Piers Plowman

Derek Pearsall is Professor Emeritus of Harvard University and a pre-eminent scholar of Langland and Chaucer; he has published widely on both authors.

Like its predecessor thirty years ago, Derek Pearsall’s new edition of the C text Piers Plowman will be a welcome volume on the shelves of scholars, teachers, and students of the poem. As with the first edition, it is a pleasure to read a version of the poem in and for itself, with enough context provided to allow readers with a general competence in Middle English, but not deeply versed in Piers Plowman scholarship or the poem’s cultural milieu, to engage with the work. That engagement is aided by the side glosses (new in this edition); explanatory footnotes (significantly expanded from the first edition); and a revised introduction, with a very useful series of thematic notes on such overarching topics as the Dreamer, friars, Lady Meed, the seven deadly sins, and so on, expanded and transferred from their original positions in the old on-page notes. Given the reasonable price of the paperback edition, the text could well be used in advanced undergraduate as well as introductory graduate courses in Middle English Literature ... the book is generally pleasing to the eye; slightly larger-than-normal dimensions provide enough white space for easy reading, always a concern in books with apparatus in both the margins and the foot of the page ... The revised text, the enriched but still selective textual apparatus, and the extensively updated notes, introduction, and bibliography make Pearsall’s new, annotated Piers Plowman a valuable introduction to the C text as is has come to be understood over the last thirty years and an important complement to other editions of the poem.M. Teresa Tavormina, The Journal of Speculum, Volume 85

• PrefaceAbbreviationsSelect Bibliography of Critical Studies of Piers PlowmanIntroductionPrologue – The Fair Field Full of FolkI. Holy ChurchII. The Marriage Plans of Meed the MaidIII. Meed the Maid at WestminsterIV. Meed the Maid on TrialV. The Author’s Apologia and the Sermon of ReasonVI. The Confession of the SinsVII. The Shriving of the Folk; Piers Plowman’s Guide to TruthVIII. The Ploughing of the Half-AcreIX. The Pardon Sent from TruthX. The Search for Dowel: The Discourse of the Friars, Thoughtand WitXI. Learning and Salvation: the Discourse of Study, Clergyand RechelesnesseXII. The Debate about Salvation continued: Discourse of Rechelesnesseon Humility and Patient PovertyXIII. Rechelesnesse Concludes; the Mirror of Middle-EarthXIV. ImaginatifXV. The Feast of Patience and the Meeting with Activa VitaXVI. Patience and Liberum ArbitriumXVII. Liberum Arbitrium on Charity and the ChurchXVIII. The Tree of Charity and the Meeting with FaithXIX. Hope and the Good SamaritanXX. The Crucifixion and the Harrowing of HellXXI. The Founding of Holy ChurchXXII. The Coming of AntichristTextual VariantsReference ListGlossary