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Session 129 (MRDS)
Stage Properties and Material Culture in Early Drama
Thursday, 6 May, 3:30 p.m.–5:00 p.m.
Schneider Room 1125
“‘Beseyn aftyr a Busshop of the Hoold Lawe’: Clues for Costuming the
N-Town’s High Priests”
Paula von Loewenfeldt, Purdue Univ.
“Properties of Skill: Artisanal Props from the Mysteries to The Shoemaker’s
Holiday”
Jonathan Gil Harris, Ithaca College
“‘An imaginative ground-plat of a profitable invention’: From Medieval
Praxis to Early Modern Property in Elizabethan Drama”
Henry S. Turner, Columbia Univ.
Respondent: Margaret A. Pappano, Columbia Univ.
Note from the Organizer
This session offers three different approaches to the study of stage properties and the
material aspects of performance of late medieval and Renaissance drama. Paula
von Loewenfeldt demonstrates that costume directions in the N-Town Passion are
neither intentionally anticlerical nor blatantly antisemitic, as has been suggested; rather,
they are inherently, even deliberately, ambiguous. She uncovers evidence of economic
corruption and institutional strife in and among the power structures of town, monastery
and bishopric in East Anglia. This evidence is borne out in Satan’s prologue, the
Passion proper, and the costume directions. Jonathan Gil Harris’ essay
considers two distinct notions of props as property: first, as membership within a corporate
body; and, second, as privately owned capital asset. These two notions are made visible in
early English drama through metatheatrical episodes that in certain respects anticipate the
twentieth-century practice of product placement. Many of the props of the late medieval
cycle plays advertise themselves as both products and theatrical emblems of a guild
economy in which property was understood to constitute membership within a
communitas or network of social relations. By contrast, the props of the Elizabethan
professional theater companies demand to be seen largely as a nascent form of capital;
they often functioned as profitable investments by means of which companies could
advance their wealth and social standing. Henry S. Turner traces the history of the
concept of “plot,” and argues that modern structural notions of dramatic form
derive from the use of rudimentary geometrical methods by the late-medieval mason, carpenter,
and land surveyor. The term plot designated the schematic working drawings used by the
mason or the carpenter, as well as a parcel of land. In its verbal form (to plot, plotting,
platting) it described the act of measuring and reducing to a two-dimensional pattern
through the use of basic geometrical operations. The term also designated intrigue,
trickery, or cleverness, and the convergence of these two meanings in the drama itself
provided a notion of dramatic “form.” The paper then will examine the use of stage
properties known as platts—schematics of stage action used to organize the
actors’ entrances and exits—in the public theaters of the late-sixteenth century.
Session 228 (MRDS)
Early Drama and the Celtic World
Friday, 7 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Schneider Room 1125
“‘The Strong Man’: Problems of Translation of a Medieval Welsh Morality
Play”
Sarah Campbell, Boston Univ.
“The York Cycle and the Cornish Ordinalia: A Study in Contrasts”
Alexandra Johnston, Univ. of Toronto
“Richard Carew’s ‘Ordinary’”
Philip Butterworth, Univ. of Leeds
“Ordered Chaos: Carnival in Southern Galicia”
Max Harris, Univ. of Wisconsin—Madison
Note from the Organizer
This well-rounded session on Early Drama and the Celtic World will feature papers on
text and performance, as well as on elements of both religious and popular culture—not to
mention some lurid spectacle—from three Celtic zones. First, Sarah Campbell will
discuss linguistic dilemmas faced by those who choose to research the early drama of
Celtic Britain. Following this contribution on an early 16th-century morality play,
Alexandra Johnston’s paper will bring the content and message of the lesser-known
Middle Cornish cycle into a dialogue with the well-known plays from York. Next, Phillip
Butterworth will add to our understanding of Cornish drama and address issues related
to the nature of performance, theatrical conventions, and actors’ roles and the use of
language/speech in early Cornish productions. And finally, Max Harris will transport
us to a third Celtic zone and add a touch of the carnivalesque with a paper that promises
“‘live action’ footage” (video and slides) of “ant-flingers,”
“men in diapers, and satirical (and very vulgar) floats satirizing the Pope’s visit
to Cuba.” For those who have wondered what the Celtic world has to offer the scholar of
early drama, this session will provide a rich sample of food for thought. Join us for the
feast.
Session 281 (MRDS)
The Rhetoric of Early Drama
Friday, 7 May, 3:30 p.m.–5:00 p.m.
Schneider Room 1125
“Rhetorical Audiences and Situations in Medieval English Drama”
Chet Scoville, Univ. of Toronto
“Overreachers: Verbal Performance and Power in Shakespeare’s Henry Plays”
Michael Harrawood, Univ. of Wyoming
“Vicious Rhetoric in Like Will to Like”
Douglas Hayes, Univ. of Toronto
Note from the Organizer
The three papers in this session approach a wide variety of English plays from the point
of view of their rhetorical construction. Chet Scoville examines the Towneley play of
“Thomas of India” as an exploration of the limitations of rhetoric when dealing with
the mysteries of Incarnation and Resurrection. Michael Harrawood considers Joan of
Arc’s “circle in the water” speech (Henry VI Pt. I, 1/3) as an example of what
Puttenham called ‘overreaching,’ and expands this analysis to look at Joan’s
centrality to both the action and the language of the early history plays. Doug Hayes
argues that the effectiveness of Nichol Newfangle depends upon his rhetorical virtuosity, and
that the moral ends of the play are complicated by a destabilized and ambivalent representation
of the dissident power of words.
In 1453, an elaborate pageant or “machine” greeted a certain member of the nobility. On it the patron of the town, St. Prospero, appeared to float, surrounded by cherubim and angels. Justice, attended by a genius, also appeared on this occasion; a car drawn by a unicorn followed a car in the form of a ship; the clergy furnished religious allegory in the lay-figure of Idolatry and the personification of Faith. When the girl representing the latter had addressed the noble traveler, the column supporting the former broke in pieces. Caesar, accompanied by the seven Virtues, also addressed the visitor, and after the service at the Cathedral, all the paginae persones rendered homage to the guest, while three angels flew down from an adjacent building.
Who was the recipient of this warm welcome? In what city did this ceremony take place?
There may not be a thousand clues,
But the answer you will surely find
Sometime in Fall, for peace of mind
If you pay your membership dues!
Session 83
The End of History in Medieval Drama
Thursday, 6 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Schneider Room 1125
“Recontextualizing the End of History: The Reception of the Chester
Antichrist”
Richard K. Emmerson, Western Washington Univ.
“The Tegernsee Ludus de Antichristo and the Liturgy of All Saints’
Day”
Kristina Rutledge, Catholic Univ. of America
“When and Where: The Fate of Souls in Late-Medieval Art and Theater”
Véronique Plesch, Colby College
Session 175
Laughter in Medieval Drama
Friday, 7 May, 10:00 a.m.–11:30 a.m.
Schneider Room 1125
“Ancient Mirth Hath Present Laughter: Humor in the York Plays”
Shirley Carnahan, Univ. of Colorado—Boulder
“Audience Responses to Mankind”
Michelle Butler and Anne Brannan, Duquesne Univ.
Respondent: Glending Olson, Cleveland State Univ.
Session 186
Medieval Song and Dance
Friday, 7 May, 10:00 a.m.–11:30 a.m.
Bernhard Center Room 208
“Patterns of Improvisation in Fifteenth-Century Choreographed Dances”
Jennifer Nevile, Univ. of New South Wales
“Image, Text, Performance: Dance as Shown in Medieval Manuscripts”
Jonathan Alexander, New York Univ.
“The Latin Poet as Performer: Improvised Song and Renaissance Humanists”
Ann Moyer, Univ. of Pennsylvania
Session 194
Late Medieval French Literature
Friday, 7 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Valley III Room 302
“‘Le Temps sur elle n’a pas de prise’: Rewriting Melusine’s
Metamorphosis”
Catherine M. Müller, Univ. of Lausanne
“Le Livre Messire Ode d’Othon de Grandson”
Jean-François Kosta-Théfaine, Sartrouville, France
“Pagans and Devils: Parallel Representations of Evil in Three French Saint’s
Plays”
Jennifer Tormey, Pennsylvania State Univ.
Session 197
Musicology V: Music for Festal Days
Friday, 7 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Valley III Stinson Lounge
“La Haye, Bibl. Royale de La Haye, 70 E 4, Section 3, Book I: The Feast of Corpus
Christi”
Barbara R. Walters, Kingsborough Community College—CUNY
“A Newly Recognized Polyphonic Christmas Gospel, Liber generationis: And
Another Look at the Polyphony in the Manuscript Assisi, Bibl. del Sacro Convento, MS.
695”
Julie Shinnick, Austin, Texas
“Osanna: New Light on the Palm Sunday Processional Antiphon Series”
Clyde Brockett, Christopher Newport Univ.
Session 238
Social Performances
Friday, 7 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Bernhard Center Room 208
“Hysterical Theatre? The Staging of Sickness in Late Medieval Dominican
Mysticism”
Ulrike Wiethaus, Wake Forest Univ.
“The Performance of the Poor in Late Medieval Paris”
Nadine D. Pederson, CUNY
“Performing the Peace: Healing Miracles in the Peace of God”
P. J. Nugent, Earlham College
Session 291
Performing History, History of Performance
Friday, 7 May, 3:30 p.m.–5:00 p.m.
Bernhard Center Room 208
“Performing History: Geography as Prophecy in Matthew Paris’s Itinerary
Maps”
Daniel Connolly, Scottville, Michigan
“Woman and Literacy: Witnessing the Audio-Visual Text, ca. 1200”
Morgan Powell, Franklin College, Switzerland
“The Art of Advertising One’s Craft: Jongleurs vs. Writers”
Madeleine Jeay, McMaster Univ.
Session 370
Humor in the Medieval Theater: In Honor of Alan Knight
Saturday, 8 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Valley I Britton Lounge
“Humor and Critique in French Farce”
Konrad Schoell, PH Erfurt, Institut für Romanistik
“Why Do Fools Fall in Love? Or, Aspects of Fin’amors in Late Medieval
French Drama”
Deborah Hovland, SUNY College—Buffalo
“Serious Humor in the Spanish Autos Sacramentales”
Jay E. Moore, Hampton Univ.
“Des pastourelles aux comédies pastorales: comique changeant, comique
constant”
Elisabeth Caron, Indiana Univ. Northwest
Session 398
Medieval Drama in the Classroom
Saturday, 8 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Schneider Room 1220
“A Thief, His Wife, a Hoofed Child and the Birth of a Savior: The Second
Shepherd’s Play on Stage and in the Classroom”
Christine Cornell and Andrea Schutz, St. Thomas Univ.
Roundtable Discussion: “From Text to State: Aspects of Performance”
With Eckehard Simon, Harvard Univ.; Jesse Hurlbut, Brigham Young Univ.;
Yvonne LeBlanc, CIA; Evelyn Vitz, New York Univ.; Simonetta Cochis,
Transylvania Univ.; and David Bevington, Univ. of Chicago
Session 401
Performance and Medieval French Romance
Saturday, 8 May, 1:30 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Bernhard Center Room 208
“The Performer of and in Romance: Minstrel as Author, Narrator, Protagonist”
Marilyn Lawrence, New York Univ.
“Mise-en-texte as Indication of Oral Performance in Old French
Narrative”
Keith Busby, Univ. of Oklahoma
“Erotic Literacy and the Reading of Romance”
E. B. Vitz, New York Univ.
Session 493
Pilgrimage, Ritual, and Drama
Sunday, 9 May, 8:30 a.m.–10:00 a.m.
Schneider Room 1130
“The Pilgrimage in Gil Vicente”
Manuela Maria Ferreira Carvalho, Univ. of Birmingham
“High Hopes, Veiled Threats, and Business as Usual: Mary Stewart’s 1561 Entrance
into Edinburgh”
Karen Woodworth, Univ. of Chicago
“Wife on the Run: Female Liminality in Cymbeline”
Corinne S. Abate, New York Univ.
Session 510
Mary Magdalene in the Later Middle Ages II: The Continental Heritage
Sunday, 9 May, 10:30 a.m.–12:00 Noon
Valley III Room 312
“Conversion and Seduction in Nicole Bozon’s Life of Mary Magdalene”
Maureen Gillespie, Univ. of Kansas
“Mary Magdalene and the Virgin Mary as Joculatrices Dei: Franciscan Spirituality
in the Lyrics of the German-Latin Passion Play”
Peter Loewen, Univ. of Southern California
“Mary Magdalene and the Medieval City in Fifteenth-Century French Drama: A Comparison
of Gréban’s Mystère de la Passion and La Passion
d’Arras”
Kevin J. Ruth, Newark Academy and Rutgers Univ.
Session 525
Medieval Drama
Sunday, 9 May, 10:30 a.m.–12:00 Noon
Schneider Room 1130
“‘The Education of a Torturer’: The Psychological Impact of the York
Crucifixion Pageant”
Joan Faust, Southeastern Louisiana Univ.
“Audience and Actors: The York Cycle”
Megan S. Lloyd, King’s College
“Memory, Judgement, and History: Hell and the End of Time in the Play of the Last
Judgement”
M. Rick Smith, Kent State Univ.—Trumbull
Graham Runnalls of the University of Edinburgh has recently made available on the Internet a bibliography of medieval French religious drama. It includes an extensive list compiled over the course of twenty years of research on French mystery and miracle plays. The bibliography includes critical editions as well as more than 500 studies on medieval French religious drama.
The new bibliography complements Runnalls’ “Corpus du théâtre religieux français du Moyen Age,” an exhaustive list of medieval French miracle and mystery plays. Both bibliographies are hosted by the French Medieval Drama Database Project, which can be found at http://toisondor.byu.edu/fmddp.
Drama and Visual Culture
The three papers in this session broadened our original focus on visual culture to explore the complex dynamics of spectatorship in early performance. They remind us, as did James Stokes in his provocative “Talking Points,” that there is an abundance of unexplored evidence in the records for charting audience response and that in this area in particular “documentarians and theorists... have much of value to say to each other.”
In “Spectator as Actor in the Moveable Playworld of Parish Drama,” James Stokes drew on the early 17th-century records of May games and guild shows in Wells to demonstrate how “active, participatory, and unstable” was the role of the audience of this community-sponsored drama. The street theater of Wells transforms townscape into playworld and audience into actor, he argued, in a “complex and sophisticated social mimesis.” Lloyd Edward Kermode (“Playing the Past to Secure the Future”) centered his analysis of the “reciprocal, productive power of audience response” on the example of Henry VII’s visit to York in 1486. Such royal street theater shapes an imaginary whole out of incompatible materials to confirm a social “stability that does not yet exist” except in the hope invested in the monarch, the unifying center. Aimed at a dual audience—monarch and town populace, whose faith in one another must be constructed—the play is “a work in progress, a joint project of the monarch and his or her subjects.” In “Performing Reformation in the New World,” Beth Quitslund turned our attention to a very different kind of spectator—the Protestant observer of indigenous American ritual. Demonstrating both through verbal and visual examples the ways these European reformers reacted to native ritual and festival, she provided vivid proof of the transformative power of the spectator, in this case active (mis)readers of performances upon which they project their own ambivalence, “expressing alienation and even repugnance” for the rites and yet reshaping their representations to make the strange familiar.
Philip Butterworth, Theatre of Fire: Special Effects in Early English and Scottish Theatre. London: The Society for Theatre Research, 1998.
Audrey Davidson and Clifford Davidson, Performing Medieval Music Drama. Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications for the Society for Old Music, 1998.
Clifford Davidson, Material Culture and Medieval Drama. Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 1999. Introduction by the editor, and the following essays:
DUNBAR H. OGDEN
“Costumes and Vestments in the Medieval Music Drama”PHILIP BUTTERWORTH
“The Providers of Pyrotechnics in Plays and Celebrations”VERONIQUE PLESCH
“Notes for the Staging of a Late Medieval Passion Play”GLORIA J. BETCHER
“Makers of Heaven on Earth: The Construction of Early Drama in Cornwall”JESSE D. HURLBUT
“The Sound of Civic Spectacle: Noise in Burgundian Ceremonial Entries”MARY REMNANT
“Musical Instruments in Early English Drama”
Clifford Davidson, “The Sacrifice of Isaac in Medieval English Drama,” Papers on Language and Literature 35 (1999): 28–55.
Jody Enders, “Medieval Snuff Drama,” Exemplaria 10 (1998): 171–206.
Jody Enders, The Medieval Theater of Cruelty: Rhetoric, Memory, Violence. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999.
Alan Hindley, “Les VII Pechie Morteil: Dramatizing Sin in the Old French Moralité,” Romance Studies 32 (1998): 21-32.
Charles Mazouer, Le théâtre français du moyen âge. Paris: SEDES, 1998.
David Mills, Recycling the Cycle: The City of Chester and its Whitsun Plays. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998.
Contents: 1: Approaches to Early Drama; 2: Time and Space in Tudor Chester; 3: Writing the Record; 4: A Spectrum of Ceremonial and Entertainment; 5: The Midsummer Celebrations; 6: Religious Feasts and Festivals; 7: Professionalism Commercialism and Self-Advertisement; 8: The Past in the Present: The Text of the Whitsun Plays; 9: Manuscripts, Scribes and Owners; 10: Medievalism and Revival
Richard Rastall, The Heaven Singing: Music in Early English Religious Drama (paperback edition). Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell and Brewer, 1999.
Anne Sancier and Pierre Servet, eds. Les Genres insérés dans le théâtre. Lyon: Centre d’études des interactions culturelles, 1999.
MICHEL ROUSSE
“Jonglerie dans le théâtre des mystères,” 13–29.PIERRE SERVET
“L’insertion épique dans les mystères hagiographiques: la Vie de Sainct Christofle de Chevalet,” 31–45.
D. Smith, “Les manuscrits de théâtre: introduction codicologique des manuscrits qui n’existent pas,” Gazette du Livre Médiéval 33 (1998): 1–10.
Mercedes Travieso, “L’échec de la magie dans le Jeu de la Feuillée,” Sénéfiance 42, Centre universitaire d’études et de recherches médiévales d’Aix, Université de Provence: Aix-en-Provence, France, 1999, 531–546.
Mercedes Travieso, “Ficción y Realidad en el Jeu de la Feuillée de Adam de la Halle,” dissertation defended November 13, 1998, Universidad de Cádiz, Spain.
PATRICK RYAN
“Marlowe’s Edward II and the Medieval Passion Play”DOC ROSSI
“Hamlet and The Life of Galileo”ROBERT L. REID
“Epiphanal Encounters in Shakespearean Dramaturgy”STEPHEN K. WRIGHT
Review of Cox and Kastan, A New History of Early English DramaCLIFFORD DAVIDSON
Review of Claire Sponsler, Drama and ResistanceCLIFFORD RONAN
Review of C. Kahn, Roman ShakespeareCYNTHIA MARSHALL
Review of Jonathan Baldo, The Unmasking of DramaSARA EATON
Review of Richard Hillman, Self-Speaking in Medieval and Early Modern English Drama
BARBARA D. PALMER
“Staging the Virgin’s Body: Spectacular Effects of Annunciation and
Assumption”
DUNBAR OGDEN
“Costume Change in Liturgical Drama”
LYNETTE R. MUIR
“Further Thoughts on the Tale of the Profaned Host”
Reviews by Max Harris, Clyde Brockett, Cyrilla Barr, Timothy Graham, and Nils Holger Petersen
Performance reviews of performances of Hildegard of Bingen’s Ordo Virtutum by Rick Johnson (Sequencia in Ann Arbor) and Susan Weiss (performance at the Peabody Conservatory)
The first issue of Early Theatre is now available from McMaster University Press. Copies were mailed out to subscribers on December 14, but late subscribers are welcome. To subscribe, contact http://websites.mcmaster.ca/mupress/journals/et/journal.html.
To preview the contents of this volume, see
http://www.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~reed/early.
We are now accepting articles and notes for volumes 2 and 4. Volume 3 will be a special volume on the York Cycle, co-edited by Alexandra Johnston.
Helen Ostovich
Editor, Early Theatre
Dept of English CNH-321
McMaster University
Hamilton, ON, Canada L8S 4L9
(905) 525-9140 x24496
FAX (905) 777-8316
ALEXANDRA JOHNSTON
“At the Still Point of the Turning World: Augustinian Roots of Medieval Dramaturgy”PETER MEREDITH
“The Professional Travelling Players of the Fifteenth Century: Myth or Reality?”JOHN C. COLDEWEY
“The Way Things (Never) Were: Spiritual Nostalgia in Medieval English Plays”PETER HAPPE
“Cycle Plays: the State of the Art”ENRICO GIACCHERINI
“Theatrical Chaucer”GRAHAM CAIE
“Unfaithful Wives and Weeping Bitches ‘Den utro hustru’”ELSA STRIETMAN
“Pawns or Prime Movers? The Rhetoricians in the Struggle for Power in the Low Countries”JOHN CARTWRIGHT
“Modes of Performance at the Antwerp ‘Haagspel’ of 1561”JACQUES TERSTEEG
“The Fourteenth-Century, Middle-Dutch, Secular Play of ‘Esmoreit’”FEMKE KRAMER
“How to Stage an ‘Abel Spel’: Reflections on the Theatrical Treatment of Historical Play-texts”KUSUE KUROKAWA
“Producing the Harrowing of Hell and Last Judgement Plays in a Japanese Buddhist drama style”ROBERT POTTER
“The Holy Spectacles of Hildegard of Bingen”EVELYN S. NEWLYN
“Middle Cornish Drama at the Millennium”SYDNEY HIGGINS
“Playing the Serpent: Devil, Virgin or Mythical Beast?”JAY E. MOORE
“The Scapegoat in the Spanish ‘Auto Sacramental’”PETER THOMSON
“Gestus revisited: Ballam and Ballak in Chester”THERESIA DE VROOM
“In the Context of Rough Music: The Representation of Unequal Couples in Some Medieval Plays”ANDRE LASCOMBES
“Revisiting ‘The Croxton Play of Sacrament’: Spectacle and the Other’s Voice”LESLEY WADE SOULE
“Subverting the Mysteries: The Devil as Anti-Character”
Further details on the European Medieval Drama Journal are available at
http://www.leeds.ac.uk/theatre/emd/brepols.htm.
Dorset/Cornwall, the latest volume in the series, has just been published (eds. Rosalind Conklin Hays & C.E.McGee/Sally L. Joyce & Evelyn S. Newlyn, University of Toronto Press & Brepols Publishers, 1999). Further details on ordering are available at the REED website: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~reed/reed.html.
Please send information on recent publications not yet mentioned in the MRDS newsletter
to
Jesse Hurlbut
Dept. of French and Italian, 4002 JKHB
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
jesse_hurlbut@byu.edu
Erenstein, R. L., ed. Een theatergeschiedenis der Nederlanden: Tien eeuwen drama en theater in Nederland en Vlaanderen. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996., 915+xxiv pages, illustr.
Flanders and the Netherlands have long harbored a substantial tradition of dramatic activity. This rich volume chronicles 120 specific events over the course of ten centuries. Each chapter deals with a single moment in dramatic history and offers an thorough overview of its cultural context. The collection begins in 1130 with an Ordo Stellae copied for an abbey near Maestricht and ends in 1993 with the prize-winning innovations of Theu Boermans. Of specific interest to MRDS members are the first twenty chapters or so which cover such topics as minstrels, chambers of rhetoric, civic processions, and triumphal entries, in addition to specific plays such as Lanseloet, Mariken van nieumeghen, and Tielebuys.
Beautiful color and black and white illustrations as well as useful bibliographical annotations accompany each chapter.
—Jesse D. Hurlbut
The XIIIth Medieval-Renaissance Conference at Clinch Valley College
CALL FOR PAPERS
Deadline: June 10th, 1999
Clinch Valley College, Wise, Virginia
September 16–18, 1999
Keynote: Dolores Warwick Frese, University of Notre Dame; “The Wife of Bath as ‘Mother Tongue’: Chaucerian Allegories of Vernacular Practice”
Submissions are welcome on all topics of interest to Medieval and Renaissance scholars, including history, philosophy, English and foreign literature, art, music, and pedagogy.
Please submit a brief abstract accompanied by a one-page vita to
Tom Costa, Dept. of History and Philosophy
or
Amelia Harris, Dept. of Language and Literature
or
Ken Tiller, Dept. of Language and Literature
Clinch Valley College of the University of Virginia
Wise, VA 24293
Preliminary screening begins May 1st; the final deadline is June 10th.
Tom Costa
Dept. of History and Philosophy
Clinch Valley College
(540) 376-4573
Wise, VA 24293
tmc5a@pluto.clinch.edu
Gardens of Delight:
The Pleasures of the Middle Ages
CALL FOR PAPERS
Deadline: June 30, 1999
Saturday, October 23, 1999
Philosophy Hall, Columbia University
Keynote Address: Professor Louise Fradenburg, UC Santa Barbara
This conference will examine the topic of pleasure from a variety of angles. How did medieval people represent pleasure and theorize its uses and abuses? How do modern critical discourses of pleasure condition our responses to medieval texts and images? We will scrutinize the categories, terms, and purposes of pleasure in the Middle Ages, and we invite papers on material pleasures of all kinds and on vocabularies of secular love, mystical rapture, and other forms of enjoyment. We are equally interested in papers on how modern paradigms of pleasure inform our views of the period.
We welcome papers from all disciplines. Suggested topics include:
Feasting
Gaming and hunting
Friendship and love
Class, gender, and pleasure
Forbidden pleasures
May revels and popular pastimes
Meadhalls, inns, gardens, and places of pleasure
Mumming, music, dance, and drama
Eroticism
Virtues and vices
Pleasure and mysticism
Utopian and Edenic fantasies
Eloquence and Decorum
Jokes, Riddles, and word games
Beauty: art, architecture, and literature
Modern theories, medieval texts
Graduate students and recent recipients of the Ph.D. in Art History and Architecture, Archaeology, History, Music, Philosophy, Religion, and all literature departments are invited to submit a 250-word abstract and cover letter indicating any audiovisual requirements to:
Medieval Guild
Dept. of English and Comparative Literature
602 Philosophy Hall-MC 4927
Columbia University
New York, NY 10027-4927
For further information, please contact:
Mary Agnes Edsall
mae4@columbia.edu
(212) 666-5394
Lisa H. Cooper
lhc11@columbia.edu
(212) 280-6451
Heather Blurton
hfb8@columbia.edu
(212) 316-6507
6th Annual ACMRS Interdisciplinary Conference
“Fear and Its Representations in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance”
CALL FOR PAPERS
Deadline: October 1, 1999
The Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Arizona State University invites session and paper proposals for its sixth annual interdisciplinary conference, February 17–19, 2000. The Center welcomes papers that explore any topic related to the study and teaching of the Middle Ages and Renaissance and especially those that focus on this year’s theme of fear. Papers may address, for example, the role fear of such things as torture, the exchange of hostages, public punishment, and dismemberment plays as a deterrent in secular matters; or they may investigate literal fear, such as fear of hell and damnation, fear of battle, fear of love, and fear of losing love, or other relevant topics. The plenary speaker will be R. I. Moore (University of Newcastle), author of The Formation of a Persecuting Society: Power and Deviance in Western Europe, 950–1250 (1987) and The Origins of European Dissent (1977).
WORKSHOP
The conference will also host “The Medieval Book: A Workshop in Codicological
Practice.” This pre-conference, half-day workshop led by Richard Clement, University of
Kansas, will focus on the making of the medieval codex. Participants will discuss the production
of parchment, paper, pens, and ink, and then will make several quires in preparation for
writing. Note: This workshop does not cover scripts and is not calligraphic.
DEADLINE
By October 1, 1999, send two copies of session proposals or one-page abstracts, along with two
copies of your current c.v. and the audiovisual request form (available on the website), to
Robert E. Bjork
Director, ACMRS
Arizona State University
Box 872301
Tempe, AZ 85287-2301
Email:
acmrs@asu.edu
(602) 965-5900 Fax: (602) 965-1681
Access our website http://www.asu.edu/clas/acmrs or contact ACMRS for more information.
Medieval Horror
Pembroke College, Cambridge, UK
10 July 1999
What did it mean to feel FEAR in the Middle Ages? What was it like to experience PAIN? Where was the pleasure in HORROR?
This conference will address the nuances of medieval horror by seeking to place emotions like “fear” and “pain” in a cultural context. What were the particular resonances of the medieval sense of horror that set it apart from today? Where, in a culture obsessed with representing emotions of terror, was the pleasure in horror? How were feelings such as fear and pain harnessed to religious ends, for example in representations of hell and punishment? How were pollutant bodily fluids such as blood and faeces invested with connotations of danger? Why were certain social groups marginalised with reference to their terrifying characteristics? And can we speak of a medieval fear of ghosts and the undead? It is hoped that “Medieval Horror” will provide an interdisciplinary forum in which to debate such questions.
For more information, see http://www.cam.ac.uk/CambUniv/Societies/medart/horr1.htm.
International Medieval Congress
University of Leeds
IMC 1999, 12–15 July
The IMC ’99 is hosted by the International Medieval Institute at the University of Leeds. It will include 300 sessions on all aspects of the European Middle Ages (c. 450–1500), events and excursions. IMC ’99 will feature interdisciplinary special thematic strands on Saints and on Encyclopaedias and Storytelling. Keynote lectures on these topics will be given by Prof. Peter Brown and Prof. Kenneth Varty.
Contact the Congress Administration at the address below for further information and registration forms.
IMC 2000, 10–13 July
Call for Sessions/Call for Papers
Deadline: Papers—31 August 1999
Sessions—30 September 1999
At IMC 2000 papers and sessions are particularly encouraged on the theme of Time and Eternity, as a special strand will be dedicated to this area of resarch. However, as in previous years, papers and sessions on all aspects of Medieval Studies are most welcome.
The deadline for submitting individual paper proposals for IMC 2000 is 31 August 1999. Proposals for full sessions of three 20-minute papers should be submitted by 30 September 1999.
An information package including Proposal Forms for IMC 2000 may be obttained from the address below. Additional information can also be found on our website.
Marianne O’Doherty or Josine Opmeer
International Medieval Congress
International Medieval Institute, Parkinson 1.03
University of Leeds
LEEDS LS2 9JT
+44 (0113) 233-3614 Fax: +44 (0113) 233-3616
Email: IMC@leeds.ac.uk
Website:
http://www.leeds.ac.uk/imi/imc/imc.htm
York Early Music Festival
2–11 July 1999
Britain’s premier festival of early music takes full advantage of the myriad of houses, guild halls and historic churches of the ancient city of York. Enjoy candlelit concerts, illustrated lectures, coffee concerts, walks, talks and exhibitions featuring some of the world’s finest early music specialists. Guests joining the festival this year include the Italian ensemble Mala Punica making their UK debut on Friday 9th July, the SCASA Chorale from Soweto, South Africa in a concert with the early music vocal specialists I Fagiolini on Tuesday 6th July, and the Tibetan Monks from the Tashi Lhunpo Monastery presenting a concert of sacred Mask Dances and Sacred Music on Tuesday 6th July.
Further details of the festival are available from:
Festival OfficeAspects of European Medieval Drama
Camerino, Italy
August 5–8, 1999: Conference
August 1–8, 1999: Medieval Festival
July 26–August 6: Medieval Drama Workshops
The fourth annual “European Medieval Drama” conference, workshops and festival are being organized jointly by the European Medieval Drama Council and the University of Camerino.
The MEDIEVAL FESTIVAL will take place from 1–8 August 1999 when there will be: concerts of medieval music; plays presented in the open-air by companies from the USA, the UK, Ireland, Germany, Holland and Italy; street performers; street restaurants; a medieval joust; dancing; and a Latin mass with medieval choral music.
As a part of the activities, there will be a series of practical workshops on aspects of medieval drama.
A. THE PRINCIPAL WORKSHOPS
Each morning, Monday to Friday from 09.30–12.30, there will be a choice of six intensive
workshops on aspects of medieval drama performance, each led by a renowned expert: 1. Mask
Making and Articulated Costumes; 2. Silk Painting of Costumes and Carnival Make-up; 3.
European Medieval Dances; 4. Secular Medieval Choral Music; 5. The Fool in the Medieval
Theatre—An Acting Workshop; 6. Physical and vocal preparation for medieval
performances. Participants in each of these workshops will be involved in the presentation of a
small final performance during the Festival.
B. THE SUBSIDIARY WORKSHOPS
Each afternoon there will be a choice of activities: either
1) an Italian language course for beginners or 2) a series of 2-session workshops including: The
Medieval Art of Flag-throwing, Stilt-walking, Church bell-ringing, Long-bow archery, The
recorder for beginners.
For more information, contact:
Sydney Higgins
Conference and Festival Organiser
“European Medieval Drama”
email: gorgiano@unicam.camserv.it
The 1999 SITM newsletter, mailed to members in February, included the minutes of the August 1998 business meeting, the SITM statutes (brief and to the point), a list of national representatives, and the address of SITM’s new website: http://www.sdu.dk/hum/sitm. The website contains SITM news and (through April 1999) copies of all the papers from the 1998 colloquium. Papers not available before the colloquium will remain on the website until July 1999.
If you believe you are a member of SITM but did not receive a newsletter, if you received a newsletter but haven’t paid your dues and your conscience is bothering you, or if you would like to join SITM, please contact Max Harris, Wisconsin Humanities Council, 802 Regent Street, Madison, WI 53715 (tel: 608/262-0706; email: MRHARRI1@FACSTAFF.WISC.EDU). The modest membership fee is $15 p.a.
The next triennial SITM conference will be in Groningen (Netherlands) during the third week of July 2001, immediately following the International Medieval Conference in Leeds (UK).
Fall 1999 Tour: Twelfth Night
Sept. 20–26: Middle Tennessee State University, Murfreesboro, TN
Sept. 27–Oct. 3: University of the South, Sewanee, TN
Oct. 4–10: University of Texas–San Antonio
Oct. 11–17: University of Texas at Austin
Oct. 18–24: Michigan Technological University, Houghton, MI
Oct. 25–31: Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw, GA
Nov. 1–7: Hope College, Holland, MI
Nov. 8–14: Lawrence University, Appleton, WI
Nov. 15–21: University of Delaware, Newark, DE
Information on ACTER and the Fall Tour can be found at http://www.unc.edu/depts/acter/.
Kate Egerton, ACTER
kegerton@email.unc.edu
(919) 967-4265 (phone/fax)
Mail to: 1100 Willow Drive
Chapel Hill, NC 27514
Gerard NeCastro of the University of Maine at Machias was responsible for a production of Occupation and Idleness, which was performed both at UMM and at the New England Medieval Association. Occupation and Idleness has long been neglected by scholars and directors; the only other production of this play in modern times was the 1994 Poculi Ludique Societas version produced by Terry Wade and directed by Doug Hayes in Toronto. The UMM production used the same text as the PLS production, which NeCastro also edited, modernized and abridged.
For more information, see the web announcement at http://www.umm.maine.edu/faculty/gnecastr/getmdvl.htm.
The Guilds of York, for the first time in 400 years, presented their Mystery Plays in the city streets on 12 July 1998. The entire pageant waggon production was filmed at Station Two (King's Square, York) on Outside Broadcast equipment by four professional cameramen. The video is now on sale in three parts, each tape lasting 1 hour.
Tape One
1: Creation to Fifth Day: Guild of Building with York College
2: Creation of Adam and Eve: Parish of Wheldrake
3: Fall of Adam and Eve: Poppleton Players
4: Flight into Egypt: Foxwood Players
5: Temptation of Christ: Gild of Freemen
Tape Two
6: Agony in the Garden: Company of Cordwainers
7: Death of Christ: Company of Butchers with Howdenshire Live Arts
8: Harrowing of Hell: St Luke’s Church
Tape Three
9: The Incredulity of Thomas: Guild of Scriveners
10: Ascension: Lords of Misrule for the Company of Merchant Taylors
11: Doomsday: York Settlement Players for the Company of Merchant Adventurers
York Mystery Plays 1998 was directed by Jane Oakshott for York Early Music Festival and the Guilds of York.
The wide variety of plays, the street audience, the waggons, the technical quality—all combine to make the tapes a highly entertaining teaching tool. The cost is $100 (£69.00) for the set, including package and posting. Money should be wired direct in Sterling currency. To receive a pro forma invoice and bank details, contact:
James Waterhouse, Integrated Media Services
email: IMS
mystery@integrated-media.demon.co.uk
fax: +44 (01274) 581766
Do you have a site you’d like to see listed on the Digital Resources page? Send the URL to Jesse Hurlbut (jesse_hurlbut@byu.edu).
Early European Drama Translation Series
http://www.acad.cua.edu/as/engl/eedt.htm
EDAM Web Page
http://www.wmich.edu/medieval/research/edam/
Perform discussion group
http://toisondor.byu.edu/perform/
To subscribe, send email to:
listserv@listserv.indiana.edu
with the following line in the body of the message:
subscribe PERFORM FIRST_NAME LAST_NAME
Perform Archives:
http://listserv.indiana.edu/archives/perform.html
Poculi Ludique Societas: Medieval & Renaissance Players of Toronto
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/~medieval/www/pls/
REED Web Page
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~reed/reed.html
REED-L discussion group
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~reed/reed-l.html
To subscribe, send email to:
listserv@listserv.utoronto.ca with the following line
in the body of the message: subscribe REED-L FIRST_NAME LAST_NAME
Atlantia Medieval Drama and Theater Links
Thoughtfully edited list of both medieval and renaissance drama links.
http://moas.atlantia.sca.org/topics/dram.htm
French Medieval Drama Database Project
Bibliographies (including a new bibliography for the Jour dou Jugement) and
miniatures from theatre manuscripts.
http://toisondor.byu.edu/fmddp/
Medieval English Drama: Modernized Performance Texts
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~ajohnsto/
REED Links for Theatre History: Mediaeval and Early Modern Theatre
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~reed/stage.html#med-em
Net Serf Medieval Drama Page
http://netserf.cua.edu/drama/
The Complete Works of Christopher Marlowe: An Electronic Edition
Crane, Gregory R. (ed.) The Perseus Project
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Texts/Marlowe.html, April, 1999
The Complete Works of Christopher Marlowe is part of a growing database of Renaissance texts compiled and edited as part of the Perseus Project at Tufts University. This impressive site offers complete electronic texts of Marlowe’s writings along with variants as they appear in several different early editions. Much to their credit, the editors have made creative attempts to exploit the interactive potential that the web offers.
From the home page, visitors can follow a preliminary menu to Drama, Poetry, Translations or Miscellaneous. Following the links to Tamburlaine the Great, Part 1, leads us to a table of contents dividing the text into Marlowe’s front matter and separate links for each scene of the play. The initial stage directions appear in the list and facilitate the identification of each scene. The most interesting feature of this page and of all the pages that follow is a drop-down menu box at the top of the page that allows us to select which of 20 different editions of the text we want to consult. Pick an edition and click on the “Change now” button, and the page will update with the text from that edition. Click on any scene from the table of contents to begin reading the text itself. Each scene is on a separate page, but convenient links at both the top and bottom of each page move forward or backward through the scenes.
In the margin to the right of the text proper, one finds an editorial apparatus consisting of a list of the sigla of the alternate versions. At every point where the texts are at variance, the words or expressions in question are highlighted in the text and alternate editions are listed in the apparatus. To view the variant text, click on the siglum, and the page reloads with the full text of the same scene from the newly chosen edition. Unfortunately, this does not allow the reader to compare two versions at the same time. Moreover, the general page layout may lead to some disorientation, especially when flipping between different editions. The format of the apparatus creates different amounts of white space between lines of text. Since each version of the text has its own apparatus, the amount of white space at any point in the text varies. Line numbers are provided and facilitate somewhat the location of a given passage. In my browser, however, the line numbers are positioned too close to the text.
The managers of this site have addressed some of the disadvantages described above in their presentation of Dr. Faustus. Here, the reader has the choice of consulting the editions of 1604 or 1616, or The English Faust Book. In fact, linguistically modernized versions of each of these are also available. Any of these versions can be opened and compared to any of the others, which are presented in a facing window. This flexibility in the juxtaposed views of any two versions raises the potential research value of this site considerably. Nevertheless, I found myself somewhat lost amid the four different frames—especially when the navigation buttons slipped out of sight in the top frame.
In spite of some navigational difficulties, the information made available on these pages is extremely valuable. The theoretical implications of maintaining a separate apparatus for each edition of the play are also worth mentioning. A traditional collation depends on the selection of a base text. On these pages, however, the base text is simply whichever edition is currently on the screen. Although this arrangement makes it somewhat more difficult to visualize the precise relationship between the different editions, the elimination of a privileged base text offers a new paradigm for critical editors and readers alike.
In short, this site offers some excellent insight into the representation on the Internet of critical editions. A more efficient use of links and layout could create even clearer connections between different versions of the text.
The second release of this site appeared in September 1997. A very long wish list of works to be included in the online Library of Early Modern Sources/Resources/Analogues appears at the click of a link at the very bottom of the home page. The Perseus Project has been preparing interactive digital libraries and CD-ROMs of Roman, Greek, and other early texts since 1987.
—Jesse D. Hurlbut
Minutes from the Annual Business Meeting
Kalamazoo, MI
May 8, 1998
5:00 p.m.
Schneider 1135
Larry Clopper, Presiding
President: Milla Riggio
Vice President: John Coldewey
Secretary/Treasurer: Jesse Hurlbut
Council Members: Richard Emmerson, James Stokes and Paul Whitfield White
Since the new Vice President was taken from the ranks of the Council, three candidates (instead
of two) were elected into the Council.
KALAMAZOO 1999
Early Drama and the Celtic World (Gloria Betcher)
Stage Properties and Material Culture in Early Drama (Margaret Pappano)
The Rhetoric of Early Drama (David Klausner)
MLA 1999
Carnival and Popular Culture (Milla Riggio)
The Representation of Jews in Medieval and Early Modern Stage (Bob Clark)
Other topics remaining for future sessions:
Exotic or Non-European Influences on Drama (Max Harris)
Representing the Sacred (Gerard NeCastro)
Teaching Early Drama (Gloria Betcher)
The Function of Music in Early Drama
Digital Studies of Early Drama
Shirley Carnahan
Eckhard Simon
Garrett Epp
Jody Enders won a Guggenheim award to pursue her research on “The Social Context of Medieval French Drama.”
Call for Papers: “Improvisation in Drama, Music and Dance: History, Theory,
Practice”
May 2-4, 1999 Toronto.
Call for Papers: Medieval Academy at Kalamazoo 1999: Topic: Performance.
Call for Papers: The Third World Conference on Carnival. October 19-24, 1999, Trinidad and
Tobago.
Respectfully submitted,
Jesse D. Hurlbut
May 16, 1998
President: Milla Riggio, Trinity College (Hartford, CT):
milla.riggio@mail.trincoll.edu
Vice President: John Coldewey (1999), Univ. of Washington:
jcjc@u.washington.edu
Secretary/Treasurer: Jesse D. Hurlbut, Brigham Young Univ.:
jesse_hurlbut@byu.edu
Shirley E. Carnahan (2002), Univ. of Colorado, Boulder:
carnahan@spot.colorado.edu
Garrett PJ Epp (2002), Univ. of Alberta:
Garrett.Epp@ualberta.ca
Richard Emmerson (2001), Western Washington Univ.:
rickem@henson.cc.wwu.edu
James Stokes (2001), Univ. of Wisconsin—Stevens Point:
jstokes@uwsp.edu
Paul Whitfield White (2001), Purdue Univ.
paul@purdue.edu
Robert Potter (2000), Univ. of California—Santa Barbara:
potter@humanitas.ucsb.edu
Max Harris (2000), Wisconsin Humanities Council:
mrharri1@facstaff.wisc.edu
Theresa Coletti (1999), Univ. of Maryland:
Theresa_M_Coletti@umail.umd.edu
© 1999 Medieval and Renaissance Drama Society
Editor: Jesse D. Hurlbut
Assistant Editor: Katherine Hanson
Department of French and Italian
4002 JKHB
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
jesse_hurlbut@byu.edu