The Laborer's Two Bodies Labor and the "Work" of the Text in Medieval Britain, 1350-1500

by Robertson, Kellie

• ISBN13: 9781403965165
• ISBN10: 1403965161
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-02-05
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

This book explores the intellectual, cultural, and political consequences of one of the most fundamental shifts in late medieval English society: the first national labor regulation in the wake of the 1348 plague. Bridging the medieval and early modern periods, this book analyzes a wide range of texts and images produced in this initial period of labor regulation (1349 to 1500), including works by Chaucer, Gower, Langland, the Paston Family, and Barclay.

Author Biography

Kellie Robertson currently serves as Director of the Medieval and Renaissance Studies Program at the University of Pittsburgh. She has published articles on Geoffrey of Monmouth, Chaucer, Milton, and postcolonial theory. She is editor (along with Michael Uebel) of a collection of essays, The Middle Ages at Work: Practicing Labor in Late Medieval England (Palgrave Macmillan, 2004).

Table of Contents

Illustrations	vi
Abbreviations	vii
Acknowledgements	viii
Introduction: Keeping Paradise	1	(12)
The Laborer's Two Bodies	13	(38)
Chaucer and the Enforcement of the Labor Statutes	51	(27)
The Ideology of Common Profit: Rebels, Heretics, Merchants	78	(41)
Corporeal Style: Representing the Gentry Household	119	(34)
``Let God Work!'': Drama and Rebellion in Fifteenth-Century East Anglia	153	(30)
Epilogue: Vagrant Times	183	(11)
Notes	194	(57)
Bibliography	251	(20)
Index	271