The Roman de Troie by Benoît de Sainte-Maure by Glyn S. Burgess and Douglas Kelly

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Roman de Troie by Benoît de Sainte-Maure by Glyn S. Burgess and Douglas Kelly Cristina Politano Glyn S. Burgess and Douglas Kelly, The Roman de Troie by Benoît de Sainte-Maure (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer 2017) viii + 475 pp. The goal of this study is to offer an updated translation and recontextualization of one of the most widely-circulated romances of twelfth-century France, Benoît de Sainte-Maure's Roman de Troie, a medieval retelling of the Trojan War. Loosely assimilated with the "Matter of Rome," a subgenre of the romans antiques that appropriates the literature of antiquity to a medieval framework, Sainte-Maure's vernacular adaptation of Latin sources on the Trojan War prevails as a subject of literary study, due not only to its distinctive merits but, also, to the sizable influence that it had on late Medieval and Renaissance texts across western Europe; Boccaccio's Il Filostrato, Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde, Robert Henryson's Testament of Cresseid, and William Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida all borrow plots, themes, and structure directly from Sainte-Maure's Roman de Troie. With this in mind, Burgess and Kelly's new translation is certain to prove a useful and appropriate text for medieval, Renaissance, and early modern scholars across disciplines. Given the importance of the Roman de Troie in its context, it comes as somewhat of a surprise that Glyn Burgess and Douglas Kelly should be the first to attempt a project of this nature. Robert Kay Gordon's Story of Troilus (Toronto: Medieval Academy of America, 1978 [1934]) compiled all the major medieval versions of Troilus and Criseyde and included a rare English translation of Sainte-Maure's Roman de Troie. This sole English version of the twelfth-century Trojan war story, first published in 1934, was incomplete and in need of an update. Given the eminence of each scholar's background in medieval studies, the scope of their critical work, and the nature of the previous [End Page 229] texts that they had offered for translation, both Burgess and Kelly emerge as the most suitable scholars for the task. Douglas Kelly's vast output spans courtly literature and romance in medieval France, while some of Burgess' more recent contributions include a collaboration on the first English translation of Wace's Roman de Rou (St. Helier 2002), as well as his hagiographical works (Leiden: Brill, 2014). Each scholar brings a set of veteran eyes to the project, along with a panoramic view of the literature of the French Middle Ages. Before delving into the translated material, Burgess and Kelly supply an introduction and note on the translation, as well as an outline of the Roman. Their translated text is based on Léopold Constan's edition of the Roman de Troie. The primary text contains a Prologue, an Overview of the Plot, then proceeds to Part One (Causes and Effects), Part Two (The Trojan War), and Part Three (Settling Scores and Surviving), totaling nearly four hundred pages and over thirty thousand lines of translated text. The romance is followed by two appendices, a "Note on Some Common Words in the Roman de Troie," "Manuscripts of the Roman de Troie," an extensive bibliography, and indices of both personal and geographical names. These contain no known omissions, no small feat considering the lengthy and circuitous nature of the plot. It is the introduction and appendices that the advanced reader will deem the edition's most compelling contribution. The appendix on the common words assumes no prior knowledge of Old French, and yet it still contains edifying interventions for the advanced scholar. The appendix on manuscripts provides valuable information for those readers pursuing independent study in the archives. As a result, this volume contributes to the growing body of academic discourse on the romans antiques of the French Middle Ages, particularly as these texts dialogue with issues of Old French morphology, philology, and manuscript studies. Notwithstanding its more sophisticated interventions, this volume is well-suited to the undergraduate student. The translation balances fidelity to the Old French text with readability, thereby availing it to a wide Anglophone audience. The introduction, appendices, and extensive bibliography are...