Medieval Afterlives in Popular Culture

Candace Barrington Andrew LynchSteve EllisLouise D'ArcensDaniel T. KlineRobert SturgesSteve GuthrieBrantley L. BryantAngela Jane WeislRichard UtzLeslie CootePhilippa SemperGail AshtonKathleen Coyne Kelly

'Spanning many centuries and multiple media, this collection will inform and delight specialists, generalists, and anyone else interested in how we shape the Middle Ages and they shape us. Through highly engaging case-studies, the authors thoroughly and thoughtfully explore the vast and sometimes surprising legacy of our medieval past. They challenge the most fundamental assumptions of (neo)medievalism and open new avenues of research into one of the most dynamic and wide-ranging fields in the humanities.' - Karl Fugelso, professor of Art History at Towson University and editor of Studies in Medievalism 'An insightful collection that confronts issues too often left implicit in studies of medievalism head-on. Together the essays pose an important challenge: to examine the persistence, contingency and plurality of medievalism, and the implications that has for periodization and the ongoing influence of the medieval on the modern.' - David W. Marshall, California State University San Bernardino and editor of Mass Market Medieval: Essays on the Middle Ages in Popular Culture 'The essays in Medieval Afterlives in Popular Culture are energetic and spirited. They explore the diversity of medievalisms in popular culture, asking powerful questions about modern critical, creative, and political investments in such forms of medieval re-creation. Through a series of detailed readings, the authors offer loving, critical attention to texts that are often dismissed or unregarded. The best of these essays go even further: to consider the role of medievalism in shaping our ideas of modernity, and the relationship between high and popular culture. This collection is packed full of fresh insights and readings, and will become essential reading for students and researchers working in this field.' - Stephanie Trigg, University of Melbourne

• 1. 'The YouTube Prioress: Anti-Semitism and Twenty-First Century Participatory Culture' 2. 'Animated Conversations in Nottingham: Disney's Robin Hood (1973) ' 3. 'Virginia Woolf's Middle Ages' 4. 'Dario Fo's Mistero Buffo and the Left-Modernist Reclamation of Medieval Popular Culture' 5. 'Acephalic History: A Bataillian Reading of Monty Python and the Holy Grail' 6. 'Medievalism and Periodization in Frozen River and The Second Shepherds' Play: Environment, Class, Miracle' 7. 'Time Travel, Pulp Fictions, and Changing Attitudes Toward the Middle Ages: Why You Can't Get Renaissance on Somebody's Ass' 8. 'H. P. Lovecraft's Unnamable Middle Ages' 9. 'Confession, Contrition, and the Rhetoric of Tears: Medievalism and Reality Television,' 10. 'Robin Hood, Frenched' 11. 'Brief Encounters: Arthur's Epic Journey in Antoine Fuqua's King Arthur (2005)' 12. 'My other world': Historical Reflections and Refractions in Modern Arthurian Fantasy' 13. 'Queer Origins, Deformed Lines: Seeding the Future in Torchwood's 'Children of Earth'' 14. 'The Medieval Entertainment Channel: The Shrek Quartet'