Thinking Medieval Romance by Katherine C. Little Nicola McDonald

Abstract

MLR, .,   make culturally credible a concept of Europe that is neither exclusively spatial nor economically based. e volume has the merit not only of retracing debates and discoveries of a centuries-old history, but also of producing a description of Romance linguistics that is both revolutionary and illuminating. Marked by a prejudice-free fascination for the subject and a clear and engaging exposition, it proves essential reading as an introduction to linguistics and as a reflection on its connections to human culture. C U  N Y F F inking Medieval Romance. Ed. by K C. L and N MD- . Oxford: Oxford University Press. . xii+ pp. £. ISBN – –––. Arising from the ‘ink Romance!’ conference held at Fordham University in , this volume presents eleven essays, along with a comprehensive Introduction, from international contributors in the fields of medieval literature and music. Encompassing literary, visual, and sonic explorations of French, Anglo-Norman, and Middle English romances, the interdisciplinary chapters frequently overlap and invite us to read and think across the volume’s five sections, and, more broadly, across the genre. Collectively, the essays constitute a significant contribution to scholarship with appeal to interdisciplinary scholars and students of the medieval period, as well as to scholars of earlier and later periods whose works intersect with it. In the Introduction, the editors trace romance’s roots in classical and historiographical traditions and its emergence in the twelh century as an experimental form. e genre’s most distinctive trait—fictionality—provides a critical space for interrogations of social, economic, and political issues, they suggest. Section  presents the paired concepts of ‘unknowing’ and ‘unthinking’, which are undertaken, respectively, by Nicola McDonald and James Simpson. For McDonald, Octavian Imperator exemplifies how the mundane constitutes a type of unknowing or wonder , and how wonder itself can engage directly with contemporary concerns, from the spending habits of the royal treasury to the power of guilds in late medieval culture. In contrast, Simpson illustrates romance’s ability to think indirectly. Reassessing an episode of sexual violence in Sir Degaré, he suggests that shame operates subtly as a generative force, one which ultimately contributes to the restoration of the family unit and social order. Romance’s potent intertextuality and dialogic relationships with politics, religion , and visual and sonic media are the concerns of the volume’s middle sections. Here, Laura Ashe teases out the contexts and implications of various accounts of King John’s death, especially in the Brut tradition, simultaneously highlighting the slippage between and the circular influence of historiographical and fictional texts. Lee Manion reveals how the Baltic elements of Sir Gowther reflect the range of crusading activities prevalent in the medieval period and how the narrative operates as a possible speculum for crusaders in other regions. Both Matilda Tomaryn  Reviews Bruckner, examining Chrétien de Troyes’s unfinished Le Conte du Graal, and Geoff Rector, analysing Marie de France’s Lais, focus on how romancers innovate and create authorial space by integrating and reworking religious materials (for Chrétien , from exegetical traditions, and for Marie, from the Psalms). Consequently, the authors highlight how the sacred and the secular intermingle in medieval thought. Returning to Octavian, Emma O’Loughlin Bérat draws out connections between romance and Revelation in representations of motherhood, the apocalyptic Woman, and manuscript illuminations, noting that these connections can offer moments of agency for female figures. e next two essays examine the literary and the sonic, with an emphasis on French romance. Emma Dillon suggests that in a variety of romances sonic interpolations, such as festal soundscapes, demarcate space and contribute to community-building both inside and outside the text. Monika Otter , through the example of Tristan romances and songs, unravels the reciprocal influence literary texts and musical creations (extant or lost) can have upon each other. e final section foregrounds the mutability of generic labels, reinforcing the volume’s message that romance not only thinks but also needs rethinking. rough a study of Floire et Blancheflor and its Hellenistic antecedent Callirhoe, Sharon Kinoshita argues for regional considerations of romance, here one grounded in the histories and experiences of the Mediterranean, reflecting its specific...