Search results for ""Author Susan Irvine""

Part of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Collaborative Series, which now includes editions of the main texts through from A to F. This volume offers a new edition of the E-text of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, commonly known as the Peterborough Chronicle. The E-text is of enormous importance in Chronicle studies: in its early part it is the best representativeof the Northern Recension of the Chronicle; in continuing up to the second half of the twelfth century, its span is by far the longest of all the versions. Even more than other versions of the Chronicle, it reflects transitions ofvital interest to historians, linguists, and literary scholars. The E-text has not been edited in its entirety, except as a facsimile, for over a century. This semi-diplomatic edition offers a readable text with modern punctuation and capitalization. The interpolated material relating to Peterborough is clearly distinguished from the rest of the text. Indices of personal names, people-names, and place-names follow the text itself. The Introduction includes an account of the manuscript and a linguistic analysis of the E-text. The E-text cannot of course be studied in isolation. This volume is part of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Collaborative Series and with its publicationthe Series now includes editions of the main texts through from A to F. A substantial section of the Introduction to the volume is devoted to a detailed discussion of E's complex textual relationships with the other versions of the Chronicle, and also with other relevant documents such as Peterborough Charters and twelfth-century Latin chronicles. Dr SUSAN IRVINE is Senior Lecturer in the Department of English, University College, London.

Read more less

The Old English Boethius boldly refashions in Anglo-Saxon guise a great literary monument of the late-antique world, The Consolation of Philosophy. Condemned to death for treason around 525 ce, the Roman scholar Boethius turned to philosophy to transform his personal distress into a powerful meditation on fate, free will, and the human capacity for virtue in a flawed, fallen world. Boethius's Latin dialogues found a receptive audience in Anglo-Saxon England, where they were translated into Old English some time around 900. The translator (traditionally identified with King Alfred) freely adapts the Latin for a new audience: the Roman Fabricius, for example, becomes the Germanic weapon-smith Weland. The translation replicates Boethius’s alternation of prose and verse—only in this case Old English prose alternates with alliterative verse.In later centuries Chaucer and Queen Elizabeth each turned The Consolation of Philosophy into English, but the Old English translation was the first to bring it to a wider vernacular audience. Verse prologues and epilogues for works traditionally associated with King Alfred fill out the volume, offering readers a fascinating glimpse of the moment when English confidently claimed its birthright as a literature capable of anything, from sublime ideas to subtle poetry.

Read more less

Childhood and Adolescence in Anglo-Saxon Literary Culture counters the generally received wisdom that early medieval childhood and adolescence were an unremittingly bleak experience. The contributors analyse representations of children and their education in Old English, Old Norse and Anglo-Latin writings, including hagiography, heroic poetry, riddles, legal documents, philosophical prose and elegies. Within and across these linguistic and generic boundaries some key themes emerge: the habits and expectations of name-giving, expressions of childhood nostalgia, the role of uneducated parents, and the religious zeal and rebelliousness of youth. After decades of study dominated by adult gender studies, Childhood and Adolescence in Anglo-Saxon Literary Culture rebalances our understanding of family life in the Anglo-Saxon era by reconstructing the lives of medieval children and adolescents through their literary representation.

Read more less