Deborah Fraioli

Simmons University, Modern Languages and Literatures, Emerita

Simmons University, ML, Emerita

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Authenticity of the Correspondence of Abelard and Heloise
Address: Boston, Massachusetts, United States

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Papers by Deborah Fraioli

Deborah Fraioli review of Peter Godman Paradoxes of Conscience 2009 Mediaevistik 2011

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George Moore and Scott Moncrieff: An Unknown Chapter in the Authenticity Debate of the Letters of Abelard and Heloise Forum for Modern Languages Article

Forum for Modern Language Studies, 2017

Challenges to the authenticity of the Latin letters of Abelard and Heloise have made their appear... more Challenges to the authenticity of the Latin letters of Abelard and Heloise have made their appearance, sporadically but persistently, since the early 1800s. Prior to that, the celebrated couple was known primarily through romanticized fictionalizations, popular in French and in English translation. Although the first public awareness of the correspondence dates back to a French translation of the thirteenth century, attributed to Jean de Meun, that text had no more influence than the Latin letters in establishing the popular characterization of the lovers for a number of centuries. By the early nineteenth century, scholars began to question whether the historical Abelard and Heloise had actually written the letters attributed to them, because of inconsistencies, contradictions and implausibilities in the letters. But a chapter in the history of the debate has never been told, which adds immeasurably to the theoretical issues of authenticity in this debate. The colourful and contentious exchanges between George Moore, author of the novel Héloïse and Abélard (1921), and Scott Moncrieff, the first translator of the complete English edition of the Latin letters (1925), were never meant as an authenticity debate per se. Moore's main concern was for another kind of authenticity: to write a novel composed with historically accurate details, yet freely adapted to convey what was doubtless the great draw of the letters for both Moore and Walter Pater, but not Scott Moncrieff: the letters' aura of emotional authenticity and provocative eroticism. Thus tensions between textual and emotional authenticity, trending already in their literary milieu, inevitably led Moore and Moncrieff to raise questions about the historicity of the letters, and the vigorous and thought-provoking arguments of the pair, mostly in unpublished correspondence, deserve to become a recognized part of the afterlife of the letters of Abelard and Heloise.

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Heloise’s First Letter as a Response to the Historia Calamitatum

Mediaevistik, 2016

The twentieth-century novelist George Moore, who wrote a novelized version of the letters of Abel... more The twentieth-century novelist George Moore, who wrote a novelized version of the letters of Abelard and Heloise in 1921 (Héloïse and Abélard), had a curious notion of the function of the Historia Calamitatum as it pertained to the rest of the collected correspondence of the famous twelfth-century couple. His views come to light in a preface he wrote for Scott Moncrieff’s first integral English translation of the letters, The Letters of Abelard and Heloise (1926) and in the accompanying correspondence with Moncrieff. Moore believed that the authentic correspondence began with Heloise’s first letter (letter 2). He deemed letters two through eight to be genuine letters exchanged by Abelard and Heloise but, in his words, the Historia was: “A literary forgery, designed to create a background and a justification for the rest.” In other words, he thought that a forger had come across seven authentic letters by Abelard and Heloise and, finding them in need of an introduction which would un...

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L’intention dans l'Éthique d’Abélard : en savons nous plus qu’Héloïse ?

Les noms alliés d’Abélard et Héloïse, solidement joints dans l’imagination littéraire par l’Histo... more Les noms alliés d’Abélard et Héloïse, solidement joints dans l’imagination littéraire par l’Historia Calamitatum et les lettres qui s’ensuivent, sont plutôt associés avec leur aventure amoureuse qu’avec leur philosophie morale. Mais il se peut qu’une raison pour laquelle on revient à leur histoire avec une telle fascination consiste dans leur application de cette philosophie à se décharger de la responsabilité de conduite que la doctrine chrétienne considère avec mépris et spécifiquement cond..

The Letter Collection of Abelard and Heloise, edited by David Luscombe, translated by Betty Radice and revised by David Luscombe

Cahiers de recherches médiévales et humanistes, 2014

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Assessing Medieval Moral Outrage: the Correspondence of Abelard and Heloise

Mediaevistik, 2013

An argument that has frequently been made to scholars who consider it unlikely that Abelard and H... more An argument that has frequently been made to scholars who consider it unlikely that Abelard and Heloise ever spoke or behaved as described in the correspondence posits that such a view is prudish, subjective, or anachronistic. 1 Citing clerics who kept concubines, or the sporadic waywardness of twelfth-century monastic life, this argument strongly downplays the misgivings or the moral outrage that contemporaries might have felt toward the twelfth-century couple. 2 Yet we should recognize that the rheto

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La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame, 1: Introduction, textes

Speculum, 1993

The Correspondence of Abelard and Heloise: The Story That Lies Within

Conference Paper, 2018

Argument based mainly on truncated and backfiring quotations against the authenticity of the corr... more

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"George Moore and Scott Moncrieff: An Unknown Chapter in the Authenticity Debate of the Letters of Abelard and Heloise"

Forum for Modern Language Studies, 2018

This article argues, drawing in large part on unpublished correspondence between Moncrieff and hi... more This article argues, drawing in large part on unpublished correspondence between Moncrieff and his editor, Guy Chapman, that the vigorous and thought-provoking arguments between Moncrieff and Abelard and Heloise novelist George Moore deserve to become recognized as an important part of the afterlife of the letters of Abelard and Heloise.