ENGL 90389 - Censorship and Controversy in Middle English Texts

Institution:

University of Notre Dame

Subject:

English

Description:

Fourteenth-century writers operated in a world fraught with political and ecclesiastical controversy, sometimes extending to censorship, yet at the same time, evidence survives of a surprising degree of tolerance for certain radical ideas. This course will examine how the major writers of late medieval England simultaneously negotiated these troubled waters, and earned or exploited tolerances extended by the authorities. English authors to be studied will include Geoffrey Chaucer, William Langland, Thomas Hoccleve, Julian of Norwich, Margery Kempe, and M.N.'s Middle English translation of Marguerite Porete. These texts will be read alongside excerpts from several Latin or Continental writers, which may include Hildegard of Bingen, Joachim of Fiore, Bridget of Sweden, William Ockham, or others, and alongside some anonymous English texts, including political lyrics, Richard the Redeless, Mum and the Sothsegger and Wycliffite writings. Examples from articles of inquisition, statutes, legal defenses, petitions and broadsides may also be used. The aim is to help illuminate how literary writers sought to defend or enlarge their religious or political orthodoxies in response to the challenges of the time. The course will also examine and question modern scholarly trends, especially the recent tendency to use the Wycliffite movement as a popular cultural and theoretical lens through which to understand the phenomenal rise of vernacular literature in Ricardian England. Topics to be discussed will include: reception of visionary writing, attitudes toward women's learning and preaching, controversial religious doctrines (like universal salvation, millenarianism, and intellectual freedom), and political controversies over the Commons' control of royal tyranny, the Rising of 1381, the deposition of Richard II, and the colonial suppression of Irish language and literary culture.

Credits:

3.00

Credit Hours:

Prerequisites:

Corequisites:

Exclusions:

Level:

Instructional Type:

Lecture

Notes:

Additional Information:

Historical Version(s):

Institution Website:

www.nd.edu

Phone Number:

(574) 631-5000

Regional Accreditation:

North Central Association of Colleges and Schools

Calendar System:

Semester

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