Skip to content
Register Sign in Wishlist

Writing the North of England in the Middle Ages
Regionalism and Nationalism in Medieval English Literature

$99.99 (F)

Part of Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature

  • Date Published: December 2022
  • availability: Available
  • format: Hardback
  • isbn: 9781009182119

$ 99.99 (F)
Hardback

Add to cart Add to wishlist

Other available formats:
eBook


Looking for an examination copy?

If you are interested in the title for your course we can consider offering an examination copy. To register your interest please contact [email protected] providing details of the course you are teaching.

Description
Product filter button
Description
Contents
Resources
Courses
About the Authors
  • Writing the North of England in the Middle Ages offers a literary history of the North-South divide, examining the complexities of the relationship – imaginative, material, and political – between North and South in a wide range of texts. Through sustained analysis of the North-South divide as it emerges in the literature of medieval England, this study illustrates the convoluted dynamic of desire and derision of the North by the rest of country. Joseph Taylor dissects England's problematic sense of nationhood as one which must be negotiated and renegotiated from within, rather than beyond, national borders. Providing fresh readings of texts such as Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, the fifteenth-century Robin Hood ballads and the Towneley plays, this book argues for the North's vital contribution to processes of imagining nation in the Middle Ages and shows that that regionalism is both contained within and constitutive of its apparent opposite, nationalism.

    • Confronts the most popular and oft-cited literary examples of medieval northern consciousness including William of Malmesbury's histories, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and the Towneley Plays, and offers a rare vigorous historical and philological analysis that unfolds their importance to the development of both the English North-South divide and the medieval English nation
    • Offers original arguments about both canonical and non-canonical texts, enabling readers to better understand the pervasive presence of the North-South divide in medieval England and, further, reconsider the relevance of non-canonical literature to our study of the period
    • Carries out sustained and detailed analyses of several genres of medieval literature (historiography, ballad, fabliau, courtly and popular romance, religious cycle plays, political poems), exposing readers to different genres and their political contents and effects
    Read more

    Reviews & endorsements

    ‘Highly recommended.’ A. L. Kaufman, Choice

    ‘… a vital contribution to a growing body of scholarship on medieval English regional identities …’ Emily Dolmans, Studies in the Age of Chaucer

    See more reviews

    Customer reviews

    Not yet reviewed

    Be the first to review

    Review was not posted due to profanity

    ×

    , create a review

    (If you're not , sign out)

    Please enter the right captcha value
    Please enter a star rating.
    Your review must be a minimum of 12 words.

    How do you rate this item?

    ×

    Product details

    • Date Published: December 2022
    • format: Hardback
    • isbn: 9781009182119
    • length: 280 pages
    • dimensions: 235 x 158 x 20 mm
    • weight: 0.54kg
    • availability: Available
  • Table of Contents

    1. William of Malmesbury, Bede, and the problem of the north
    2. The north-south divide in the medieval English universities
    3. Chaucer's northern consciousness in the Reeve's Tale
    4. Centralization, resistance, and the north of England in A Gest of Robyn Hode
    5. The Towneley plays, the pilgrimage of grace and northern Messianism.

  • Author

    Joseph Taylor, University of Alabama, Huntsville
    Joseph Taylor is Associate Professor of English at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, where he teaches courses in medieval literature and history of the English language. He is the co-editor (with Randy P. Schiff) of The Politics of Ecology: Land, Life and Law in Medieval Britain (2016).

Related Books

Sorry, this resource is locked

Please register or sign in to request access. If you are having problems accessing these resources please email [email protected]

Register Sign in
Please note that this file is password protected. You will be asked to input your password on the next screen.

» Proceed

You are now leaving the Cambridge University Press website. Your eBook purchase and download will be completed by our partner www.ebooks.com. Please see the permission section of the www.ebooks.com catalogue page for details of the print & copy limits on our eBooks.

Continue ×

Continue ×

Continue ×
warning icon

Turn stock notifications on?

You must be signed in to your Cambridge account to turn product stock notifications on or off.

Sign in Create a Cambridge account arrow icon
×

Find content that relates to you

Join us online

This site uses cookies to improve your experience. Read more Close

Are you sure you want to delete your account?

This cannot be undone.

Cancel

Thank you for your feedback which will help us improve our service.

If you requested a response, we will make sure to get back to you shortly.

×
Please fill in the required fields in your feedback submission.
×