David C. Fowler - Böcker

In this companion to his previous book, The Bible in Early English Literature, David Fowler completes his stimulating and broad-ranging study of medieval English literature in the light of biblical tradition. As in the first volume, he both provides a broad general view of literary trends and closely examines representative works that illustrate these trends.The author begins by discussing medieval drama in England--with special attention to the Cornish drama-- as revealed in the cycle plays that enacted the entire history of the world from Creation to Doomsday. He demonstrates how the drama grew out of the liturgy of the Church and developed into a parallel fashion with other kinds of vernacular literature in the later Middle Ages, and he offers a possible explanation of the origin of the morality play in England.This is followed by an examination of representative shorter medieval lyrics. Fowler shows that many of these lyrics were composed to memorialize particular “secular’ and “religious” elements blended subtly and distinctively in Middle English lyrics, often with a complete harmony of sacred and sexual significance. A special section deals with Mary Magdalene in popular tradition, comparing her description in the Bible with her treatment in legend, drama, lyric poetry, and the ballad.The final three chapters focus on particular literary works which the author believes to be outstanding examples of poems composed in the biblical tradition. “The Parliament of Fowls” is selected as the best example of biblical influence in all of Chaucer. The work is seen as a Creation poem with its organizing principles derives from commentaries on the first chapter of Genesis--a new theory of the poem’s structure which the author feels resolves many of the difficulties previously encountered by scholars.Fowler than treats several works of the “Pearl” poet--“Cleanness,” “Patience,” “Saint Erkenwald,” and the “Pearl”--in their particular blend of humor, seriousness, and Christian serenity. In stark contrast, “Piers the Plowman,” the final work dealt with, reflects the agony of the turmoil of late fourteenth-century England. The emphasis is on the historical significance of the poem: the importance of the A text as an ideological influence on the leadership of the Peasants’ Revolt in 1381, and the exschatological implications of the later versions (B and C texts). “It is my hope,” the author states, “that future studies of ‘Piers’ will increasingly take history into account and likewise study the versions of the poem separately. Until we learn to walk from this text out into history, we run the risk of missing the important message that this profound and troubling poem offers to twentieth-century man.”This book will be of value both to scholars and students of medieval literature and religion and to general readers interested in the varied and intriguing ways that the Bible has influence vernacular literature.

John Trevisa (ca.1342-1402), perhaps the greatest of Middle English prose translators of Latin texts into English, was almost an exact contemporary of Geoffrey Chaucer. Trevisa was born in Cornwall, studies at Oxford, and was instituted vicar of Berkeley, a position he held until his death.Over a period of thirty-five years eminent medievalist David Fowler has pieced together an account of Trevisa’s life and times by diligently seeking out documents bearing on his activities and translations. This has resulted in a cultural history of fourtheenth-century England that ranges from the administrative, geographical, and linguistic status of Cornwall to the curriculum of medieval university education, and from religious and secular conflicts to the administration of a substantial provincial household and the role of its aristocratic keepers in the Hundred Years War.Fowler provides an analysis of Trevis’s known translations the “Gospel of Nicodemus”, “Dialogus inter Militem et Clericum”, FitzRalph’s “Defensio Curatorum”, the “Polychronicon”, “De Regimine Principum” and “De Proprietatibus Rerum.” He also advances the hypothesis that Trevisa was one of the scholars responsible for the first complete translation of the scriptures into English: the Wycliffite Bible. An appendix contains a collection of biographical and historical references designed to illustrate Fowler’s contention that Trevisa may have been responsible for the revisions of “Piers the Plowman” now known as the B and C texts.

Learn how information professionals are addressing the electronic resource issues being faced in their own libraries and around the world! This informative volume gives you an up-close look at the increasingly important role that electronic serials play in the overall library collection, today and in the future. It addresses many of the themes, problems, and questions raised by this fast-evolving medium, including e-journal publishing issues, troubleshooting, and accreditation issues, as well as e-reserves, e-books, and more. In E-Serials Collection Management: Transitions, Trends, and Technicalities, library professionals from the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia discuss these issues, the problems they have faced, and the solutions they have developed for them. From the editor: It is my belief that e-serials will continue to emerge as the key players in the library world, as the physical library gradually and inexorably gives way to the virtual library. As e-journals insinuate themselves throughout the infrastructures of libraries and expand their reach globally, the issues addressed in this book are becoming of concern to all librarians, not just the electronic resources and information technology specialists. Librarians all over the world are struggling with how to manage electronic serials and the issues associated with them. In this book, readers will see how library professionals just like themselves deal with electronic journals, their transitions, trends, and technicalities. With helpful graphs, figures, and charts making the information in the book easily accessible and understandable, E-Serials Collection Management: Transitions, Trends, and Technicalities will increase your understanding of:the interrelationship between pricing, licensing, technological aspects, and proximity to publishers and librariesfrom the point of view of a leading global subscription agent the benefits and pitfalls of using vendors/publishers, third-party providers, and subscription agents for electronic journal services how information professionals are currently developing and cataloging online materialswith a survey of 70 libraries! the IP ranges vs. passwords conundrum the advantages of joining a consortium to make journals available to users at a lower cost to your library how to determine the amount of usage your electronic products are getting claiming and troubleshooting e-journalswith a fascinating case study from UCLA's biomedical library how to efficiently handle electronic articles destined for a reserve collection how to select an e-book model that will satisfy your users and your staff open-access systems and softwareand what they mean to your institution regional accreditation for e-serials using a database-driven approach to manage e-resources and more!

Learn how information professionals are addressing the electronic resource issues being faced in their own libraries and around the world! This informative volume gives you an up-close look at the increasingly important role that electronic serials play in the overall library collection, today and in the future. It addresses many of the themes, problems, and questions raised by this fast-evolving medium, including e-journal publishing issues, troubleshooting, and accreditation issues, as well as e-reserves, e-books, and more. In E-Serials Collection Management: Transitions, Trends, and Technicalities, library professionals from the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia discuss these issues, the problems they have faced, and the solutions they have developed for them. From the editor: It is my belief that e-serials will continue to emerge as the key players in the library world, as the physical library gradually and inexorably gives way to the virtual library. As e-journals insinuate themselves throughout the infrastructures of libraries and expand their reach globally, the issues addressed in this book are becoming of concern to all librarians, not just the electronic resources and information technology specialists. Librarians all over the world are struggling with how to manage electronic serials and the issues associated with them. In this book, readers will see how library professionals just like themselves deal with electronic journals, their transitions, trends, and technicalities. With helpful graphs, figures, and charts making the information in the book easily accessible and understandable, E-Serials Collection Management: Transitions, Trends, and Technicalities will increase your understanding of:the interrelationship between pricing, licensing, technological aspects, and proximity to publishers and librariesfrom the point of view of a leading global subscription agent the benefits and pitfalls of using vendors/publishers, third-party providers, and subscription agents for electronic journal services how information professionals are currently developing and cataloging online materialswith a survey of 70 libraries! the IP ranges vs. passwords conundrum the advantages of joining a consortium to make journals available to users at a lower cost to your library how to determine the amount of usage your electronic products are getting claiming and troubleshooting e-journalswith a fascinating case study from UCLA's biomedical library how to efficiently handle electronic articles destined for a reserve collection how to select an e-book model that will satisfy your users and your staff open-access systems and softwareand what they mean to your institution regional accreditation for e-serials using a database-driven approach to manage e-resources and more!

This is the first volume of a critical edition of the last of John Trevisa's major translations (previously unavailable in print). The De regimine principum, a Latin treatise on the education of princes, was composed originally for the French King Philip the Fair (1238-1314) and translated by Cornishman John Trevisa (c. 1342-1402), chaplain and man of letters to Thomas IV Lord Berkeley, a baronial representative in the deposition of the English King Richard II in 1399. The work comprises 182 folios of the Bodleian manuscript Digby 233, which is the only surviving copy of the translation-perhaps even copied and corrected from Trevisa's autograph.This edition will be of great value to scholars interested in the reception and transmission of De regimine principum, which with its nearly 300 known surviving manuscripts-55 of them having a medieval English provenance-in Latin and most European vernaculars, was one of the most popular and influential political/didactic works of the later Middle Ages.The second volume of this edition will explicitly place the text and its author within a larger historical and linguistic context and will include textual variants and a glossary.

Authors of the Middle Ages is a new series, designed for research and reference. Each volume, by an expert on the subject, gives an account of the facts known about the Author's life and immediate historical context, together with a review of subsequent scholarship. This is supported by citation of al known contemporary references; a dated and classified list of manuscripts and editions; and a bibliography of secondary sources. The aim is to combine, in one compact volume, a biography of a medieval author with all the information needed for further research. The series is divided into sections. A first, edited by M. C. Seymour, focuses on English Writers of the Late Middle Ages, a second, more general section, edited by Patrick J. Geary, deals with Historical and Religious Writers of the Latin West. John Trevisa (d. 1402) is renowned for his major literary translations of the Polychronicon, the encyclopedia of Bartholomaeus Anglicus, and other works. What is known of his life and context as a factious Oxford scholar, possibly associated with Wyclif and the English translation of the Bible, and as a turbulent canon of Gloucestershire is here set out. The work is based on fresh research in university and diocesan records, and supported by an appendix of transcriptions of unpublished archival material.

Authors of the Middle Ages is a new series designed for research and reference. Each part, by an expert on the subject, gives an account of the facts known about a particular Author’s life and immediate historical context, together with a review of subsequent scholarship. This is supported by citation of all known contemporary references; a dated and classified list of manuscripts and editions; a bibliography of secondary sources; and appendices listing or printing the key literary and documentary sources. The aim is to combine, in one compact work, a bibliography of a medieval author with all the information needed for further research. Each will be available individually, or in a collection with three other contemporary Authors. Authors of the Middle Ages is divided into two sub-series, English Writers of the Late Middle Ages and historical and Religious Writers of the Latin West.

Authors of the Middle Ages is a new series, designed for research and reference. Each volume, by an expert on the subject, gives an account of the facts known about the Author's life and immediate historical context, together with a review of subsequent scholarship. This is supported by citation of al known contemporary references; a dated and classified list of manuscripts and editions; and a bibliography of secondary sources. The aim is to combine, in one compact volume, a biography of a medieval author with all the information needed for further research. The series is divided into sections. A first, edited by M. C. Seymour, focuses on English Writers of the Late Middle Ages, a second, more general section, edited by Patrick J. Geary, deals with Historical and Religious Writers of the Latin West. John Trevisa (d. 1402) is renowned for his major literary translations of the Polychronicon, the encyclopedia of Bartholomaeus Anglicus, and other works. What is known of his life and context as a factious Oxford scholar, possibly associated with Wyclif and the English translation of the Bible, and as a turbulent canon of Gloucestershire is here set out. The work is based on fresh research in university and diocesan records, and supported by an appendix of transcriptions of unpublished archival material.