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The politics of Middle English parables examines the dynamic intersection of fiction, theology, and social practice in translated Gospel stories. Parables occupy a prominent place in Middle English literature, appearing in dream visions and story collections as well as in lives of Christ and devotional treatises. While most scholarship approaches these scriptural stories as stable vehicles of Christian teachings, this book characterises Gospel parables as ambiguous, riddling stories that invited audience interpretation and inspired the construction of new, culturally inflected narratives. In parables related to labour, social inequality, charity, and penance, the book locates a creative theological discourse through which writers reconstructed scriptural stories and, in doing so, attempted to shape Christian belief and practice. Analysis of these diverse retellings reveals not what a given parable meant in a definitive sense but rather how Middle English parables inscribe the ideologies, power structures, and cultural debates of late medieval Christianity.

Die Annahme eines Stabreimverses und die Gleichsetzung von Aigil andi Allrun (eine bessere Lesung als Aïlrun) mit dem altnordischen Paar Egill und Ǫlrún wird bekräftigt. Die plausibelste Bedeutung von gasokun ist ‘hatten (miteinander) gestritten’, und ltahu könnte der Name der Burg sein, die Ægili auf Franks Casket verteidigt. Es wird vermutet, dass er so die Hand der Allrun, einer Tochter des römischen Kaisers, gewonnen hatte, und sich später ein Konflikt zwischen ihnen entspann. Dann könnte die Zitierung dieses Konflikts auf der Gürtelschnalle durch eine spätere Versöhnung veranlasst sein und auf sie hinweisen: passend für das Geschenk einer Frau mit dem gleichen Zweck. Support is given to the assumption of an alliterative long line and the equation of Aigil andi Allrun (a better reading than Aïlrun) with the Old Nordic pair Egill and Ǫlrún. The most plausible meaning of gasokun is ‘had quarrelled (with each other)’, and ltahu may be the name of the castle defended by Ægili on Franks Casket. It is supposed that he has thereby won the hand of Allrun, a daughter of the Roman Emperor, and that later conflict arose between them. Then the quotation of the conflict on the buckle may be caused by and pointing towards a later conciliation: apt for a gift by a woman, and with that very purpose.

This unique and exciting collection, inspired by the scholarship of literary critic Stephanie Trigg, offers cutting-edge responses to the writings of Geoffrey Chaucer for the current critical moment. The chapters are linked by the organic and naturally occurring affinities that emerge from Trigg's ongoing legacy; containing diverse methodological approaches and themes, they engage with Chaucer through ecocriticism, medieval literary and historical criticism, and medievalism. The contributors, trailblazing international specialists in their respective fields, honour Trigg's distinctive and energetic mode of enquiry (the symptomatic long history) and intellectual contribution to the humanities. At the same time, their approaches exemplify shifting trends in Chaucer scholarship. Like Chaucer's pilgrims, these scholars speak to and alongside each other, but their essays are also attentive to 'hearing Chaucer speak' then, now and in the future.

Kuhn (1933) proposed that the evolution of Germanic syntax began with a need to restore acceptable sentence rhythm after a shift to fixed initial stress. Kuhn found support for his hypothesis in ‘laws’ for word placement that applied in alliterative poetry but not in prose. Kuhn assumed that his laws were syntactic rules of Proto-Germanic maintained by conservative poets. Here I argue that Kuhn's Laws were rules of poetic meter that obscured basic word order. Adopting the universalist approach in Russom (2017), I integrate Kuhn's Laws with the metrical constraints observed by Sievers (1893) and explore the interaction between meter and syntax. When there are no adverse metrical consequences, subject-object-verb order is employed with remarkable consistency in Beowulf, our most valuable source of poetic evidence. My analysis receives independent support from Smith (1971), a study of the earliest Germanic texts that focuses primarily on prose.

The paper deals with the linguistic and poetic analysis of the formula 'X maþelode' ('someone said') in comparison to other ways of introducing direct speech in the Old English heroic epic poem Beowulf. It is considered to be dependent upon the situations of feast and battle which are regarded as the most significant social acts of the early Middle Ages. Its connection with ritual actions such as greeting, boasting, giving oath, flyting, giving treasures, etc. is analysed – the actions which accompanied ceremonial interaction of the nobility. Its close links with canons of Old Germanic alliterative verse and poetics of heroic epic is described, as well as the means of lexical and semantic variability and contextual extension. In the position of the subject ('X maþelode') proper names prevail which shows the connection of the formula with alliterative lists of names of Old Germanic chieftains. The presence of patronymic, ethnonymic and eponymous names as well as words emphasizing the formal type of communication indicates the important role of this formula in displaying the values of the heroic world. At the same time, the anonymous author's remarks, narrative or reflective, testify to the serious changes which the poetics of heroic epic has undergone after the conversion of England. The cognates and derivatives of the verb maþelian allow to refer the semantics of the formula 'X maþelode' to the period of Germanic tribal community. Its subsequent fate is predetermined by the extinction of the Anglo-Saxon poetic tradition and the transformation of the English society after the Norman invasion of England. However, the verbal form maþelode has given its function of a high poetic word to its synonym cwæþ, which is represented in the poetry of modern times as quoth.

This highly original book draws on narrative and film theory, psychoanalysis, and musicology to explore the relationship between aesthetics and anti-Semitism in two controversial landmarks in German culture. David Levin argues that Richard Wagner's opera cycleDer Ring des Nibelungenand Fritz Lang's 1920s filmDie Nibelungencreatively exploit contrasts between good and bad aesthetics to address the question of what is German and what is not. He shows that each work associates a villainous character, portrayed as non-Germanic and Jewish, with the sometimes dramatically awkward act of narration. For both Wagner and Lang, narration--or, in cinematic terms, visual presentation--possesses a typically Jewish potential for manipulation and control. Consistent with this view, Levin shows, the Germanic hero Siegfried is killed in each work by virtue of his unwitting adoption of a narrative role. Levin begins with an explanation of the book's theoretical foundations and then applies these theories to close readings of, in turn, Wagner's cycle and Lang's film. He concludes by tracing how Germans have dealt with the Nibelungen myths in the wake of the Second World War, paying special attention to Michael Verhoeven's 1989 filmThe Nasty Girl. His fresh and interdisciplinary approach sheds new light not only on Wagner'sRingand Lang'sDie Nibelungen, but also on the ways in which aesthetics can be put to the service of aggression and hatred. The book is an important contribution to scholarship in film and music and also to the broader study of German culture and national identity.

This chapter contains sections titled: Notes References and Further Reading

En quatre sections, « Entendre », « Voir », « Toucher », « Tourner », l’article se propose de lire un vers de Lamia (1820), le dernier du poème, retenu pour ce qu’il a à la fois de spécifiquement keatsien et d’objectivement universel. De circonstanciel et d’immémorial. Précédée d’un rapide tour d’horizon de ce qui fait le propre d’un vers de John Keats, l’analyse s’adosse à trois types de lectures, et de lecteurs : l’anthropologie visuelle, telle que mise en œuvre par Georges Didi-Huberman, dans ses travaux qui mêlent archéologie de la forme et métapsychologie de l’image, Ninfa dolorosa (2019) tout particulièrement. Le visuel se trouve aussi du côté des recherches intermédiales : il y a dans Lamia la mise en scène d’un spectacle haut en couleurs, évoquant l’univers du show business , voire du cinéma et de ses stars (Orrin N.C. Wang) ; mais l’austère et formel enveloppement du corps de Lycius, en préambule à sa mise au tombeau, selon un motif iconographique vieux comme le monde, dissout intégralement l’empire du divertissement. La philosophie, en l’espèce celle de Jean-Luc Nancy, disparu pendant la rédaction de l’article, grand analyste du corps « excrit ». La poétique, et les poéticiens, enfin, attachés au mètre comme aux allitérations, à la forme du vers comme à la trace qu’il laisse dans son sillage. Non pas tout Keats dans un vers, mais un vers de part en part keatsien. Keats in toto , en bref. In four sections, “Hearing,” “Seeing,” “Touching,” “Turning,” the paper purports to read a line excerpted from John Keats’s Lamia (1820), the last line, to be precise, selected in view of what makes it specifically Keatsian and objectively universal in its appeal. At once circumstantial and immemorial. Preceded by a quick insight into what is unique to lines by Keats, the analysis is underpinned by three types of readings and readers. Visual Anthropology, as conducted by Georges Didi-Huberman in works that combine the archeology of forms and the metapsychology of images, Ninfa dolorosa (2019) in particular. The visual is also featured thanks to intermedial studies: Lamia stages the world of show business, and possibly too, the realm of movies and cinema stars (Orrin N.C. Wang). But the austere and formal winding of the body of Lycius in heavy robes prior to his entombment, in the line of iconographic models that are as old as the hills, finally puts paid to the presence of entertainment. Philosophy—that of the late Jean-Luc Nancy, who excelled at portraying the “ corps excrit .” And finally poetics, and poeticians, attached to discussing meter and alliterations, the form of a line of poetry, but also its indelible imprint. Not all of Keats in a single verse, therefore, but a line that is Keatsian through and through. Keats in toto , in short.