The essays in this collection are attempts to understand medieval aesthetic principles and products, not to champion the numerical approach. All the essays share a confidence that when Chaucer, for example, wrote alle thynges been ordeyned and nombred, he was enunciating a philosophical and aesthetic principle of fundamental importance to medieval thought.

Medieval Literature: Criticism and Debates combines classic critical essays alongside new voices and approaches, highlighting vibrant debates on medieval literature that will continue to shape critical conversations for the coming decades. Holly A. Crocker and D. Vance Smith present a fascinating collection of essays from leading contemporary scholars of medieval literature and culture, examining topics including gender, sexuality, politics, belief, language, nationhood, science and desire. The volume sheds light on critical discussions of the medieval period and shows the continuing relevance and vivacity of Medieval English literature in the twenty-first century. Each section is thoroughly introduced and the essays develop various debates in key areas, providing a springboard for readers to establish their own study, arguments and opinions. Further reading sections make this volume an accessible and important resource for those studying literature from the Medieval period and beyond. Contributors: Anthony Bale, Sarah Beckwith, Anke Bernau, Glenn Burger, Ardis Butterfield, Christopher Cannon, Christine Chism, Lisa H. Cooper, Susan Crane, Holly A. Crocker, George Edmondson, Ruth Evans, Sylvia Federico, Laurie Finke, Aranye Fradenburg, Frank Grady, Richard Firth Green, Patricia Clare Ingham , Hannah Johnson, Steven Justice, David Lawton, Robert Mills, J. Allan Mitchell, Nicholas Perkins, Tison Pugh, Elizabeth Robertson, Kellie Robertson, Jessica Rosenfeld, Sarah Salih, Corinne Saunders, Martin Shichtman, D. Vance Smith, Emily Steiner, Jennifer Summit, Stephanie Trigg, Marion Turner, David Wallace, Angela Jane Weisl, Nicolette Zeeman

First detailed examination of theatricality in Chaucer and in Middle English literature and culture as a whole. Theatricality as a cultural process is vitally important in the middle ages; it encompasses not only the thematic importation of dramatic images into the Canterbury Tales, but also the social and ideological `performativities' of the mystery and morality plays, metadramatic investments, and the ludic energies of Chaucerian discourses in general. The twelve essays collected here address for the first time this intersection, using contemporary theoryand historical scholarship to treat a number of important critical problems, including the anthropology of theatrical performance; gender; allegory; Chaucerian metapoetics; intertextual play and jouissance; social mediationand rhetoric; genre; and the institutionality of medieval studies. JAMES J. PAXSON is Associate Professor of English at the University of Florida; LAWRENCE M. CLOPPER is Professor of English at Indiana University; SYLVIA TOMASCHis Associate Professor of English at Hunter College, City University of New York. Contributors: KATHLEEN ASHLEY, MARLENE CLARK, RICHARD DANIELS, ALFRED DAVID, RICHARD K. EMMERSON, JOHN GANIM, WARREN GINSBERG, ROBERT W. HANNING, SHARON KRAUS, SETH LERER, WILLIAM MCLELLAN, PAMELA SHEINGORN, PETER W. TRAVIS

Historicist readings of the politics and ethics exhibited in a range of medieval texts including Chaucer, Malory and the York Corpus Christi plays. Critical historicist readings engage with the politics and ethics of selected medieval texts, addressing a wide range of literature and topics of enquiry: Langland, Chaucer, and the Pearl-poet, Malory and the York Corpus Christi plays; chivalric cultures, their forms of identity and mourning; and the politics, ethics and theology of some of the most fascinating writing in late medieval England. Intended as a tribute to Professor Derek Pearsall, andreflecting his major contribution to medieval literary criticism, they are an important addition to the critical and historical study of the period.DAVID AERS is James B. Duke Professor of English and Professor of Historical Theology at Duke University.

Presents literary criticism on the works of classical and medieval philosophers, poets, playwrights, political leaders, scientists, mathematicians, and writers from other genres. Critical essays are selected from leading sources, including published journals, magazines, books, reviews, and scholarly papers. Criticism includes early views from the author's lifetime as well as later views, including extensive collections of contemporary analysis.

Reassess medieval literature and the relationship between writers and power in England by arguing that major works commissioned by or written for a succession of Lancastrians--Henry IV, Henry V, Henry VI, and Prince Edward--reveal that John Gower, Thomas Hoccleve, John Lydgate, and John Fortescue were not propagandists.