| Paper 1725-a | Ladies, Babies, Saints, and Kings: Pairing and Layering in Athelston, a Romance for the 10th Century
(Language: English)
Sonya Veck Lundblad, Languages & Humanities, Missouri Valley College
Index terms: Language and Literature - Old English, Language and Literature - Middle English |
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| Abstract | Paper -a:
Athelston obscures 14th-century distinctions in class, gender, and ultimately race because the romance characterizes real Anglo-Saxon saints and kings through pairing and layering devices. For example, there are two Athelstons, only one is noble. Also, a stillborn child and heir to the throne is paired with a baby St Edmund born in trial by fire. And what does it mean that the women characters in the story are paired with infinitely less heroic men? What is the effect of evoking Anglo-Saxon saints and kings in the late 14th century? What impact might this have on questions of periodization?
Paper -b:
One of Gower's most popular and important images is that of the statue of man dreamt of by the Babylonian Emperor Nebuchadnezzar. The Prologue describes it as having a head of gold, breast of silver, belly of brass, legs of iron, and feet of iron and clay. This paper will examine this extensive account of Nebuchadnezzar's dream alongside the lengthy discourse on alchemy in Book IV and will argue that Gower not only uses the metallurgic language of alchemy in the Prologue but substantially employs alchemical analogies and metaphors of microcosm and macrocosm, division and unity, and corruption and redemption.
Paper -c:
Rather than considering empire in its outward trajectory - as a colonising impulse stretching out from a powerful centre - this paper reflects upon the local conditions under which that centre is sustained. In dangerous proximity to the very core of empire, Queens are simultaneously vulnerable and threatening. This paper explores the figure of the Queen in the Middle English romances Athelston, The Erle of Toulouse and Sir Launfal in her relation to empire. It asks such questions as: how does gender interact with empire in these texts? What is the queen's role, and what does her agency mean in this context?
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