'I Shal Finde It in a Maner Glose': Versions of Textual Harassment in Medieval Literature

Author / Editor
Hanning, Robert W.

Title
'I Shal Finde It in a Maner Glose': Versions of Textual Harassment in Medieval Literature

Published
Laurie A. Finke and Martin B. Shichtman, eds. Medieval Texts and Contemporary Readers (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1987), pp. 27-50.

Description
Quintilian's definition of allegory suggests that "allegorical texts produce stable meanings and mirror unequivocal truths." For Augustine, "Figural language exists so that 'by means of corporal and temporal things we may comprehend the eternal and spiritual.'" Poststructuralist debates have called these understandings into question. Hanning examines "interrelations between some medieval and postmodern concepts of allegory" and then analyzes the allegories of "Piers Plowman."

Alternative Title
Medieval Texts and Contemporary Readers.

Chaucer Subjects
Background and General Criticism.