Five Senses in Medieval and Early Modern England

Annette Kern-Stähler is Full Professor and Chair of Medieval English Studies at the University of Bern. She is particularly interested in the interrelations between material culture, sense perception and affect and in the uses and transformations of space in late medieval England. Beatrix Busse, Ph.D. (2004), University of Heidelberg, is Full Professor and Chair of English Linguistics at that university. Her research interests include the history of English and historical linguistics, corpus linguistics, stylistics and language in urban spaces. Wietse de Boer, Ph.D. (1995), is Professor of History at Miami University (Ohio). His publications are focused on the Italian Counter-Reformation, most recently Space and Conversion in Global Perspective, co-edited with Giuseppe Marcocci, Aliocha Maldavsky and Ilaria Pavan.

"This new collection demonstrates the real coming of age of sensory studies in medieval and early modern English scholarship. Its penetrating close readings of how English men and women wrote and rewrote the senses — in texts ranging from Old English translations of Boethius and Augustine, to Chaucer, Wyclif, and Milton — showcase the kind of deep discussion that is only really achievable when a field has reached a high level of maturity. From perceptual distortion to disability, to divine and human sight, the tactile theatre, the multi-sensorial afterlife, understanding-as-seeing, and the sensory richness of martyrdom — here we are offered a full banquet of sensory delights to whet our scholarly appetites."Matthew Milner, McGill University“This is a sensational book of profound relevance to scholars interested in the cultural history of the senses. The contributors excavate the shifting understandings of and engagement with the five senses in the medieval and early modern period. Through exploring the roles played by the senses in literature, liturgy and theatre, they provide us with many scintillating insights into the social construction of such categories as sin and salvation, illusion and reality, and self and world.”David Howes, Miami University

• AcknowledgementsNotes on the EditorsNotes on the ContributorsList of IllustrationsIntroduction: The Five Senses in Medieval and Early Modern CulturesAnnette Kern-Stähler and Kathrin ScheuchzerPART ONE: SENSING AND UNDERSTANDINGSight and Understanding. Visual Imagery as Metaphor in the Old English Boethius and SoliloquiesKatherine HindleyComing to Past Senses. Vision, Touch and Their Metaphors in Anglo-Saxon Language and CultureJavier Enrique Díaz-VeraPART TWO: VISION AND ITS DISTORTIONBleary Eyes. Middle English Constructions of Visual DisabilitiesBeatrix Busse and Annette Kern-StählerExterior Inspection and Regular Reason. Robert Hooke’s and Margaret Cavendish’s Epistemologies of the SensesVirginia RichterHierachies of Vision in John Milton’s Paradise LostTobias GabelPART THREE: THE PERILOUS SENSESStrange Perceptions. Sensory Experience in the Old English “Marvels of the East” Dieter BitterliThe Perils of the Flesh. John Wyclif’s Preaching on the Five Bodily SensesSean A. OttoThe Senses and Human Nature in a Political Reading of Paradise LostJens Martin GurrPART FOUR: THE MULTISENSUALMultisensoriality and the Chaucerian MultisensualRichard G. Newhauser‘Eate not, taste not, touch not’. The Five Senses in John Foxe’s Actes and MonumentsKathrin ScheuchzerPART FIVE: THE THEATRE AS SENSORY EXPERIENCESmell in the York Corpus Christi PlaysRory G. Critten and Annette Kern-StählerThe Sensory Body in Shakespeare’s TheatresFarah Karim-CooperAfterword: From Gateways to Channels. Reaching towards an Understanding of the Transformative Plasticity of the Senses in the Medieval and Early Modern PeriodsElizabeth RobertsonIndex Nominum