Vikings, Mongols, Moors:
A Global Middle Ages, Yesterday and Today
ENGL 3830.10 (CRN 15259)
Prof. Jonathan Hsy
Tue/Thu 9:35-10:50
Game of Thrones, Lord of the Rings, Merlin, Vikings, Harry Potter: in popular
media, tales of conflict, romance, and magic set in the medieval past have an
enduring appeal. What are the literary origins that gave rise to such forms of
contemporary media? How do fantasies about the medieval past inform
contemporary culture and global geopolitics?
This course will examine how medieval storytelling traditions shape popular
media (including film and TV, visual art, spoken word poetry, and internet
fandom communities). We will read representative works of medieval literature
and discover how these texts inform present-day cultural issues as wide-ranging
as religious conflict, ethnic identity, and the mysteries of love.
In our readings of medieval texts, we will approach the historical Middle Ages as a time
of perpetual change. We will witness warriors, housewives, merchants, nuns, poets,
pilgrims, intellectuals, and outcasts adapting to a world in motion and imagining
alternate forms of life far from home. Major texts will include Beowulf, Vinland Sagas,
Marco Polo’s Discovery of the World, Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, The Book of Margery
Kempe, Arthurian romances, and Shakespeare’s Othello.
Our examination of modern-day media includes the Game of Thrones franchise, and
we will consider how the Western medieval past is appropriated across AngloAmerican, indigenous, Jewish, Asian American, and African diaspora contexts.
Assignments include a close reading, review of a current form of media (such as a TV
series, film, or graphic novel), and a final project that integrates literary analysis and
contemporary scholarship.
No previous experience with medieval literature is required. All medieval texts will be
provided in modern English (or bilingual) translation.
This course fulfills the pre-1700 requirement of the English major.
REQUIRED TEXTS:
Beowulf (tr. Seamus Heaney)
Geoffrey Chaucer: The Canterbury Tales
Ibn Fadlan and the Land of Darkness
The Book of Margery Kempe
Sir Thomas Malory: Le Morte Darthur [The Death of Arthur]
Sir John Mandeville: Book [Travels] of John Mandeville
George R.R. Martin: A Song of Ice and Fire [novel]
Marco Polo: Description of the World
William Shakespeare: Othello
The Vinland Sagas
RECOMMENDED TEXTS:
Penguin Historical Atlas of the Medieval World (Jotischky & Hull)
Refugee Tales (ed. Herd & Pincius)
Travels of Ibn Battutah (tr. Mackintosh-Smith)