“Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, ... more “Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, Ana Sáez-Hidalgo, and Brian Gastle, (NY: Routledge, 2017, 37-55).
... its variations might 'meene'), he demonstrates his ear for Genius's words and ... more ... its variations might 'meene'), he demonstrates his ear for Genius's words and the feisty wit to spin ... the Knightes tale', and quites not only the tale's content but also its rhyme (3119 ... Knight's Tale, i, lines 147580) emelye's sexual anxieties linger unspoken in the couplet;'queynte'is ...
The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, 2017
“Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, ... more “Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, Ana Sáez-Hidalgo, and Brian Gastle, (NY: Routledge, 2017, 37-55).
Citing Tony Hunt's work (Miraculous Rhymes: The Writing of Gautier de Coinci) as seminal in t... more Citing Tony Hunt's work (Miraculous Rhymes: The Writing of Gautier de Coinci) as seminal in the recent re-discovery of rime riche as a powerful poetic tool, and noting that "rime riche in medieval poetry is very frequent, featuring in 650 couplets of the French and English poetry of Gower alone," Zarins asks "what is the dramatic power of rime riche? What brilliance and authority are conferred upon a character who speaks with such rhymes, and on what level do fellow characters hear them?" (239) Her essay makes a good job of offering persuasive answers. She takes up Chaucer as well as Gower (an appendix very helpfully listing the loci she discusses concludes her piece), by way of comparison and contrast, illuminating the practices of each, and along the way her claim that rime riche most often emanates from the mouths of speaking characters. She concludes that "Rime riche is only one means for a character to enrich speech, but, uniquely, it uses sameness ...
Examine Gower's use of wordplay in VC 1 to depict the most terrifying aspects of rebellion, p... more Examine Gower's use of wordplay in VC 1 to depict the most terrifying aspects of rebellion, particularly a series of puns (modeled on Geoffrey of Vinsauf and Alan of Lille) in which terms such as "caput," "pes," and "cauda" can refer either to parts of the body or to parts of a word or line. Gower begins with the riddle on the parts of his own name at the beginning of Book 1. "By making his readers aware of a word's body – its "pedes," "caput," "membra" – he prepares us for the rebels' heads and feet in the ensuing chapters. For him, syllabic play provides more than a poetic opening: it offers a way of seeing social inversion through a linguistic metaphor, in which the peasants, and not the poet, do the cropping and adding of heads to empower themselves" (148). In the rest of Book 1, the peasants are transformed twice, first into domestic beasts and then into wild ones, as they also seek to monstrously...
ANA SAEZ-HIDALGO and R.F. Yeager, eds., John Gower in England and Iberia: Manuscripts, Influences... more ANA SAEZ-HIDALGO and R.F. Yeager, eds., John Gower in England and Iberia: Manuscripts, Influences, Reception. Series: Publications of the John Gower Society. Woodbridge, Suffolk: D.S. Brewer, 2014. Pp. 335. ISBN: 978-1-84384-320-7. $99.The essays in this volume originated as papers delivered at the John Gower Society's second International Congress held at the Universidad de Valladolid in Spain in 2011. Gower scholarship has been on the rise, and there are a number of conference-related essay collections of interest to scholars and students, but this volume, as well as the Congress that occasioned it, breaks new ground by exploring the connection between England and Iberia in the late Middle Ages, specifically in regards to Gower's work. As the Introduction states, Gower's Confessio Amantis is the first vernacular English poem translated into another vernacular language, and it was translated into two, Portuguese and Castilian, by Robert Payn in 1430 and by Juan de Cuenca, who translated Payn's prose translation. The editors remark, 'Not until the early seventeenth century did the Confessio have a competitor' (1). While some of this volume's truly excellent contributions are more about Gower's English and his England, in this review of nineteen chapters I will focus on the Iberian-themed contributions, since this theme makes the volume stand out and presents new opportunities for research and teaching.The first section of the volume, on manuscripts, includes work by Alastair J. Minnis and Barbara A. Shailor, as well as two chapters on the Portuguese and Castilian manuscripts. In 'Castilian Script in the Iberian Manuscripts of the Confessio Amantis,' Mauricio Herrero Jimenez, with Tamara Perez-Fernandez and Marta Maria Gutierrez Rodriguez, describes the scripts in Madrid, Real Biblioteca MS II-3088 and Madrid, El Escorial MS g-II-19. Jimenez notes evidence of strong cultural contact and bilingualism in the fifteenth century-for example, the Portuguese manuscript produced in 1430 over a mere forty days later acquired a Castilian table of contents. The inclusion of a recipe for soap suggests the Portuguese manuscript traveled to a Castilian owner in Andalusia, where such soaps were produced. Some added writing exercises suggest the growth of literacy skills among nobility and also indicate the private use of this manuscript; it was not a presentation copy. Turning to the Castilian manuscript, Jimenez notes that it is all written in the same hand by the same scribe, yet originally came from two different manuscripts, brought together possibly in the early sixteenth century. It is not simply a matter of joining two manuscripts at a midpoint but rather quires in different places brought together with care. This curious and irregular formation points to the interest in Gower among the nobility of Castile.Though the Portuguese manuscript was not originally intended for royalty, in 'Provenance Interlacing in Spanish Royal Book-Collecting and the Case of the Confessio Amantis (RB MS II-3088),' Maria Luisa Lopez-Vidriero Arbello tracks down the Portuguese manuscript's travels and eventual placement in the libraries of Spanish kings. By discovering the importance of a shelfmark and book bindings, she determined that the book was owned by Luis de Castilla (c. 1540-1618) and then acquired and brought to Valladolid by Diego Sarmiento de Acuna, first count of Gondomar (1567-1626) and an ambassador to England during the reign of James I. It was interesting serendipity that the Congress in Valladolid occasioned the research for the manuscript's provenance, and it was traced back to Valladolid.The second section of the volume concentrates on English-Iberian relations. In 'The English Literature of Najera (1367) from Battlefield Dispatch to the Poets,' David R. Carlson points out that verse propaganda produced from state-supplied documents was not an innovation of Lancastrian England and Gower's Cronica tripertita (1400), but can be seen in the earlier fourteenth century in English-Iberian relations pertaining to the Battle of Najera, in which combined English and Portuguese forces invaded Castile to reinstate Pedro I (the Cruel) as king. …
Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.wmich.edu/accessus Part of the European ... more Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.wmich.edu/accessus Part of the European Languages and Societies Commons, History of Science, Technology, and Medicine Commons, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies Commons, Literature in English, British Isles Commons, Medicine and Health Sciences Commons, Medieval Studies Commons, and the Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons
Review
Zarins focuses her analysis on how Gower retells the stories of "two Ovidian villains who... more Review
Zarins focuses her analysis on how Gower retells the stories of "two Ovidian villains who are known for their depravity" (141), Polyphemus in "The Tale of Acis and Galatea," and Tereus the rapist who mutilates his victim. "Gower writes sympathetically about them (141), treating their stories "without irony," that is, devoid of the heavy foreshadowing that in Ovid's telling, makes them evil from the start: " . . . throughout Gower's "Confessio," monsters are not born, but made" (143). The lonely Polyphemus is assailed by envy of the happy lovers Acis and Galatea, but only when he surrenders to his sinful urge--by burying the lovers in a landslide--is he named as a "giant," a monster (144). Tereus is declared an evil freak of nature both in Ovid and Chaucer's "Legend of Good Women," while Gower goes out of his way to portray the future rapist as a loving husband until the moment of his choosing to act on a criminal desire (152). In many other tales, Genius illustrates how "conversion" to evil is possible for anyone, thus providing a cautionary example for Amans in his spiritual struggle--and of course for the reader as well. The reader's sympathy with Gower's villains is based not on guilty identification, as is sometimes alleged, but on a sense of our common humanity and free will. Zarins notes: "Gower's greatest villains are unsettling because they started out happy, hopeful, and ordinary, and in Gower's sympathetic retelling, one can imagine an alternate ending in which they remain so" (155). [LBB. Copyright. John Gower Society. JGN 36.2].
full citation: “Violence Without Warning: Sympathetic Villains and John Gower’s Crafting of Ovidian Narrative,” in John Gower: Others and the Self, edited by Russell A. Peck and R.F. Yeager (Suffolk, UK: D. S. Brewer, 2017, 141-155).
“Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, ... more “Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, Ana Sáez-Hidalgo, and Brian Gastle, (NY: Routledge, 2017, 37-55).
... its variations might 'meene'), he demonstrates his ear for Genius's words and ... more ... its variations might 'meene'), he demonstrates his ear for Genius's words and the feisty wit to spin ... the Knightes tale', and quites not only the tale's content but also its rhyme (3119 ... Knight's Tale, i, lines 147580) emelye's sexual anxieties linger unspoken in the couplet;'queynte'is ...
The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, 2017
“Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, ... more “Gower and rhetoric,” in The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower, edited by R. F. Yeager, Ana Sáez-Hidalgo, and Brian Gastle, (NY: Routledge, 2017, 37-55).
Citing Tony Hunt's work (Miraculous Rhymes: The Writing of Gautier de Coinci) as seminal in t... more Citing Tony Hunt's work (Miraculous Rhymes: The Writing of Gautier de Coinci) as seminal in the recent re-discovery of rime riche as a powerful poetic tool, and noting that "rime riche in medieval poetry is very frequent, featuring in 650 couplets of the French and English poetry of Gower alone," Zarins asks "what is the dramatic power of rime riche? What brilliance and authority are conferred upon a character who speaks with such rhymes, and on what level do fellow characters hear them?" (239) Her essay makes a good job of offering persuasive answers. She takes up Chaucer as well as Gower (an appendix very helpfully listing the loci she discusses concludes her piece), by way of comparison and contrast, illuminating the practices of each, and along the way her claim that rime riche most often emanates from the mouths of speaking characters. She concludes that "Rime riche is only one means for a character to enrich speech, but, uniquely, it uses sameness ...
Examine Gower's use of wordplay in VC 1 to depict the most terrifying aspects of rebellion, p... more Examine Gower's use of wordplay in VC 1 to depict the most terrifying aspects of rebellion, particularly a series of puns (modeled on Geoffrey of Vinsauf and Alan of Lille) in which terms such as "caput," "pes," and "cauda" can refer either to parts of the body or to parts of a word or line. Gower begins with the riddle on the parts of his own name at the beginning of Book 1. "By making his readers aware of a word's body – its "pedes," "caput," "membra" – he prepares us for the rebels' heads and feet in the ensuing chapters. For him, syllabic play provides more than a poetic opening: it offers a way of seeing social inversion through a linguistic metaphor, in which the peasants, and not the poet, do the cropping and adding of heads to empower themselves" (148). In the rest of Book 1, the peasants are transformed twice, first into domestic beasts and then into wild ones, as they also seek to monstrously...
ANA SAEZ-HIDALGO and R.F. Yeager, eds., John Gower in England and Iberia: Manuscripts, Influences... more ANA SAEZ-HIDALGO and R.F. Yeager, eds., John Gower in England and Iberia: Manuscripts, Influences, Reception. Series: Publications of the John Gower Society. Woodbridge, Suffolk: D.S. Brewer, 2014. Pp. 335. ISBN: 978-1-84384-320-7. $99.The essays in this volume originated as papers delivered at the John Gower Society's second International Congress held at the Universidad de Valladolid in Spain in 2011. Gower scholarship has been on the rise, and there are a number of conference-related essay collections of interest to scholars and students, but this volume, as well as the Congress that occasioned it, breaks new ground by exploring the connection between England and Iberia in the late Middle Ages, specifically in regards to Gower's work. As the Introduction states, Gower's Confessio Amantis is the first vernacular English poem translated into another vernacular language, and it was translated into two, Portuguese and Castilian, by Robert Payn in 1430 and by Juan de Cuenca, who translated Payn's prose translation. The editors remark, 'Not until the early seventeenth century did the Confessio have a competitor' (1). While some of this volume's truly excellent contributions are more about Gower's English and his England, in this review of nineteen chapters I will focus on the Iberian-themed contributions, since this theme makes the volume stand out and presents new opportunities for research and teaching.The first section of the volume, on manuscripts, includes work by Alastair J. Minnis and Barbara A. Shailor, as well as two chapters on the Portuguese and Castilian manuscripts. In 'Castilian Script in the Iberian Manuscripts of the Confessio Amantis,' Mauricio Herrero Jimenez, with Tamara Perez-Fernandez and Marta Maria Gutierrez Rodriguez, describes the scripts in Madrid, Real Biblioteca MS II-3088 and Madrid, El Escorial MS g-II-19. Jimenez notes evidence of strong cultural contact and bilingualism in the fifteenth century-for example, the Portuguese manuscript produced in 1430 over a mere forty days later acquired a Castilian table of contents. The inclusion of a recipe for soap suggests the Portuguese manuscript traveled to a Castilian owner in Andalusia, where such soaps were produced. Some added writing exercises suggest the growth of literacy skills among nobility and also indicate the private use of this manuscript; it was not a presentation copy. Turning to the Castilian manuscript, Jimenez notes that it is all written in the same hand by the same scribe, yet originally came from two different manuscripts, brought together possibly in the early sixteenth century. It is not simply a matter of joining two manuscripts at a midpoint but rather quires in different places brought together with care. This curious and irregular formation points to the interest in Gower among the nobility of Castile.Though the Portuguese manuscript was not originally intended for royalty, in 'Provenance Interlacing in Spanish Royal Book-Collecting and the Case of the Confessio Amantis (RB MS II-3088),' Maria Luisa Lopez-Vidriero Arbello tracks down the Portuguese manuscript's travels and eventual placement in the libraries of Spanish kings. By discovering the importance of a shelfmark and book bindings, she determined that the book was owned by Luis de Castilla (c. 1540-1618) and then acquired and brought to Valladolid by Diego Sarmiento de Acuna, first count of Gondomar (1567-1626) and an ambassador to England during the reign of James I. It was interesting serendipity that the Congress in Valladolid occasioned the research for the manuscript's provenance, and it was traced back to Valladolid.The second section of the volume concentrates on English-Iberian relations. In 'The English Literature of Najera (1367) from Battlefield Dispatch to the Poets,' David R. Carlson points out that verse propaganda produced from state-supplied documents was not an innovation of Lancastrian England and Gower's Cronica tripertita (1400), but can be seen in the earlier fourteenth century in English-Iberian relations pertaining to the Battle of Najera, in which combined English and Portuguese forces invaded Castile to reinstate Pedro I (the Cruel) as king. …
Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.wmich.edu/accessus Part of the European ... more Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.wmich.edu/accessus Part of the European Languages and Societies Commons, History of Science, Technology, and Medicine Commons, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies Commons, Literature in English, British Isles Commons, Medicine and Health Sciences Commons, Medieval Studies Commons, and the Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons
Review
Zarins focuses her analysis on how Gower retells the stories of "two Ovidian villains who... more Review
Zarins focuses her analysis on how Gower retells the stories of "two Ovidian villains who are known for their depravity" (141), Polyphemus in "The Tale of Acis and Galatea," and Tereus the rapist who mutilates his victim. "Gower writes sympathetically about them (141), treating their stories "without irony," that is, devoid of the heavy foreshadowing that in Ovid's telling, makes them evil from the start: " . . . throughout Gower's "Confessio," monsters are not born, but made" (143). The lonely Polyphemus is assailed by envy of the happy lovers Acis and Galatea, but only when he surrenders to his sinful urge--by burying the lovers in a landslide--is he named as a "giant," a monster (144). Tereus is declared an evil freak of nature both in Ovid and Chaucer's "Legend of Good Women," while Gower goes out of his way to portray the future rapist as a loving husband until the moment of his choosing to act on a criminal desire (152). In many other tales, Genius illustrates how "conversion" to evil is possible for anyone, thus providing a cautionary example for Amans in his spiritual struggle--and of course for the reader as well. The reader's sympathy with Gower's villains is based not on guilty identification, as is sometimes alleged, but on a sense of our common humanity and free will. Zarins notes: "Gower's greatest villains are unsettling because they started out happy, hopeful, and ordinary, and in Gower's sympathetic retelling, one can imagine an alternate ending in which they remain so" (155). [LBB. Copyright. John Gower Society. JGN 36.2].
full citation: “Violence Without Warning: Sympathetic Villains and John Gower’s Crafting of Ovidian Narrative,” in John Gower: Others and the Self, edited by Russell A. Peck and R.F. Yeager (Suffolk, UK: D. S. Brewer, 2017, 141-155).
Work of fiction: In this contemporary retelling of the Canterbury Tales, high-school seniors on a... more Work of fiction: In this contemporary retelling of the Canterbury Tales, high-school seniors on an all-day bus ride to Washington DC tell stories to pass the time.
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Papers by Kim Zarins
Zarins focuses her analysis on how Gower retells the stories of "two Ovidian villains who are known for their depravity" (141), Polyphemus in "The Tale of Acis and Galatea," and Tereus the rapist who mutilates his victim. "Gower writes sympathetically about them (141), treating their stories "without irony," that is, devoid of the heavy foreshadowing that in Ovid's telling, makes them evil from the start: " . . . throughout Gower's "Confessio," monsters are not born, but made" (143). The lonely Polyphemus is assailed by envy of the happy lovers Acis and Galatea, but only when he surrenders to his sinful urge--by burying the lovers in a landslide--is he named as a "giant," a monster (144). Tereus is declared an evil freak of nature both in Ovid and Chaucer's "Legend of Good Women," while Gower goes out of his way to portray the future rapist as a loving husband until the moment of his choosing to act on a criminal desire (152). In many other tales, Genius illustrates how "conversion" to evil is possible for anyone, thus providing a cautionary example for Amans in his spiritual struggle--and of course for the reader as well. The reader's sympathy with Gower's villains is based not on guilty identification, as is sometimes alleged, but on a sense of our common humanity and free will. Zarins notes: "Gower's greatest villains are unsettling because they started out happy, hopeful, and ordinary, and in Gower's sympathetic retelling, one can imagine an alternate ending in which they remain so" (155). [LBB. Copyright. John Gower Society. JGN 36.2].
full citation: “Violence Without Warning: Sympathetic Villains and John Gower’s Crafting of Ovidian Narrative,” in John Gower: Others and the Self, edited by Russell A. Peck and R.F. Yeager (Suffolk, UK: D. S. Brewer, 2017, 141-155).
Zarins focuses her analysis on how Gower retells the stories of "two Ovidian villains who are known for their depravity" (141), Polyphemus in "The Tale of Acis and Galatea," and Tereus the rapist who mutilates his victim. "Gower writes sympathetically about them (141), treating their stories "without irony," that is, devoid of the heavy foreshadowing that in Ovid's telling, makes them evil from the start: " . . . throughout Gower's "Confessio," monsters are not born, but made" (143). The lonely Polyphemus is assailed by envy of the happy lovers Acis and Galatea, but only when he surrenders to his sinful urge--by burying the lovers in a landslide--is he named as a "giant," a monster (144). Tereus is declared an evil freak of nature both in Ovid and Chaucer's "Legend of Good Women," while Gower goes out of his way to portray the future rapist as a loving husband until the moment of his choosing to act on a criminal desire (152). In many other tales, Genius illustrates how "conversion" to evil is possible for anyone, thus providing a cautionary example for Amans in his spiritual struggle--and of course for the reader as well. The reader's sympathy with Gower's villains is based not on guilty identification, as is sometimes alleged, but on a sense of our common humanity and free will. Zarins notes: "Gower's greatest villains are unsettling because they started out happy, hopeful, and ordinary, and in Gower's sympathetic retelling, one can imagine an alternate ending in which they remain so" (155). [LBB. Copyright. John Gower Society. JGN 36.2].
full citation: “Violence Without Warning: Sympathetic Villains and John Gower’s Crafting of Ovidian Narrative,” in John Gower: Others and the Self, edited by Russell A. Peck and R.F. Yeager (Suffolk, UK: D. S. Brewer, 2017, 141-155).