cleanness. Combining earlier scholarly findings with fresh research and ideas, this book sets the poetry in its historical and literary context, as well as developing new critical approaches drawn from sociology and philosophy which bring an innovative and exciting dimension to the work. The introductory chapter sets the historical scene for the poems and throughout the text the author provides fresh translations of passages from the poems and difficult foreign material. An extensive bibliography of both primary and secondary sources and an index of names and topics aid accessibility and complete the book. Written in a student-friendly style, An Introduction to the Gawain-Poet gives the general reader and the medievalist access to important old and new criticism and research on the subject. It will prove essential reading for those undertaking courses in English Medieval Literature. Ad Putter is Lecturer in the English Department of the University of Bristol, and also works for the Centre for Medieval studies at Bristol. He has researched and written extensively on medieval and renaissance literature in both books and journals.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Routledge
• Seitenzahl: 268
• Erscheinungstermin: 2. Oktober 1996
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 215mm x 138mm x 15mm
• Gewicht: 404g
• ISBN-13: 9780582225749
• ISBN-10: 0582225744
• Artikelnr.: 24277534

Autorenporträt

Ad Putter is Professor of Medieval English Literature at the University of Bristol, UK.

Inhaltsangabe

Preface Note on References and Abbreviations Acknowledgements 1. The Gawain-Poet in Context Introduction
The Poet's Reading
The Poet's way of Reading
The Poet in the Text: A humble cleric
The Poet in the Text: A Court-Poet
Dialect and Metre: The Gawain-Poet's Remoteness
A Historical Context for Alliterative Poetry 2. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Introduction
Romance and Realism
Plot-telling and the Manipulation of Memory
Conclusion 3. Patience Introduction
Suffrance in the Prologue
The Gawain-Poet as a reader of the Bible
Dramatic Irony in the Story of Jonah
God and Man
From Revelation to Trust
4. Pearl Introduction
Making Heaven Strange: The Description of Heaven
Reason and revelation: The Debate about Heaven
The Unkindness of Heaven
Patience and Protest in the Epilogue 5. Cleanness Introduction
Uncleanness and the Confusion of Kinds
Imitating God
The Beauty of Destruction
Cleaness and Knowing One's Place
Embodying Culture Bibliography