English Alliterative Verse

English Alliterative Verse Poetic Tradition and Literary History - Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature

Paperback (24 Jan 2019)

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Publisher's Synopsis

English Alliterative Verse tells the story of the medieval poetic tradition that includes Beowulf, Piers Plowman, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, stretching from the eighth century, when English poetry first appeared in manuscripts, to the sixteenth century, when alliterative poetry ceased to be composed. Eric Weiskott draws on the study of meter to challenge the traditional division of medieval English literary history into Old English and Middle English periods. The two halves of the alliterative tradition, divided by the Norman Conquest of 1066, have been studied separately since the nineteenth century; this book uses the history of metrical form and its cultural meanings to bring the two halves back together. In combining literary history and metrical description into a new kind of history he calls 'verse history', Weiskott reimagines the historical study of poetics.

Book information

ISBN: 9781316620700
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Imprint: Cambridge University Press
Pub date:
DEWEY: 821.009
DEWEY edition: 23
Language: English
Number of pages: 250
Weight: 384g
Height: 150mm
Width: 229mm
Spine width: 22mm