Description
Book SynopsisIn Telling Tales, Joel Rosenthal takes us on a journey through some familiar sources from fourteenth- and fifteenth-century England to show how memories and recollections can be used to build a compelling portrait of daily life in the late Middle Ages.
Trade Review“There has been a virtual cottage industry of studies based on the Paston letters, but no one approaches them quite the way Joel Rosenthal does in Telling Tales. With originality and erudition he examines the letters, alongside other key late medieval English texts, and in the process he offers fresh insight into the ‘small narratives’ of ordinary life in late medieval England.”
—L. R. Poos,The Catholic University of America
“Rosenthal’s goal in examining Proof of Age proceedings, depositions in the Scrope/Grosvenor controversy (1386), and Margaret Paston’s letters is to ‘illuminate the social context whence these snippets of memory and communication emanated.’ He also analyzes types of memory and the means by which testators and letter writers gained information. Modes of cognition in Proof of Age depositions and the Scrope testimony are similar: personal knowledge, hearsay, and common fame. Much the same applies to Margaret’s letters. Many Proof of Age witnesses either saw or participated in communal events (e.g., baptism) that helped establish an heir or heiress’s age. If this suggests a bond between the manor house and prominent villages, the Scrope depositions illustrate a strong unity existing among the Scrope men at arms against an adversary. This ‘us versus them’ sentiment is forcefully present in Margaret’s letters, from which we also learn of her duties as mistress of her household and of the responsibilities forced on her by her husband’s frequent absences. In addition, Rosenthal (SUNY Stony Brook) offers an interesting section on the mechanics of composing Margaret’s letters and the means of delivering them.”
—C.L. Hamilton Choice
“Joel T. Rosenthal, a specialist if ever there was one, shows how meaning and interest can be squeezed out of the most unpromising sources.”
—Ad Putter Times Literary Supplement
“In this insightful, closely argued, richly detailed, and very engaging book, Joel T. Rosenthal brings his full attention and considerable intellectual skills to bear on three types of ’so-called lesser sources.'”
—Mark C. Amodio The Medieval Review
“Telling Tales is interesting and lively reading for specialist and general audiences alike. It certainly demonstrates that the documents generated by fairly restricted groups in medieval society (a single family, the landed elite) can be deposed so as to reveal the history of other, more broadly based social groups.”
—Sherri Olson Journal of English and Germanic Philology
Table of ContentsContents
List of Figures and Tables
Preface
Introduction: Telling Tales in a Social Context
1. Proofs of Age: A Rich Fabric of Thin Threads
The World of Jurors and Testimony
The Mechanics of Recollection
Jurors’ Life Cycles and Life-Cycle Memories
Ecclesiastical Memories
Memories of the Secular World
Communities Large and Small
The Construction of Memory in the Proofs
2. Sir Richard Scrope and the Scrope and Grosvenor Depositions Recollection Re-creates Fellowship
Cognition and Recollection
Tales of the Scropes: Battles and Banners
3. Margaret Paston: The Lady and the Letters
Letters as Artifacts
Constructing the Letters: How to Tell It Like It Is
First Stuck at Home and Then Mostly Alone
Conclusion: Some Final Reflections
Notes
Bibliography
Index
