IMC 2007: Sessions

Session 1105: The Scribe as Editor in Medieval France: In Memory of Elspeth Kennedy, II

Wednesday 11 July 2007, 11.15-12.45

Sponsor:	Society for the Study of Mediaeval Languages and Literatures
Organiser:	Helen J. Swift, St Hilda's College, University of Oxford
Moderator/Chair:	Jeff Rider, Department of Romance Languages & Literatures, Wesleyan University, Connecticut
Paper 1105-a	Quoting and Punctuating in Medieval French Manuscripts (Language: English) Sophie Marnette, Balliol College, University of Oxford Index terms: Language and Literature - French or Occitan, Manuscripts and Palaeography
Paper 1105-b	Anxiety of Influence in Rubrication: Paris MS fr. 12476 (Language: English) Helen J. Swift, St Hilda's College, University of Oxford Index terms: Language and Literature - French or Occitan, Manuscripts and Palaeography
Paper 1105-c	Commemoration in La Mort le Roi Artu (Language: English) Emma Campbell, Department of French Studies, University of Warwick Index terms: Epigraphy, Language and Literature - French or Occitan
Abstract	Speakers explore Elspeth's seminal notion of the scribe as editor in a variety of codicological, literary and linguistic contexts, beginning with the examination of markers of punctuation in relation to the signalling of reported speech in prose romance manuscripts. The second speaker develops the interface between scribal activity and textual interpretation, examining how rubrics added to one manuscript of a late-15th-century defence-of-women poem convey a particularly innovative and coherent interpretation of that text. The third speaker shifts focus again to study instances of scribal activity within the fictional frame ofLa Mort le Roi Art, interrogating the status of epitaphs therein in relation to the theme of commemoration.