Texts and the Self in the Twelfth Century

by Sarah Spence

• ISBN13: 9780521572798
• ISBN10: 0521572797
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1997-01-28
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

Texts and the Self in the Twelfth Century analyses key twelfth-century Latin and vernacular texts which articulate a subjective, often autobiographical, stance. The contention is that the self forged in medieval literature could not have come into existence without both the gap between Latinity and the vernacular and a shift in perspective towards a visual and spatial orientation. This results in a self which is not an agent that will act on the outside world like the Renaissance self, but, rather, one which inhabits a potential, middle ground, or 'space of agency', explained here partly in terms of object-relations theory.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	x
1 Corpus, body, text (and self)	1	(18)
2 Writing out the body: Abbot Suger, De administratione	19	(36)
3 Text of the body: Abelard and Guibert de Nogent	55	(30)
4 Text of the self: Guilhem IX and Jaufre Rudel, Bernart de Ventadorn and Raimbaut d'Aurenga	85	(34)
5 Writing in the vernacular: the Lais of Marie de France	119	(22)
6 Conclusion	141	(6)
Works cited	147	(15)
Index	162