Description
This magnificent panoply of thirty-four essays by a distinguished cast of contributors reminds one of the ambition with which medieval and Renaissance encyclopaedists brought together vast amounts of information within a single work. The range of topics covered is impressive indeed, as is the fact that materials in both Latin and several vernaculars are given ample space, thereby ensuring that diverse sources of knowledge are respected. Fine detail and nuance are not lost in the process of reaching general overviews. The writing is cogent, accessible, and appealing. Each chapter offers a significant scholarly contribution in its own right, while opening the door to further study of the given subject. This collection is set fair to be the initial go-to volume for anyone interested in the many intersections of medieval literature and science.
Alastair Minnis, Douglas Tracy Smith Professor Emeritus of English, Yale University, USA
In the Palgrave Handbook to Medieval Literature and Science, Huxtable and Saunders have assembled a 'who s who' of medievalists ranging from early career researchers to éminences grises who offer a wide-ranging survey of the many ways that premodern scientific learning was represented in literary form, from alchemy and astronomy to medicine and physics. While Old and Middle English literary history has pride of place, chapters on Latin, French, Italian, and Norse literature round out the volume, making it an essential element on the medievalist s bookshelf.
Suzanne Conklin Akbari, Professor, Institute for Advanced Study, USA
Engaging and instructive for scholars and general readers alike, this collection of studies illuminates the deep background of a wide range of the imaginative literature of English and the Western Middle Ages. Medieval science, from cosmology to psychology, was grounded in God, but by starting from literary texts this book provides ready access to what at first might seem an alien way of thinking.
Helen Cooper, Emeritus Professor of Medieval and Renaissance English, University of Cambridge, UK
This handbook presents a comprehensive series of originally commissioned essays exploring how key topics in natural philosophy and related discourses (what we now call 'science') from the early medieval period to the fifteenth century were reflected, refracted, and transformed by writers in the Middle Ages working within a range of genres from heroic verse, maxim and riddle to romance, dream vision, moral tale and allegory. The volume spans the fields of astronomy, astrology, and cosmology; physics, mathematics, and metaphysics; geography and meteorology; flora, fauna, and the natural world; and the human body, mind, and medicine. Sections commence with contextual essays by specialists in these disciplines, exploring the key concepts, sources and influences that comprise medieval scientia the knowledge or understanding acquired by study. Subsequent chapters consider medieval science s transmission, interpretation, transformation, and recirculation in literary genres and texts from the early medieval period to the fifteenth century. The volume also includes individual case studies treating key authors. While the focus is on English lit
Chapter 1. Introduction: Medieval Literature and Science.- Chapter 2. The Revolutions of the Heavens and the Law of the Stars: Astronomy, Astrology, and Cosmology in Medieval Christendom.- Chapter 3. Looking at the Stars in Early Germanic Literature.- Chapter 4. Sun, Sea, and Earth: Astronomy in the Old English Boethius.- Chapter 5. Astrology and Romances.- Chapter 6. Chaucer as Scientist with an Astrolabe: Finding a Pilgrimage Sky.- Chapter 7. Musica from Dream to Reality in The Kingis Quair.- Part II. Physics, Mathematics, and Metaphysics.- Chapter 8. Equivocal Matter: Exploring the Plural Meanings of Matter in Scholastic Hylomorphism.- Chapter 9. The Poetics of Computus in Early Medieval England.- Chapter 10. Dante in Motion: Physics and Metaphysics in the Comedy.- Chapter 11. Substance, Form, and Sense in the Middle English Pearl.- Chapter 12. Chaucer s Chickens and the Profound Doctor.- Part III. Geography and Meteorology.- Chapter 13. Medieval Geography.- Chapter 14. The Wind-sele in Christ and Satan: Air and Demonic Winds in Medieval Tradition.- Chapter 15. A wonder has happened in our time: Climate in Medieval English Literature.- Chapter 16. On earth as it is in heaven: Eddic and Saga Literature.- Chapter 17. Romance Meets Science? Geography and Narrative in The Book of John Mandeville.- Chapter 18. Travel, Climate, and Weather in Medieval Romance.- Chapter 19. Nothyng but wawis and Wyndy s: Geography and Meteorology in Malory s Le Morte Darthur.- Part IV. Flora, Fauna, and the Natural World.- Chapter 20. Stones, Plants, and Animals: The Properties of Things.- Chapter 21. Flora, Fauna, and the Literary Forms of Early Medieval English Science.- Chapter 22. Gems, Lapidary Lore, and Medieval Poetry.- Chapter 23. Alchemy in the Late Middle Ages: Alchemical Theory and Mystical Motifs at the Dawn of Modernity.- Chapter 24. Contemplative Life as Experimental Science.- Part V. The Human Body, Mind, and Medicine.- Chapter 25. Medieval Medicine.- Chapter 26. Mind: Cogitation, Memory, Learning, Thinking.- Chapter 27. Medicine and the Body in Early Medieval England.- Chapter 28. Sense Experience in Chaucer.- Chapter 29. The Malady of Love.- Chapter 30. Medieval Dreams.- Chapter 31. Monstrous Conceptions in Medieval Literature and Science.- Chapter 32. Genealogical Imagination in Bible Manuscripts and Piers Plowman: Parallels and Contrasts to Modern Genetics.- Chapter 33. Lydgate s Medical Poetics.- Chapter 34. Epilogue: Reconfigurations and Re-illuminations.- Index.
Michael J. Huxtable is Assistant Professor of Medieval Literature in the Department of English Studies at the Durham University, UK. He researches intersections and relationships between literature and natural philosophy in the medieval period. He is Co-Director of Durham's Centre for Ancient and Medieval Philosophy and a member of the Ordered Universe Research Group. He co-edited an edition of Robert Grosseteste s De colore (The Dimensions of Colour, 2013) with Greti Dinkova-Braun, Giles Gasper, Tom McLeish and others. He is author of Grosseteste and the Green Knight: Colour Theory and Chivalric Writing (forthcoming) and chapters and articles on medieval colour theory, chivalry, and romance. He is currently completing a second monograph provisionally entitled The Concept of Colour in Medieval Literature.
Corinne Saunders is Professor of Medieval Literature in the Department of English Studies, Durham University, UK. She specialises in the history of ideas, romance and visionary writing. Her current research focuses on the connections between mind, body and emotions. She co-leads the Affective Experience Lab within Durham s Wellcome-funded Discovery Research Platform for Medical Humanities, and until 2025 was Co-Director of Durham s Institute for Medical Humanities. Her third monograph, Magic and the Supernatural in Medieval English Romance, was published in 2010. Recent co-edited books include Women and Medieval Literary Culture (2023), Middle English Manuscripts and their Legacies: A Volume in Honour of Ian Doyle (2022), The Life of Breath in Literature, Culture, and Medicine: Classical to Contemporary (2021) and Visions and Voice-Hearing in Medieval and Early Modern Contexts (2020). She is Editor for English Literature of the journal Medium Ævum.
