The twelfth-century French poet Chrétien de Troyes is a major figure in European literature. His courtly romances fathered the Arthurian tradition and influenced countless other poets in England as well as on the continent. Yet because of the difficulty of capturing his swift-moving style in translation, English-speaking audiences are largely unfamiliar with the pleasures of reading his poems. Now, for the first time, an experienced translator of medieval verse who is himself a poet provides a translation of Chrétien’s major poem, Yvain, in verse that fully and satisfyingly captures the movement, the sense, and the spirit of the Old French original. Yvain is a courtly romance with a moral tenor; it is ironic and sometimes bawdy; the poetry is crisp and vivid. In addition, the psychological and the socio-historical perceptions of the poem are of profound literary and historical importance, for it evokes the emotions and the values of a flourishing, vibrant medieval past.

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Providing students with historical and contextual background to the study of English, this introduction answers the questions of why and how the English language has come to be written and spoken as it is today. The history covers such key areas as the change from Old to Middle English and the influence of other languages on English.

Authoritative historical perspectives tracing the contribution of the HMS Challenger expeditions through to modern marine science Ecompasses oceanography, marine biology, marine geology and ocean science