Description
Book SynopsisThe Writer's Gift or the Patron's Pleasure? argues that the French King Charles V's unprecedented enthusiasm for the literary commission triggered a crucial, multi-generational debate within the book community about how a work's status as solicited or unsolicited affected its value and purpose.
Trade Review"Wemmers’ Victimology: A Canadian Perspective is essential reading for those interested in victims of crime in all their dynamism – theoretically, politically, and within the disciplines. However, Wemmers takes this further by providing a powerful analysis of structural and institutional reform, through the emerging human rights instruments that place victim rights firmly on the policy agenda. Bringing together a volume of this kind is no small feat, internationally significant, but with obvious relevance to those especially interested in Canada’s justice response." -- Elizabeth L’Estrange, University of Birmingham *
Renaissance Quarterly *
"Deborah McGrady’s analysis of patronage practices during the last quarter of the fourteenth century and the first quarter of the fifteenth, as evidenced not only by authorial dedications and presentation miniatures but also archival records, texts themselves, and manuscript witnesses, offers keen insight into the politically fraught institution hiding behind the nostalgic idea of medieval mecenat." -- S.C. Kaplan, Rice University *
French Studies *
"Deborah McGrady’s rich, meticulously researched, and lucidly written monograph addresses this surprising gap in modern studies of late medieval book communities. She shows that the decades surrounding Charles V’s translation project constitute a crucial moment of change in medieval patronage practices, characterized by a tension between spontaneous artistic expressions freely offered by the poet and transactional commissions undertaken for the pleasure of the patron." -- Julie Slinger, Washington University in St. Louis *
H-France Review *
"The Writer’s Gift or the Patron’s Pleasure? Makes important contributions to the fields of literary studies, economic history, art history, and the history of the material text—it is a pleasure to read and a gift to the scholarly community." -- Sarah Wilma Watson *
Speculum, Vol. 96, No. 2 *
Table of ContentsIntroduction: Rethinking Literary Patronage in a Medieval Context 1. King Charles V’s Sapientia Project: From the Construction of the Louvre Library to the Books He Commissioned 2. The Writer’s Work: Translating Charles V’s Literary Clientelism into Learned Terms 3. Guillaume de Machaut’s Fictions of Engagement 4. Eustache Deschamps on the Duties and Dues of Poetry 5. The Pursuit of Sponsorship: From Christine de Pizan’s Troubled Dealings with Louis of Orléans to Marketing Nostalgia 6. The Curse of the Commission: Christine de Pizan on Sacrificing Charles V’s Biography Conclusion Bibliography
