From Aesop to Reynard: Beast Literature in Medieval Britain
- Author / Editor
- Mann, Jill.
From Aesop to Reynard: Beast Literature in Medieval Britain
- Published
- New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
- Physical Description
- xii, 380 pp.
- Description
- Examines "how animals mean" in beast fable, beast epic, and related literature in classical and medieval traditions, focusing on the uses of animals in Marie de France, Nigel of Longchamp, "The Owl and the Nightingale," the Reynard tradition, Chaucer, and Robert Henryson. The power of nature and the "superfluity" of language recur as themes throughout. Chaucer focuses on how nature constrains social hierarchy and sexuality in PF. Sexuality is also a concern in SqT, NPT, and ManT, but each of these Tales also explores the limits and potential of language and signification, deeply inflected by comic awareness that humans are beasts who talk and laugh.
- Chaucer Subjects
- Parliament of Fowls
- Squire and His Tale
- Nun's Priest and His Tale
- Manciple and His Tale
- Sources, Analogues, and Literary Relations