Medieval Learning Research Articles

EDUCATION SYSTEM IN MEDIEVAL PERIOD - THE IMPACT OF SCHOLASTICISM ON MEDIEVAL LEARNING

This study explores the impact of scholasticism on medieval learning, focusing on its influence within the educational landscape also it investigates how scholastic methods, epitomized by the works of thinkers such as teaching methodologies, shaped curriculum, and intellectual climate of medieval institutions. Scholasticism, characterized by its importance on hard dialectical reasoning and the reconciliation of reason and faith, became a dominant intellectual force in medieval education. One sample test and ANOVA has been used for this research to analyse the impact of scholasticism on medieval learning. The medieval period, roughly spanning from 5th to 15th century, was characterized by a unique set of political, social, and cultural dynamics. In terms of education, this time witnessed the dominance of system deeply rooted in religious institutions and influenced by the attitude of scholasticism. The medieval period saw the traditional Indian educational systems with the introduction of Islamic influences. Islamic rulers established madrasas, centers of learning that focused on religious studies. The gurukul system continued, emphasizing disciplines such as literature, mathematics, philosophy and science. The government need to undertake initiatives to expand access to education, resulting in establishment of schools, colleges, and universities. The focus on science, technology, and vocational training became pronounced, aiming is to meet the demands of a fast changing global landscape. The Indian education system reveals the continuous effort to build a more flexible, and responsive educational framework for the diverse needs of the country.

Stephen J. Joyce, The Legacy of Gildas: Constructions of Authority in the Early Medieval West. Woodbridge: Boydell, 2022, x, 190 pp.

Abstract The British-Latin writer Gildas (493‐570) is an enduring presence in Celtic tradition. So this monograph is welcome. Its author, thanks to his command of Latin, places Gildas firmly within the context of classical, patristic, and early medieval learning, identifying him as one who contributed much to understanding of “political and ecclesiastical authority in the early medieval West” (11). The volume, consisting of six chapters, starts off with the relation of Gildas’s De Excidio Britanniae to other sources for the early Middle Ages (St. Patrick’s Confession, Bede, the ninth-century Historia Brittonum), all of them problematic, especially for fifth- and sixth-century dates. (Yet the difficulties are less than imagined.) In chapter two we encounter images of Gildas, who (53) devised “a providential history of Britain” to underpin his own “authority on Church law.” Chapter three has as subject the monastic features of De Excidio, with useful statements on Gildas as a cleric “directed by God to edify a fallen kingship and priesthood” (77). The remaining three chapters provide explorations of Gildas’s influence on St. Columbanus (d. 615), Hiberno-Latin canon law, and Bede (d. 737). There follow a conclusion and some ancillary matter.

The Figure of Minerva in Medieval Literature by William F. Hodapp

MLR, .,   pectations of feminine behaviour. Chapter  examines the collision of European and African literary traditions in Ngũgĩ’s Wizard of the Crow () to explore ongoing consequences of colonialism and tyranny’s potential to distort reality. Mack’s book offers a reading of conceptions of tradition more nodal than teleological . While the chapters on Gaskell and Ngũgĩ contain less of the close reading and comparative analysis than Mack provides for the other writers included in this book, there is a refreshing refusal to corral primary texts into a preordained model or theory. A great deal of familiarity is presumed not only with Chaucerian and Spenserian English, but also with the content and characters of many novels, poems, and plays. Nevertheless, Mack’s book is a deeply rewarding account of how ‘knowledge of tradition makes better writing possible’ (p. ). Reading Old Books succeeds in its aim to ‘indicate the richness, the spread, and the variety of uses of literary tradition’ (p. ) and serves as a timely reminder that, as Ferrante argues in her own essay collection about writing, Frantumaglia (), cited by Mack, ‘the writer must know literary traditions and be able to alter and add to them’ (p. ). Writing with traditions is just as instructive as reading old books. M  N I E e Figure of Minerva in Medieval Literature. By W F. H. Cambridge: Brewer. . xiv+ pp. £. ISBN ––––. It is cheering when a scholar packs a lifetime’s experience into a book of real erudition. e Figure of Minerva in Medieval Literature is no callow offering by a fledgling doctor of philosophy, but a densely written monograph that builds upon its author’s earlier work. Its proposition is this: ‘Shot through with allusions, echoes, paraphrases, ideas, and images from other texts, medieval poetry reminds us’ how medieval culture tended to be a ‘textual culture’ (p. ). Between Introduction and Conclusion, this foray into textuality has six parts, as follows. Part  is an examination of Minerva as embodiment of wisdom in the ancient world, and how medieval people regarded her in the context of classical myth. Part  relates this to Lydgate’s Reson and Sensuallyte and Gavin Douglas’s translation of Virgil, with the Judgement of Paris analysed as a theme common to both. Part  goes further into medieval learning through consideration of Martianus Capella, the fieenth-century Court of Sapience, teaching on the Four Daughters of God, and Skelton’s e Garland of Laurel. Aer that, the fourth part takes us from Walter of Châtillon and Joseph of Exeter in the twelh century via Guido delle Colonne, Christine de Pizan, and Lydgate to Stephen Hawes in the early sixteenth. Central here is Minerva as one who protects and gives benefits, particularly as regards the Trojan War. Part  is more theological; Part , more erotic. In the first are Jewish and Christian attitudes to idols, including patristic views of Minerva. Aer that is Minerva as idol in medieval texts, with reference to the catalogue of deities and the fieenth-century Assembly of Gods. ere follows consideration of Minerva as  Reviews Othea (goddess of prudence), and then discussion of Minerva–Athena in Dunbar’s e Golden Targe. Part  presents traditions of Ovid. Despite the ‘indifference if not outright conflict’ (p. ) between Athena–Minerva and Aphrodite–Venus in Graeco-Roman writing, they ally themselves as promotors of love in Lydgate’s e Temple of Glas, e Kingis Quair by James I of Scotland, and English poems by Charles of Orleans. e Figure of Minerva in Medieval Literature is a volume in the tradition of European literature and the Latin Middle Ages and its great names (Curtius, Auerbach, C. S. Lewis, J. A. W. Bennett, Peter Dronke, Douglas Gray). To discover Chaucer and English or Scottish Chaucerians here referred so naturally to ancient sources (scriptural, classical, patristic, scholastic) is refreshing. William F. Hodapp (professor at the College of St Scholastica, Duluth, Minnesota) belongs to an orthodox Christian humanism wherein allusion to classic authors (Homer, Virgil, Boethius, Alcuin, Eriugena, Hildegard of Bingen, Abelard, Aquinas, Dante, Boccaccio, Philip Sidney) comes effortlessly. When, therefore, many books on the Middle Ages impose modern views (oen profoundly unhistorical) on...

Maulana Abul Kalam Azad and His Ideas about the National Education System

Maulana Abul Kalam Azad was one of the foremost leaders of the Indian freedom struggle. He was not a run-of-the-mill politician, but an intellectual and thinker who spent several decades writing and speaking on diverse issues, including education. His commitment to the pluralist ethos of the Indian freedom struggle is reflected in his work and career as the first minister for education, science and culture in independent India. He constantly strived as a minister and as an intellectual to synthesize Indian and Western ideas into a single, coherent pattern suitable for the newly independent nation. He was one of the few leaders of the freedom movement who, while steeped in medieval scholarship and classical learning, nevertheless transcended the limits of different classical languages and religion. Azad castigated a narrow outlook of any kind, whether expressed as cultural tradition, as national chauvinism or as religious orthodoxy. Several scholars have written on Azad’s political contributions and on his theological acumen as an Islamic scholar par excellence. However, few have examined in detail and acknowledged his immense contributions to nation building, particularly in the areas of education and culture. The need to do this is even more significant in the context of Islam today, not only in India but also globally. Maulana Azad’s ideas on education are found scattered in his writings, speeches and letters, which run into thousands of pages. He drew inspiration from diverse sources, ranging from religion to philosophy and from history to science. Most of his early engagements with, and Contemporary Education Dialogue 12(2) 238–257 © 2015 Education Dialogue Trust SAGE Publications sagepub.in/home.nav DOI: 10.1177/0973184915581920 http://ced.sagepub.com

Maria Luisa Ardizzone Dante: Il paradigma intellettuale; Un’“inventio” degli anni fiorentiniDante: Il paradigma intellettuale; Un’“inventio” degli anni fiorentini. Maria Luisa Ardizzone. Florence: Olschki, 2011. Pp. xxvi+264.

<i>Maria Luisa Ardizzone</i> Dante: Il paradigma intellettuale; Un’“inventio” degli anni fiorentini<i>Dante: Il paradigma intellettuale; Un’“inventio” degli anni fiorentini</i>. Maria Luisa Ardizzone. Florence: Olschki, 2011. Pp. xxvi+264.

Daniel Hobbins, Authorship and publicity before print. Jean Gerson and the transformation of late medieval learning

L’apparition de la figure de l’auteur, ainsi que de l’espace «public» ou circulent ses œuvres, est souvent mise en relation avec la diffusion du livre imprime. Le present ouvrage permet de relativiser une telle perception des choses, et de mieux apprehender une realite beaucoup plus complexe, a travers une enquete sur le monde de la culture ecrite («authorship, books, publishing, writing, reading», p. XI) pendant les cinquante ans environ qui ont precede la parution des premiers incunables, p...

Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning

Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning

Marino Sanudo Torsello. The Book of the Secrets of the Faithful of the Cross (Liber Secretorum Fidelium Crucis), tr. Peter Lock

The Venetian Marino Sanudo’s Secreta Fidelium Crucis, compiled between 1306 and 1321, is one of the major literary works of the later middle ages. While part of a genre of post-1274 ‘recovery literature’ designed to assist attempts to re-conquer the Holy Land, it escapes easy categorisation. Wrapped in an assumption of religious purpose, geography, history, economics, logistics, finance, international relations and military planning are all brought together in an encyclopaedic investigation of the practical requirements for a successful crusade. The work survives in over twenty manuscripts, some fragmentary, many of them prestige presentation copies given by the author to popes, kings and princes during a career of exhaustive promotion of a new crusade. The scope of the Secreta is extraordinary, combining a history of Outremer with an analysis of the commercial significance of Egypt and the methods and consequences of an economic blockade. Descriptions of techniques of naval and amphibious warfare in the Nile Delta are matched by details of budgeted costs and methods of recruitment, the play of geopolitics, and minutiae of shipbuilding, catapults, sailors’ diet and cures for ships’ worms. The claims, interests and expertise of Venice feature prominently. Dotted throughout are lively, relevant scriptural and historical anecdotes. Although conventional in the general thrust of his argument, Sanudo reveals wide perspectives of objective analysis, as when he comments: ‘for just as water will naturally flow into valleys, so goods will be attracted to places where they are most sought’. Nine of the surviving manuscripts are accompanied by bespoke selections of maps probably commissioned from the Genoese cartographer Pietro Vesconte, some based on portolan charts. Composed in sophisticated but clear Latin, and littered with apt references to the Scriptures, the Secreta skilfully deploys an impressive array of classical and medieval learning, including references to Seneca, Cicero, Josephus, Augustine, Vegetius, Frontinus, Boethius, Gregory the Great, Isidore of Seville, John of Salisbury, William of Tyre and his continuators, James of Vitry, Hayton of Corycus and Vincent of Beauvais. In the historical sections, Sanudo adds a number of original details.

Standing Distant from the Fathers: Smaragdus of Saint-Mihiel and the Reception of Early Medieval Learning

Abbot Smaragdus of Saint-Mihiel elaborates on the practice of compilation in his ninth-century Liber comitis, a compendium of biblical exegesis organized around the readings used in the liturgy. In the preface to this work, he makes it quite clear that the ideas expressed are not his own, but instead derive from the works of the church Fathers: Seeing that many in the church wisely seek to investigate the mystical sense of the divine scriptures and pluck from them the figurative fruit, I have made an effort to gather one book from many, filled with the flowers of allegory, acting both as an abbreviator and deriver of the tractates and teachings of the great Fathers, namely of Hilary, Jerome, Ambrose, Augustine, Cyprian, Cyril, Gregory, Victor, Fulgentius, John Chrysostom, Cassiodorus, Eucharis, Tychonius, Isidore, Figulus, Bede, Primasius, and also of those who must be approached cautiously, such as Pelagius and Origen, as if reducing powerful rivers and whirling eddies of the sea into moderate currents.

Standing Distant from the Fathers: Smaragdus of Saint-Mihiel and the Reception of Early Medieval Learning

Abbot Smaragdus of Saint-Mihiel elaborates on the practice of compilation in his ninth-centuryLiber comitis, a compendium of biblical exegesis organized around the readings used in the liturgy. In the preface to this work, he makes it quite clear that the ideas expressed are not his own, but instead derive from the works of the church Fathers:Seeing that many in the church wisely seek to investigate the mystical sense of the divine scriptures and pluck from them the figurative fruit, I have made an effort to gather one book from many, filled with the flowers of allegory, acting both as an abbreviator and deriver of the tractates and teachings of the great Fathers, namely of Hilary, Jerome, Ambrose, Augustine, Cyprian, Cyril, Gregory, Victor, Fulgentius, John Chrysostom, Cassiodorus, Eucharis, Tychonius, Isidore, Figulus, Bede, Primasius, and also of those who must be approached cautiously, such as Pelagius and Origen, as if reducing powerful rivers and whirling eddies of the sea into moderate currents.

Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning

Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning

:Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning

:<i>Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning</i>

Daniel Hobbins, Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning. (The Middle Ages Series.) Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009. Pp. xii, 335; 14 black-and-white figures, tables, and 3 maps. $49.95.

Daniel Hobbins, <i>Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning</i>. (The Middle Ages Series.) Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009. Pp. xii, 335; 14 black-and-white figures, tables, and 3 maps. $49.95.

Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning – By Daniel Hobbins

Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning – By Daniel Hobbins

Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning, by Daniel Hobbins

<i>Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning</i>, by Daniel Hobbins

Hobbins, Daniel. 2009.Authorship and Publicity Before Print. Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning

Reviewed by: Authorship and Publicity Before Print. Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning Johnny Grandjean Gøgsig Jakobsen Hobbins, Daniel . 2009. Authorship and Publicity Before Print. Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning. The Middle Ages Series. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0-8122-4155-6. Pp. 320. £32.50; $49.95. Jean Gerson (1363-1429) was one of the most important theologians of the late Middle Ages. Coming from a modest background in the hamlet of Gerson in northern France, he made it to the top of the University of Paris, where he held the office of chancellor from 1395. Gerson's fame and influence probably peaked during the Council of Constance, where he was regarded the most prominent theologian. Furthermore, he was among the most productive writers of the Middle Ages, leaving more than 500 known works for posterity. Earlier scholars have called the fifteenth century "the century of Gerson", and Daniel Hobbins, one of the newest contributors to the abundant study of Gerson, agrees. In spite of his obvious importance for theology and written culture in fifteenth-century Europe, Jean Gerson remains a somewhat overlooked figure for most medievalists outside devoted "Gersonist circles", which, in Hobbins's opinion, is a shame: "Gerson research desperately needs to be drawn into larger conversations that for the most part have excluded him" (14). In his first book, Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of late Medieval Learning, Daniel Hobbins focuses on the more technical side of Gerson's authorship: how he wrote in different genres and styles, and how the works were distributed to his audience in a world before the technology of book printing. Generously using his impressive insight on the works of Gerson as well as other high and late medieval writers, Hobbins invites his reader on a fascinating and educational tour through not only the authorship of Jean Gerson, but also — as the book's title promises — through the transformation of learning in late medieval Europe in general. Hobbins's book takes a chronological approach, though not in terms of Gerson's overall authorship, but rather in the authorial process from the initial decision to write, the choice of genre and style to [End Page 140] write in, the production of the actual work on paper, to making the product available to the rest of the world. In chapter 3, the reader is offered a closer look at the broader authorship of Jean Gerson. For this, Hobbins has chosen only to include works from Gerson's late, but extremely productive period from 1418 to his death in 1429. This approach gives a fine presentation of Gerson's mature authorship during his exile in Lyon. While this is indeed commendable and undoubtedly will attract more readers to this otherwise rather neglected part of Gerson's writings, one can argue that it is perhaps not the most representative period for his entire authorship. In some sense these late works are a bit "messy", as they not only are a product of Gerson's deliberate attempt to sum up all his wisdom for posterity, but also seem to lack the editorial censorship, which he invested in his earlier works before publishing them. Among his many interesting points, Hobbins argues that Gerson's authorship requires a new literary category that breaks down the rigid scholastic-humanist dichotomy. Often solidly anchored in strict literary guidelines with a stable theological language set down by thirteenth-century authorities, Gerson was also aware of the importance of using various literary and rhetorical qualities to help the message get through to his intended audience. According to Hobbins, it would be underestimating Gerson to describe him as a transitional figure between scholasticism and humanism, in allowing traditional academic periodization to interpret the evidence for us. Rather, Gerson's authorship should be seen as both being representative and a model for fifteenth-century writing before the breakthrough of humanism. Another essential point in Hobbins is his recognition of Jean Gerson as a "medieval public intellectual", far more concerned than any of his academic predecessors with the world beyond the schools. Gerson realized that he had a huge...

Authorship and publicity before print. Jean Gerson and the transformation of late medieval learning. By Daniel Hobbins. (The Middle Ages Series.) Pp. xii+335 incl. 14 ills and 3 maps. Philadelphia: University of Pennyslvania Press, 2009. £32.50 ($49.95). 978 0 8122 4155 6

Authorship and publicity before print. Jean Gerson and the transformation of late medieval learning. By Daniel Hobbins. (The Middle Ages Series.) Pp. xii+335 incl. 14 ills and 3 maps. Philadelphia: University of Pennyslvania Press, 2009. £32.50 ($49.95). 978 0 8122 4155 6 - Volume 61 Issue 2

Authorship and publicity before print: Jean Gerson and the transformation of late medieval learning

Daniel Hobbins, Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning (Philadelphia, Pa: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009). xii + 335 pp. ISBN 978- 0-8122- 4155- 6. $49.95/£32.50.'Ours is not a tour of the familiar. We shall see strange, foreign things: startlingly ambitious but bizarre and messy works, long on creativity but short on execution, pieced together without much skill, sometimes declining into dull and plodding lists, sometimes so exalted and complex they challenge our understanding' (p. 73). Daniel Hobbins's brilliant study of Jean Gerson as an author liberally endowed with 'self-consciousness about the task of writing' (p. 1) is mimetic of its rich subject. As Gerson instinctively situated his persona as a writer on the cusp of different worlds (Latin, vernacular, devotional, pastoral, scholastic, diplomatic, political), so Hobbins's study necessarily occupies a new scholarly space in which fresh negotiations between historiographical and literary-critical approaches are essential. The task of writing about Gerson, he points out, 'requires a new category, one that allows us to break down the rigid scholastic-humanist dichotomy' (p. 12). He is similarly frank about what he sees as 'a more general ambivalence about the historical space that Gerson inhabits' (p. 17). Hobbins rises to the challenge of exorcising Huizinga's unquiet spirit from this space in a study informed throughout by a confluence of intellectual, codicologkaL and literary history, its emphasis on Gerson as bookman complementing Brian Patrick McGuire's evocation in his 2005 biography. It is an extremely important study because it lifts the burden of belatedness and mediocrity from the fifteenth century, restoring its distinctive intellectual character and priorities, all of which are focused through Gerson's rich and flexible subjectivity. As Hobbins states of his subject, 'All the cultural traffic of the fifteenth century runs through him' (p. 218), and the signal achievement of this book is that it enables its readers to feel the energy and modernity of that traffic.Those familiar with 'The schoolman as public intellectual', a study in which Hobbins explored the significance of the late medieval tract as a distinct literary form, and its prominence in Gerson's writing in particular, have long been prepared for the approach that he develops further, and so rewardingly, in this study. Gerson is a particularly appealing subject for modern scholars because he is a medieval theologian to whom a literary sensibility may unequivocally be ascribed. Hobbins acknowledges this early in this study, pointing out that Gerson's intellectual distinctiveness arose from his conviction of the intrinsic worth of writing 'as a glorious calling', sharing as he did 'with Petrarch and Erasmus a commitment to rhetoric in literary expression' (p. 12). He robusdy defends his right to draw Gerson research into the 'larger conversations' (p. 14) currently being generated by histories of reading, codicology, and libraries. …

Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning by Daniel Hobbins (review)

Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning by Daniel Hobbins (review)

Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning (review)

Reviewed by: Authorship and Publicity before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning Takashi Shogimen Hobbins, Daniel, Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning (Middle Ages), Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009; cloth; pp. xii, 335; 14 b/w illustrations, 3 b/w maps; R.R.P. US$49.95, £32.50; ISBN 9780812241556. In the last decade, we have witnessed a series of new major publications on Jean Gerson. Patrick Brian McGuire's editorial efforts, such as Jean Gerson: Early Works (1998) and A Companion to Jean Gerson (2006), were accompanied by his own biographical account, Jean Gerson and the Last Medieval Reformation (2005). Marc Vial produced a theological study, Jean Gerson: Théoricien de la théologie mystique (2006). Daniel Hobbins' book, however, is not merely 'another' monograph on Gerson. In fact, it marks a significant departure from the existing scholarship: Hobbins attempts not only to offer a fresh reinterpretation of Gerson as a late medieval intellectual – which alone would have been significant enough – but also to reconstruct the rapidly transforming intellectual landscape in which Gerson lived and worked. In this context, Gerson is viewed as a 'mirror' of the intellectual and cultural shifts of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Hobbins' aim is to understand Gerson as an author who was 'self-conscious about the task of writing and skilled in putting it to good use' (p. 1). The book is neither a conventional biography nor a study of 'straight' intellectual history. It steers a middle course between conventional intellectual history that highlights intellectual 'giants' and their 'canons', and the social history of ideas and the history of the book that look at the circulation and impact of books and pamphlets written by anonymous or unknown authors as well as famous ones. Hobbins rises to this methodological challenge. The question underlining this erudite work is: how and why was Gerson enormously successful in reaching a wide international audience? Hobbins begins his enquiry by exploring Gerson's literary motives. In the later Middle Ages, ancient authorities were still embraced, while new works continued to be produced by schoolmen. Living in the growing world of books, Gerson discerned the urgent need to establish the sources of a safe and secure theology, what he called the 'common school of theological truth'. Gerson privileged 'great books' which offered 'a blend of learning and piety'. Through this endeavour, Hobbins argues, Gerson transformed late medieval learning in many ways. First, he redefined the role of a theologian [End Page 221] as a physician who diagnosed moral diseases, in opposition to the impersonal legalism of the canonists. His desire to safeguard Christian piety and the language by which to verbalize orthodox faith was also accompanied by his extraordinary drive to produce literary works one after another across literary genres ranging from sophisticated theological treatises to poetry. Further, Gerson refashioned contemporary prose: while he remained respectful of the scholastic logical style, he recognized the importance of rhetoric, thus seeking to achieve the readers' understandings as well as their devotional affections. Unlike those of most schoolmen, Gerson's literary output was appealing to a lay audience because he was conscious of the reading public's needs. Thus he never wrote anything like a summa; instead, he wrote numerous short pieces on specific topics. Gerson's editorial attention to readers' needs allowed him to add colophons, diagrams, headings and subdivisions to the text. As a result, Gerson was no longer a conventional schoolman in the ivory tower; he increasingly emerged as a 'public intellectual'. Gerson's ambitious undertakings, however, could not materialize unless as many copies as possible of his writings circulated far and wide in Western Europe. 'Publishing' in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries posed problems unique to the time, such as how to ensure the accuracy and authenticity of copies produced by scribes. Hobbins concludes the book with two extensive chapters dealing with the highly complex questions of book production and distribution. While no 'open market' for books existed, Gerson's massive output was disseminated widely, if not evenly, in Western Europe through what Hobbins calls 'distribution circles' such as the Councils of Constance and Basel...