The Erotics of Consolation: Desire and Distance in the Late Middle Ages by Catherine E. Léglu, Stephen J. Milner

Abstract

REVIEWS The Erotics of Consolation: Desire and Distance in the Late Middle Ages. Ed. by Catherine E. Leglu and Stephen J. Milner. (The New Middle Ages) Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 2008. viii+241 pp. ?42.50. ISBN 978-1 4039-7619-2. This interesting collection of ten essays explores the appropriation and misappro priation of the classical and late antique consolatory tradition in various literary settings in the latemedieval and Renaissance era. Although two of the essays prominently feature the influence of Cicero (Tusculan Disputations) and Seneca (e.g. the Consolatio ad Marciam, theDe tranquillitate animi, and the spurious De remediisfortuitorum), the collection chiefly focuses on the influence of Boethius's Consolatio philosophiae. In fact, in the introduction co-editors Catherine Leglu and Stephen Milner describe the book as concentrating] on the vernacular and literary aspects of the reception of Boethius' work in Italy, France, Bohemia, and England in the period between 1300 and 1600' (p. 4). Boethius's Consolation was indeed a pervasive presence in the latermedieval period, owing to itsfunction as a popular textbook, but therewere other reasons aswell why it was readily adapted to various literary ends. The verse half of thisprosimetrum dialogue naturally linked it to the poetic tradition, and its framework of Lady Philosophy consoling a man (the imprisoned Boethius) encouraged its absorption by the amatory form?and erotic content?of love poetry. JeandeMeun, himself a translator of theConsolatio, provided a template for this adaptation, as he incorporated Boethian arguments into his extension of theRoman de laRose. The essays in Part 1, entitled 'Consolation and Desire', deal with some of the more unexpected uses of the Consolation of Philosophy. In an examination of fourteenth-century French narrative poems (dits) Sarah Kay argues that the authors of such works were more attracted to theverse sections of theConsolation than to the prose, and were drawn to the tangible discussions of fortune in the early sections rather than to the abstract philosophizing in the later ones. She focuses on theRemede defortune (c. 1340) and Confort d'ami (1357) ofGuillaume de Machaut to show how he adapts Boethian poetry to the realm of amatory vicissitudes, poetic expression, and even literaryglory. Jessica Rosenfeld considers the impact of Boethius on Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde. She argues thatChaucer, who relied upon Nicholas Trevet's highly Aristotelian' commentary on Boethius inhis own translation of thework, gained from itamore worldly, naturalistic view of human experience. Such a Peripatetic reading of Boethius?in contrast to the earlier more Platonic readings?inspired Chaucer to develop the erotic joys as well as the romantic sorrows of Troilus and Criseyde. Olivia Holmes explores the par allels between Boethius's Lady Philosophy and Dante's Beatrice in the Commedia. Focusing on the dream in Purgatorio xix inwhich a Donna Santa (probably a refiguring of Lady Philosophy and possibly, inpart, Beatrice) drives offan enticing siren,much as Lady Philosophy drove off themuses of poetry at the start of the MLR, 105.2, 2010 503 Consolation, she argues that a Boethian model of sickness and healing is repli cated in the Commedia. Co-editor Milner finds thatDante's Trecento successor, Boccaccio, makes a subversive use of Boethius and of rhetorical conventions in theDecameron. He argues that the putatively consolatory function of thework as stated in the Proemio?to divert and comfort lovesick women?is not genuine, but rather a satirical ploy to use the rhetoric of epistolary exchange popularized by the ars dictaminis to gain access towomen. Thus, rather than urging a Boethian rejection of theworldly for the sublime, Boccaccio the faux consoler is doing just the opposite by furthering erotic pursuits. A fifthessay in this section by Adrian Armstrong examines JeanLemaire de Belges's Concorde des deux langages (1511) in the rather contrived consolatory context of an author seeking to elevate his interest in the higher studies of language and knowledge as being worthy of the Temple of Minerva (as opposed to the lowlier Temple ofVenus)?and thereby constituting a 'Consolation of Philology. The essays in Part 11, 'Consolation and Loss', treatworks that develop con solatory motifs in themore traditional realms of death and misfortune. Letizia Panizza examines Petrarch's Latin writings to show his use of Cicero and Seneca...