The Life of Saint Clement: A Translation of ‘La Vie de seint Clement’ by Daron Burrows

Abstract

 Reviews not, on the whole, go in for this kind of comparative analysis—but this collection nevertheless provides valuable stimulus towards further work on Coe’s place within the emerging traditions of twenty-first-century writing. L U M G e Life of Saint Clement: A Translation of ‘La Vie de seint Clement’. By D B. (Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, . e French of England Translation Series, ) Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies. . xii+ pp. $. ISBN ––––. Daron Burrows’s translation of the Anglo-French version of the ,-line Life of Saint Clement found (only) in Trinity College, Cambridge, MS R.., forms the tenth volume in the French of England Translation series (FRETS), but it might also be regarded as a companion volume, and as a necessary complement, to his own three-volume edition of this text for the Anglo-Norman Text Society (volumes –, , and , published in , , and  respectively). Altogether, the four volumes offer an extraordinarily thorough presentation and analysis of this text—and an impressive testament to industrious scholarship. In his Introduction to the FRETS translation Burrows offers a wide-ranging and enterprising account of the poem, including a summary of the text; a brief description of the manuscript; a careful explanation of the Anglo-French Life’s place within the complex and very extensive tradition of ‘pseudo-Clementine’ texts; accounts of the author’s treatment of his sources, style, and versification; a useful discussion of Saint Clement’s cult and of the representation of the figure of Simon Magus (the archetypical wicked magician); and finally a consideration of the ways in which the text might reflect the educational and pastoral objectives of the Fourth Lateran Council of . In all of this, very considerable learning is on show, and a great deal of secondary material is cited along the way (see, for example, the extensive annotation to the discussion of French of England religious and hagiographical literature on pp. –), but never at the cost of accessibility: Burrows’s presentation of the issues is always elegant and engaging. As to the translation itself, Burrows says that he has tried to ‘reflect the general extent of repetition and relatively limited vocabulary of the text’ (p. ), but the effect of this was not particularly evident to me. If anything, the register of the translation seems quite high, with a distinct tendency towards the Latinate. So, to give just one example, lines – (‘nus ne devum leissier mie | Dreiture pur avuerie’) become ‘we must not abandon rectitude on account of affection’. In this case, it is a style that is by no means inappropriate to the original. Indeed, it might be said to draw attention to argument and eloquence in a way that only reflects the Life’s own self-conscious thematization of formal disputation and debate. e French also has a tendency to syntactical complexity (on which Burrows remarks at page ), and the translation does not hide this: but again, this seems entirely MLR, .,   appropriate, given how deeply this text seems to be invested in the very idea of elaborately thoughtful speech. U  D N C Philippe de Mézières, rhétorique et poétique. Ed. by J B with R B-K and A C. Geneva: Droz. .  pp. €.. ISBN ––––. Oratio tragedica. By P  M. Ed. and trans. by J B and A C. Geneva: Droz. .  pp. €. ISBN ––– –. ese two new volumes by Droz testify to the continuing interest in the legacy of the fascinating and versatile figure of Philippe de Mézières (–), the Frenchman whose long career as a soldier, diplomat, and mystic—and a prolific writer—encompasses the better part of the fourteenth century. Rhétorique et poétique is dedicated to Mézières’s poetics and follows on the heels of two previous volumes which scrutinize his work against, respectively, a Mediterranean and a European political, intellectual, and religious background (Philippe de Mézières and his Age: Piety and Politics in the Fourteenth Century, ed. by Kiril Petkov and Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski (Leiden: Brill, ); Philippe de Mézières et l’Europe: nouvelle histoire, nouveaux espaces, nouveaux langages, ed. by Joël Blanchard and Renate...