IMC 2020: Sessions
Session 1246: Beyond the Borders of Chivalry: Martial Skills, Knightly Disbelief, and Gender Transformations in Medieval French Literature
Wednesday 8 July 2020, 14.15-15.45
| Sponsor: | Society for the Study of Medieval Emotions |
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| Organiser: | Laura Bernardazzi, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York |
| Moderator/Chair: | Emma Campbell, Department of French Studies, University of Warwick |
| Paper 1246-a | Reassessing the Knight's Skills: Jaufre and Medieval Fight Books (Language: English) Index terms: Language and Literature - French or Occitan, Mentalities, Military History |
| Paper 1246-b | Know Your Limits!: Marvellous Encounters and the Boundaries of the Self in Perceforest (Language: English) Index terms: Language and Literature - French or Occitan, Mentalities, Philosophy |
| Paper 1246-c | Beyond the Borders of Chivalry: Martial Skills, Knightly Disbelief, and Gender Transformations in Medieval French Literature (Language: English) Index terms: Gender Studies, Language and Literature - French or Occitan, Mentalities |
| Abstract | This panel seeks to reassess medieval ideals of chivalry by analysing how the protagonists of French romances and epic poems react to the situations they are confronted with: in Jaufre, the hero proves himself to be, contrary to previous scholarship, a talented fighter; marvellous encounters in Perceforest provide space for the experience of the knights' limits and fallibility; and in Yde et Olive transvestism, a lesbian marriage, and a divine sex-change calls into question the gendered nature of knighthood and chivalry. Through various interdisciplinary approaches spanning martial knowledge, literary and gender theory, eco-criticism, and psychology, the papers in this session will attempt to challenge and reconsider normative chivalric characterisations. |