Living Death in Medieval French and English Literature

by Gilbert, Jane

• ISBN13: 9781107003835
• ISBN10: 1107003830
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-03-28
• Publisher: Cambridge Univ Pr

Summary

Medieval literature contains many figures caught at the interface between life and death - the dead return to place demands on the living, while the living foresee, organize or desire their own deaths. Jane Gilbert's original study examines the ways in which certain medieval literary texts, both English and French, use these 'living dead' to think about existential, ethical and political issues. In doing so, she shows powerful connections between works otherwise seen as quite disparate, including Chaucer's Book of the Duchess and Legend of Good Women, the Chanson de Roland and the poems of Francois Villon. Written for researchers and advanced students of medieval French and English literature, this book provides original, provocative interpretations of canonical medieval texts in the light of influential modern theories, especially Lacanian psychoanalysis, presented in an accessible and lively way.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	p. vi
Note on translations	p. viii
Introduction: living death	p. 1
Roland and the second death	p. 29
The knight as Thing: courtly love in the non-cyclic prose Lancelot	p. 60
The ubi sunt topos in Middle French: sad stories of the death of kings	p. 103
Ceci n'est pas une marguerite: anamorphosis in Pearl	p. 151
Becoming woman in Chaucer: on ne naît pas femme, on le devient en mourant	p. 191
Conclusion: living dead or dead-in-life?	p. 215
Notes	p. 222
Bibliography	p. 253
Index	p. 279
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