898 research outputs found

    Humour in fifteenth-century France: a study of visual evidence

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    Humour in Fifteenth-Century France: A Study of Visual Evidence is an investigation of the development of humour in late medieval France, as expressed in the visual arts. The research identifies and examines comic themes in Valois visual culture through analysis of three case studies. The first is the new iconography for the comedies of Terence, created in the early fifteenth century for the Duke of Berry and the Valois Princes (BnF Lat. 7907A and Arsenal Ms-664 réserve). The second is the manuscript of René d’Anjou’s Livre du Coeur d’Amour Épris (ÖNB Cod. Vind. 2597). The third is the only extant fifteenth-century illuminated manuscript of the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles (GUL Ms Hunter 252 [U.4.10]). The special emphasis on the arts of the book allows for a discussion of the illuminations in relation to the text they intend to illustrate. Each of these works offers a distinct contribution to the topic by presenting a rich variety of material and different shades, types and forms of humour expressed pictorially. Their nature as manuscripts involves a personal dimension, which narrows their intended audience to specific and well researched historic personalities, facilitating the reconstruction of their tastes, pleasures and sense of humour. Thus, these works permit insights into how humour was expressed, understood and appreciated, and they allow for a nuanced discussion on the comedic and the nature of visuality in late medieval France. Each of the investigated manuscripts has been studied previously, yet their visual humour has not been addressed as an independent and intentional artistic creation with the specific function of provoking amusement and laughter. This thesis is the first such investigation of humour in visual culture for this period, addressing the lacuna in scholarship and showing that there is a rich diversity of visual material that merits analysis. It argues that pictorial expressions of humour became an important focus for leading creative artists in France through the course of the fifteenth century, and it contextualises this art historical phenomenon within the intellectual, social and political history that surrounded it. The reconstruction of the circumstances in which works of art were made, displayed and understood highlights the changes in the prospective audiences for these works, and the ways different viewers engaged and appreciated humour expressed visually. As well as providing new insights into the patrons, this thesis discusses the artists’ approach towards their text of reference, their inventions, innovations and creative impulses. In doing so, the investigation highlights a close connection with theatre and performance, and it identifies the printing industry as a contributing factor for the diffusion of comic iconography. Studying humour is important because it determines social boundaries and functions as a barometer of social, political, sexual and ethical sensibilities. Humour in Fifteenth-Century France: A Study of Visual Evidence addresses a variety of media and permits a closer reading of the role of humour and its functions in Valois France and in Western Europe in the later Middle Ages, expanding our understanding of late medieval concepts of visuality and appreciation of the image

    Nobility and Female Rule in the Dragon Age Series

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    BioWare’s Dragon Age series has often been cited as an example for meieval fantasy games being inclusive of women despite their medieval worlds. This article, in contrast, argues that the kingdom of Ferelden constructed by the game is based on the idea of the Middle Ages as an era where any form of female rule is deemed impossible or at least a sign of a deep crisis. This becomes clear through both the remarks made by the developers and authors about the ideas behind the construction of these medieval worlds and the analysis of Queen Anora’s female rule (or the lack thereof). Furthermore, the article compares the construction of nobility, restricted female rule, and queerness in Ferelden as a fictional medieval-inspired kingdom and the Empire of Orlais inspired by the early modern world.BioWare’s Dragon Age series has often been cited as an example for meieval fantasy games being inclusive of women despite their medieval worlds. This article, in contrast, argues that the kingdom of Ferelden constructed by the game is based on the idea of the Middle Ages as an era where any form of female rule is deemed impossible or at least a sign of a deep crisis. This becomes clear through both the remarks made by the developers and authors about the ideas behind the construction of these medieval worlds and the analysis of Queen Anora’s female rule (or the lack thereof). Furthermore, the article compares the construction of nobility, restricted female rule, and queerness in Ferelden as a fictional medieval-inspired kingdom and the Empire of Orlais inspired by the early modern world

    Queering The Winter\u27s Tale in Jeanette Winterson\u27s The Gap of Time

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    Reading the Middle Ages: The Post-Modern Medievalism of C.S. Lewis

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    Excerpt: C. S. Lewis’ interest in and study of medievalism have long been neglected. Even among Lewis scholars, the subject of medievalism remains one of the least analyzed aspects of his entire literary and academic repertoire. There is a great need for the exploration of this important topic, not least because Lewis’ appropriation of the Middle Ages greatly enriched his work in all of its phases, from his scholarly non-fiction to his Christian apologetic fantasy and novelistic forms. Furthermore, a better understanding of Lewis’ brand of medievalism will help to explain the enduring influence that the Middle Ages has exercised on many thoughtful persons ever since the nineteenth century, in both England and America

    Tracing the Critical Reception of Walter Scott in Italy: 1945-2020

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    In The Reception of Sir Walter Scott in Europe (2007), a cura di Murray Pittock, è subito evidente che quando si parla della ricezione europea di Walter Scott, non c’è un capitolo dedicato alla sua influenza in Italia. Sebbene la questione italiana sia brevemente trattata in varie sezioni del volume, lo stesso curatore afferma nell’introduzione che ‘si è rivelato impossibile ottenere una copertura soddisfacente del Portogallo o dell'Italia’. Sebbene esistano studi dedicati alla ricezione italiana di Scott, i quali si concentrano maggiormente sulla sua accoglienza in Italia nell'Ottocento, non esisteva ancora un’analisi completa della sua influenza e risposta in Italia in tempi più recenti. Infatti, il periodo che va dalla seconda metà del Novecento ad oggi non era ancora stato investigato. Lo scopo principale di questa ricerca è stato quindi quello di ripercorrere la storia letteraria e critica di Walter Scott in Italia dal dopoguerra ai giorni nostri, cercando di comprendere i motivi per cui nel corso del 1900 la sua popolarità sperimentò un evidente declino. Il punto di partenza è stata la rassegna e l’analisi degli studi critici dedicati a Scott nel corso del Novecento fino ai giorni nostri. La ricerca ha esplorato poi l’influenza di alcuni dei più importanti intellettuali italiani (e stranieri) sull’accoglienza di Scott in Italia. Tutto il discorso è stato contestualizzato secondo le principali teorie critiche che hanno segnato ogni fase del Novecento e dell’inizio del nuovo millennio per costruire un’analisi complessiva della ricezione italiana di Scott. È stato anche scopo di questa ricerca raccogliere in una lista gli studi critici, le nuove traduzioni, le edizioni e le riedizioni per costruire una cronologia della ricezione italiana di Scott. L’obiettivo finale è stato quindi il tracciare la presenza dell’autore nel Paese e comprendere le fluttuazioni che hanno caratterizzato la sua fama nel corso di settantacinque anni.In The Reception of Sir Walter Scott in Europe (2007), edited by Murray Pittock, it emerges that when speaking about the European reception of Walter Scott, there is not a dedicated chapter to his reception in Italy. Although the Italian situation is briefly treated in various sections of the volume, the editor himself states in the introduction that ‘it proved impossible to get satisfactory coverage of Portugal or Italy’. Although there are studies devoted to Scott’s Italian reception, which specifically focus on his early reception in the nineteenth century, there was not yet a comprehensive analysis of his most recent influence and response in Italy. The entire period from the second half of the twentieth century until today was still uncovered. The main purpose of this research was therefore to retrace the literary and critical history of Walter Scott in Italy, trying to understand the reasons why during 1900 he experienced an evident decline in popularity. The starting point was the review of the critical studies dedicated to Scott during the course of the twentieth century up to the present day. The research then explored the influence of some of the most important Italian (and foreign) intellectuals on Scott’s reception in Italy. The whole discourse was contextualised according to the main critical theories that marked each phase of the twentieth and early twentieth-first centuries to build a comprehensive analysis of Scott’s Italian reception. It was also the aim of this research to collect the critical studies, new translations, editions, and re-editions to build a timeline of Scott’s Italian reception. The final goal was to trace the author’s presence in the country and understand the fluctuations that characterised his fame over the course of seventy-five years

    Tales of Bygone Kings. Discussions of Monarchy, Form of Government and Popular Sovereignty in Danish Medievalistic Literature c. 1789-1848

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    This dissertation, entitled Tales of Bygone Kings. Discussions of Monarchy, Form of Government and Popular Sovereignty in Danish Medievalistic Literature c. 1789-1848, studies how Danish fictional literature published between c. 1789 and 1848 used representations of medieval regents to consider political issues pertaining to the absolute monarchy and popular, political agency. The dissertation takes as its starting point an overview of the distribution of publications of this type of literature from the last part of the eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century. I this is identified a tendency that on the whole, fictional literature about Danish, medieval regents are first published in the 1790s, that the frequency of publication drops in the first two decades of the nineteenth century, and that there is a significant increase in the number of publications from the 1820’s and until 1848. The dissertation studies why the publications of fictional literature about medieval regents are distributed in this way and argues that there is a relation between high frequency in publications and periods in which questions about royal power and form of government is more widespread in the Danish public. Following this, the dissertation examines how the literary depictions of medieval regents were used to consider political questions pertinent to royal power in the period Because of the significant amount of objects of analysis, the dissertation is limited to examine representations of the events in Danish, royal, medieval history, which are most often represented in the literature. The dissertation therefore studies fictional literature about Sweyn Grathe, Canute V and Valdemar the Great; Eric Clipping and Eric Menved; the Interregnum 1332-1340 and Valdemar Atterdag; and Christian II, divided between c. ten novels, twenty plays, some poems and ballets. The corpus for analysis consists of some well-known works, but is mostly comprised of literature that has not or has rarely been studied by researchers. The dissertation consists of four chapters that examine different political themes, which are prevalent in the studied literature. The first chapter focuses on the first wave of medievalistic literature published over a few years in the 1790s. The chapter analyses the significant influence of republican thought in literature, which is also found in the literature of the nineteenth century, but particularly finds expression in the literature of the late eighteenth century. The chapter consists of analyses of two literary works about the end of the Interregnum; Levin Christian Sander’s play Niels Ebbesen af Nørreriis [Niels Ebbesen of NĂśrreriis] (1797) and Malthe Conrad Bruun’s ode “Niels Ebbesen, TyrandrĂŚberen” [Niels Ebbesen, the Tyrant Killer] (1797), which both incorporates republican ideas into a fictional, Danish context, but to significantly different effects. The second chapter deals with ius resistendi, the right to resist an unfit ruler. This was not a theme that was discussed in the public debate of the period, but the theme is quite prevalent in the literature studied in the dissertation. The chapter demonstrates that it is a widespread theme by providing an overview over where and how the theme finds expression in literature and mapping out the different stances towards ius resistendi expressed through different literary works. The third chapter of the dissertation examines the distribution of political agency between regent and people in the literary works. It shows how the fictional people are provided with a degree of political agency which is significantly greater than that of the contemporary, real Danish people and how the king in some instances – but not all – is reduced to a more politically passive figure. Like chapter two, this chapter consists of selections from a number of literary works which functions to map out the different ways in which the distribution of political agency is dealt with in the literature. The fourth chapter has a dual but connected aim. It analyses how some of the literature dealt with nationalises the figure of the king so that the king is not only portrayed as a political head of state, but is given a part in the national, popular community. In addition to that, the chapter examines why the large majority of the fictional literature about Christian II is limited to being published in the 1830s and 1849s. The chapter analyses the nationalisation of Christian II in three literary works about the king: Hans Christian Andersen’s play Kongen drømmer [The King Dreams] (1844), Carsten Hauch’s novel Vilhelm Zabern. En Autobiografi fra Christian den Andens Tid [Vilhelm Zabern. An Autobiography from the Time of Christian the Second] (1834) and Ole Bang’s Kongen vaagner [The King Awakens] (1846). The chapter argues that Christian II’s status as a king of the people or king of the burghers makes him an apt figure for discussing inclusion of the people in the government of the country, and that the emotionally controlled nature of the king makes him fit for exploring whether one is necessarily suited for reigning only because one is born to do it. Both are political issues which are highly pertinent to Denmark in the 1830s and 1840s, by when the absolute monarchy had had its day and it was widely acknowledged that the country would soon transfer to constitutional monarchy. The dissertation comprises a contribution to the understanding of how the Danish literature of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries facilitated considerations about contemporary political issued, which in the case of the nineteenth century could not be discussed explicitly in public because of the restrictions of the freedom of the press which gave strict limits for public discussion of royal power and the government. The dissertation thereby contributes to expanding the understanding of the public debate and the considerations which preceded the abolition of the absolute monarchy in 1848 and thereby demonstrates how fictional literature provides a fruitful supplement to the description of the political development during the late absolutism offered by historical research

    Fictional Practices of Spirituality I: Interactive Media

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    "Fictional Practices of Spirituality" provides critical insight into the implementation of belief, mysticism, religion, and spirituality into worlds of fiction, be it interactive or non-interactive. This first volume focuses on interactive, virtual worlds - may that be the digital realms of video games and VR applications or the imaginary spaces of life action role-playing and soul-searching practices. It features analyses of spirituality as gameplay facilitator, sacred spaces and architecture in video game geography, religion in video games and spiritual acts and their dramaturgic function in video games, tabletop, or LARP, among other topics. The contributors offer a first-time ever comprehensive overview of play-rites as spiritual incentives and playful spirituality in various medial incarnations

    Stories That Kill: Masculinity and Capital Prosecutors\u27 Closing Arguments

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    The American death penalty is a punishment by, for, and about men: Both historically and today, most capital prosecutors are men, most capital defendants are men, and killing itself is strongly coded male. Yet despite—or perhaps because of—the overwhelming maleness of the institution of capital punishment, the subject of masculinity is largely absent from legal discourse about the death penalty. This Article addresses that gap in the legal discourse by applying the insights of masculinities theory, an offshoot of feminist theory, to capital prosecutors’ closing arguments. This Article hypothesizes that capital prosecutors’ masculinity is strongly influenced both by white Southern ideologies around manhood and by the hypermasculinity common within law enforcement. In turn, these ideologies influence capital prosecutors’ sentencing phase closing arguments
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