Even after seven centuries of historical development, the core of Dante’s work is probably more relevant today than ever. With his Divine Comedy, the great poet wanted to open the eyes of his contemporaries to the realities of the spiritual world and to the consequences of how we choose to live our life.
Number and Numeracy in Late Medieval English Sermons
Explores discussions of numbers, arithmetic, and other mathematical operations in late medieval English sermons, revealing that popular English-speaking audiences were encouraged to engage in a wide range of numerate operations in their daily religious practices.
The Utopia Reader compiles primary texts from a variety of authors and movements in the history of theorizing utopias. Utopianism is defined as the various ways of imagining, creating, or analyzing the ways and means of creating an ideal or alternative society. Prominent writers and scholars across history have long explored how or why to envision ......
This is a complete translation into contemporary English of the ancient Greek epic by Homer. The translation by Charles Underwood is presented in prose to emphasize the distinctive narrative qualities that illustrate Homer's mastery of stirring language and evocative storytelling.
This scholarly work focuses on encounters with light, telling the story of "seduction" from the Middle Ages through our times, as revealed in works of literature and art, including architecture and film. Rather than the historical investigation of light's "essential" nature, its subject is our relationship with light.
This book explores the uses of the term "paradigm" with respect to both logos and myth in Plato, with a focus on Sophist and Statesman. In so doing, Conor Barry argues for a unitary as opposed to a developmental conception of Plato's dialogues.
The Secret in Medieval Literature explores the many secret agents, actions, creatures, and other beings influencing human existence. Medieval poets had a clear sense of the alternative dimension (the secret) and allowed it to enter quite frequently into their texts.
A Literary and Ethical Reading of Cicero's De Republica
In An Ancient Guide to Good Politics: A Literary and Ethical Reading of Cicero's De Republica, Moryam VanOpstal argues that Cicero should be considered the great unifier of classical political thought, with fresh insight on pivotal issues such as the best way of life and how to preserve a good regime.
Sayings, Sermons, and Teachings of 'Ali, with the One Hundred Proverbs a
Ali ibn Abi Talib was an acknowledged master of Arabic eloquence and a renowned sage of Islamic wisdom. This is a collection of sayings, sermons, and teachings attributed to 'Ali ibn Abi Talib (d 40H/661AD), cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad, first Shi'a Imam and fourth Sunni Caliph.
Over the last few decades, the field of trauma studies has shed new light on biblical texts that deal with individual and collective catastrophe. In The Language of Trauma in the Psalms, Danilo Verde advances the conversation, moving beyond the emphasis on healing that prevails in most literary trauma studies. Using the lens of cognitive ......
Criticism of the Court and the Evil King in the Middle Ages: Literary-Historical Analyses, identifies and discusses the discourse focused on the criticism of the court, specifically of the king, across medieval Europe. Tracing its development from the tenth through the fifteenth centuries, chapters examine Icelandic sagas, Old Spanish heroic epic ......
With an Edition of Middle English and Middle Scots Pastourelles
Centering on the difficult and important subject of medieval rape culture, this book brings Middle English and Scots texts into conversation with contemporary discourses on sexual assault and the #MeToo movement. The book explores the topic in the late medieval lyric genre known as the pastourelle and in related literary works, including chivalric ......
Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Culture: New Series
Since its founding in 1943, Medievalia et Humanistica has won worldwide recognition as the first scholarly publication in America to devote itself entirely to medieval and Renaissance studies. Since 1970, a new series, sponsored by the Modern Language Association of America and edited by an international board of distinguished scholars and ......
A Literary and Ethical Reading of Cicero's de Republica
An Ancient Guide to Good Politics: A Literary and Ethical Reading of Cicero's De Republica illuminates Cicero's subtlety of craft and thought in his most painstakingly written dialogue. As Cicero--notable among ancient thinkers for his accomplishments as a statesman and as a philosopher--has enjoyed a resurgence of interest in recent decades, ......
The Secret in Medieval Literature: Alternative Worlds in the Middle Ages explores the many strange phenomena, both in the Middle Ages and today, that do not find any good rational explanations. Those do not pertain to magic or to religion in the traditional sense of the word; they are secrets of an epistemological kind and tend to defy human ......
Mythic Shapes and Contemporary Influences in Hitchcock's Film
Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo has dazzled and challenged audiences with its unique aesthetic design and startling plot devices since its release in 1958. In Classical Vertigo: Mythic Shapes and Contemporary Influences in Hitchcock's Film, Mark William Padilla analyzes antecedents including: (1) the film's source novel, D'entre les morts (Among the ......
Who is the Pearl-poet? How do ideas about his life and interpretations of his poems shape our understanding of his work in late-medieval England--and beyond? In Becoming the Pearl-Poet: Perceptions, Connections, Receptions, readers can explore the world of this extraordinary, fourteenth-century writer. In Part I, "Perceptions," five scholars give ......
Jane Austen, that product of Georgian refinement and restraint, seems far removed from medieval romances abounding in valiant knights rescuing beautiful maidens from ferocious dragons. Yet, Jane Austen's Romantic Medievalism traces her knowledge of the medieval tradition of courtly love and happy endings through medieval authors, through ......