Cambridge University Press
0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL LITERATURE 48
Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
In medieval society, gestures and speaking looks played an even more important
part in public and private exchanges than they do today. Gestures meant more
than words, for example, in ceremonies of homage and fealty. In this, the first
general study of its kind in English, John Burrow examines the role of non-verbal
communication in a wide range of narrative texts, including Chaucer’s Troilus and
Criseyde, the anonymous Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Malory’s Morte Darthur,
the romances of Chrétien de Troyes, the Prose Lancelot, Boccaccio’s Il Filostrato,
and Dante’s Commedia. Burrow argues that since non-verbal signs are in general
less subject to change than words, many of the behaviours recorded in these texts,
such as pointing and amorous gazing, are familiar in themselves, yet may prove
easy to misread, either because they are no longer common, like bowing, or because
their use has changed, like winking.
john burrow is Emeritus Professor and Research Fellow in the Department of
English at Bristol University. He has published widely on Middle English literature.
His books include Medieval Writers and Their Work (1982).
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Cambridge University Press
0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL LITERATURE
General editor
Alastair Minnis, University of York
Editorial board
Patrick Boyde, University of Cambridge
John Burrow, University of Bristol
Rita Copeland, University of Pennsylvania
Alan Deyermond, University of London
Peter Dronke, University of Cambridge
Simon Gaunt, King’s College, London
Nigel Palmer, University of Oxford
Winthrop Wetherbee, Cornell University
This series of critical books seeks to cover the whole area of literature written in
the major medieval languages – the main European vernaculars, and medieval
Latin and Greek – during the period c. 1100–1500. Its chief aim is to publish and
stimulate fresh scholarship and criticism on medieval literature, special emphasis
being placed on understanding major works of poetry, prose, and drama in relation
to the contemporary culture and learning which fostered them.
Recent titles in the series
Margaret Clunies Ross Old Icelandic Literature and Society
Donald Maddox Fictions of Identity in Medieval France
Rita Copeland Pedagogy, Intellectuals and Dissent in the Later Middle Ages:
Lollardy and Ideas of Learning
Kantik Ghosh The Wycliffite Heresy: Authority and Interpretation of Texts
Mary C. Erler Women, Reading, and Piety in Late Medieval England
D.H. Green The Beginnings of Medieval Romance: Fact and Fiction, 1150–1220
A complete list of titles in the series can be found at the end of the volume.
© Cambridge University Press
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Cambridge University Press
0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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Gestures and Looks in
Medieval Narrative
J. A. BURROW
© Cambridge University Press
www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
Frontmatter
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published by the press syndicate of the university of cambridge
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C J. A. Burrow 2002
This book is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without
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First published 2002
Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge
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© Cambridge University Press
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Cambridge University Press
0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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For Diana
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0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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Such shapes, such gesture, and such sound expressing
(Although they want the use of tonge) a kinde
Of excellent dumbe discourse.
The Tempest
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0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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Contents
Acknowledgements
List of abbreviations
1
2
3
4
5
6
page x
xi
Introduction
Gestures
Looks
Two Middle English narratives
Dante’s Commedia
Afterword
1
11
69
114
156
180
Bibliography
Index of names and titles
Index of signs
186
196
199
ix
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0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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Acknowledgements
I am grateful to colleagues who have given me advice and information:
Richard Gregory, Nick Havely, Christian Kay, Richard Lewis, Bella
Millett, Jonathan Nicholls, John Parkin, Rhiannon Purdie, Ad Putter,
Frank Shaw, Myra Stokes, Matthew Strickland, and Barry Windeatt.
I have also enjoyed and benefited from discussions at the Oxford
Dante Society, the St Andrews Medieval Society, the Second International Langland Conference, and the Bristol Centre for Medieval
Studies. The Bristol University Library and its Interlibrary Loans department have done much to facilitate my work.
x
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0521815649 - Gestures and Looks in Medieval Narrative
J. A. Burrow
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Abbreviations
DOST
EETS
MED
NVC
OED
STS
Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue
Early English Text Society (E.S. Extra Series, S.S.
Supplementary Series)
Middle English Dictionary
non-verbal communication
Oxford English Dictionary
Scottish Text Society
xi
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