What Kind of a Thing Is a Middle English Lyric?

by Cristina Maria Cervone (Editor), Nicholas Watson (Editor)

Overview

What Kind of a Thing Is a Middle English Lyric? considers issues pertaining to a corpus of several hundred short poems written in Middle English between the twelfth and early fifteenth centuries. The chapters draw on perspectives from varied disciplines, including literary criticism, musicology, art history, and cognitive science. Since the early 1900s, the poems have been categorized as “lyrics,” the term now used for most kinds of short poetry, yet neither the difficulties nor the promise of this treatment have received enough attention. In one way, the book argues, considering these poems to be lyrics obscures much of what is interesting about them. Since the nineteenth century, lyrics have been thought of as subjective and best read without reference to cultural context, yet nonetheless they are taken to form a distinct literary tradition. Since Middle English short poems are often communal and usually spoken, sung, and/or danced, this lyric template is not a good fit. In another way, however, the very differences between these poems and the later ones on which current debates about the lyric still focus suggest they have much to offer those debates, and vice versa.

As its title suggests, this book thus goes back to the basics, asking fundamental questions about what these poems are, how they function formally and culturally, how they are (and are not) related to other bodies of short poetry, and how they might illuminate and be illuminated by contemporary lyric scholarship. Eleven chapters by medievalists and two responses by modernists, all in careful conversation with one another, reflect on these questions and suggest very different answers. The editors’ introduction synthesizes these answers by suggesting that these poems can most usefully be read as a kind of “play,” in several senses of that word. The book ends with eight “new Middle English lyrics” by seven contemporary poets.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780812298512
Publisher:	University of Pennsylvania Press
Publication date:	08/30/2022
Series:	The Middle Ages Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	560
File size:	45 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Cristina Maria Cervone is Associate Professor of English at the University of Memphis.
Nicholas Watson is the Henry B. and Anne M. Cabot Professor of English at Harvard University.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

Conventions xi

List of Abbreviations xiii

Introduction. Why stonde we? why go we no3t? Cristina Maria Cervone Nicholas Watson 1

Chapter 1 Lyric Editing Ardis Butterfield 30

Chapter 2 Wondering Through Middle English Lyric Cristina Maria Cervone 61

Chapter 3 Lyric Romance Christopher Cannon 88

Chapter 4 Language and Meter Ian Cornelius 106

Chapter 5 Lyric Value Ingrid Nelson 135

Chapter 6 Cognitive Poetics of Middle English Lyric Poetry Raymond W. Gibbs, Jr. 159

Chapter 7 Lyric Vessels Aden Kumler 182

Chapter 8 The Sound of Rollean Lyric Andrew Albin 218

Chapter 9 The Lyric Christ Barbara Zimbalist 243

Chapter 10 The Religious Lyric in Medieval England (1150-1400): Three Disciplines and a Question Margot Fassler 268

Chapter 11 Theory of the Fourteenth-Century English Lyric Andrew Galloway 303

Chapter 12 Response: Old Lyric Things Virginia Jackson 342

Chapter 13 Response: Hevy Hameres Stephanie Burt 355

New Medieval Lyrics: A Chapbook 371

Hank McCoy's Complaint Against the Danger Room Stephanie Burt 373

Margerykempething 22 Pattie McCarthy 374

The Word Water Hunter Keough 375

A Trinity-Riddle ^†Carter Revard 376

When I left my second husband Kate Caoimhe Arthur 377

I am a wonder to behold Bill Manhire 378

Notes from March and April 2020 Miller Wolf Oberman 379

What the Eagle Fan Says Carter Revard 381

Notes 383

References 475

List of Contributors 521

Index 525

Acknowledgments 545

Editorial Reviews

"[T]his stimulating book...aim[s] to rebuild the study of Middle English lyric from the ground up. The thirteen chapters proceed from foundation to rooftop...The book is a passionate invitation to plunge into Middle English lyric. It raises countless questions. It is certain to spur continuing, vigorous cultivation of its field."

Modern Philology

"What Kind of Thing Is a Middle English Lyric? asks scholars and poets to rethink not only the Middle English lyric (especially between the late twelfth and late fourteenth centuries) from the ground up, but the generic and historiographic contours of Medieval Studies, lyric studies, and poetry altogether...In addition to serving as a worthy reference source for the Middle English lyric, indexed as it is, the book’s stronger impulse of troubling the lyric forces deeper, more flexible engagements with poetry in theory and practice, past and present...Altogether, this company of scholars and artists exemplifies collaboration at its finest."

Early Middle English

"This outstanding collection of essays boldly reconceptualizes Middle English lyric, brilliantly illuminating its formal intricacies, historical contexts, and power. Among other subjects, the essays explore lyric multilingualism, wonder, sonic richness, material inscription, narrativity, dialogism, performativity, figuration, and intersubjectivity. Destined to hold a distinguished place in studies of poetry and poetics, this book deserves to be widely read and relished by anyone interested in new angles of approach to poetry."

author of Poetry in a Global Age Jahan Ramazani