British Literature

Anglo-Saxon Theories of Prayer at Kalamazoo’s 48th Medieval Congress
Stephanie Clark, U of Oregon
degree at U of Illinois
small taste of her book on Gift Theory of Prayer

Catholic Homily 131—praying over xxx with paternoster rather than chanting to enchant them…

“if prayer is at the heart of religion…. the use of prayer that Aelfric advocates has real implications for the way that AS …

usually looked at this prayer as charm creation

Obviously none of us like it when the medievalists ignore the Dark Ages, but some of it is the type of prayer, set prayer as opposed to personal or contemplative prayer. We assume that highest form of prayer is the individual soul gaining knowledge of the divine.

As in Christianity in general, not a lot of OE… but Aelfric and Bede… place prayer in the context of gift exchange.
Xianity uses gift exchange, models.
AS Eng added native English practices of gift…

both use language and obligation of gift, when talking about prayer
both cases practices of lordship are related to Germanic expectations
both wary of certain exchange models
both articulate different limits/boundaries to reciprocity

gift theory… gifts have a so-to-speak voluntary character…
100 years of gift theory… to tease out…

question of self-interest
gifts are constrained and self-interested

opposition between interested gifts and selfless gift is important in modern experience
we are uncomfortable with gift giving.
pure gift has particular ideological implication

quite often gift giving’s continuum goes from self-interest and selfishness
Those who try to blur the line between the two are selling something.

considering Bede, would expect to find strong reciprocity in Aelfric
exchange model is ideal gift (or balanced reciprocity)

commodity makes relationship between commodity
gift exchange expresses relationship between the givers
(restrained and self-interested)

to spell out responsibilities is to destroy gift…
gift is already insincere, because talked about one way and used in another

How can we tell if intention is pure or gift is counterfeit?

Litany of the Saints and the Literary History of OE Hagiography at Kalamazoo’s 48th Medieval Congress
Robin Norris, Carleton U
assoc professor, degree from U of Toronto
finishing monograph called Litany of the Saints…
paper is a preview

all female saints are classed as virgins, no matter who/how they are

divided into apostle, martyr, confessor, virgin

Aelfric is more concerned about confessors.
boom of Aelfric scholarship, but litany not studied until Norris (speaker)

analysis of what is happening in each text:
All Saints homily…
1st half (l. 1-146)
willing to alter source text
source puts anchorites after virgins, Aelfric moves anchorites to be sub-category of confessors
moves Mary to virgins, “in order according to her female gender”
Litamus included men and women in virgin list
Aelfric, however, included only women and showed martyred and unmartyred

Excusatio dictantis
“a few homilies in common about apostles and martyrs, confessors and holy women, for the glory of Christ”

No women were in the Catholic homilies.

homilies to be used ad hoc
Aelfric discusses relationships of the homilies
for holy women, he features the story from Matthew on ten virgins

martyrs undermine devils
confessors undermine heretics
martyrs and confessors are paralleled in their responsibilities

Confessor… umbrella term, every possible type of non-martyred saints.
Aelfric makes same move when brings together priests and anchorites.
lists men who are monks and bishops “very holy men whom we call confessors”
Aelfric keeps translating the OE andetteras and states we call these things confessors (Latin).
He is citing the Litany of the Saints.

saints occupy choirs in heaven, have class levels,
minimize differences between martyrs and confessors

…
Latinic framework is historically ordered.
Virgins take the least important status/place for status.

Aelfric is concerned with treatment of confessors.

“Kinship, Etymology, Inheritance, and Vernacular Voice in OE Genesis A” at Kalamazoo 48th Medieval Congress
Joseph Leake, U of Connecticut
finishing MA and starting PhD

He was late to the session, came in after he was introduced.

biblical book of Genesis is about kinship
creation and maintenance of descendants
Aelfric wrote “book is called Genesis, because it is the first book and tells about each race/generation”
in Genesis A family relations, offspring, inheritances are telescoped
as a poem, language based strategies for conveying meaning
language and theme on etymological wordplay and literary linguistic feature

two-fold purpose:
how wordplay structure is used to highlight theme
examine language of play

examples of constructions outside Bible are on handout (but he had about 1/3 as he needed)

traditional body of texts on etymology
Jerome considered etymology in exegesis
Genesis 2:33 works fairly well as a wordplay in Hebrew and in Latin and in English…
Jerome is willing to stretch Latin virago to match with viro
Bede talks about parts of speech that work best in Hebrew, can work in Latin (or in English)

use of etymological verbal constructions occur across language, examples from Old Irish, Old Slavic, Isidore of Seville’s work

dialogue between vernacular and etymological Latin… imitates but finds its own way
process of adaptation/expansion

Genesis A uses wordplay that has no source in the Vulgate
etymological wordplay not centered around kinship, but features play on these kinship terms

whole study on wordplay that comes in Vulgate but adapted with different ideas

with wealth and with possessions is a wordplay instead of on death and dying
numerous instances of kinship terms which are not found in the Vulgate
jumble of kinship terms playing, draws together connections

importance to include but go beyond the Vulgate, it shows the way that adaptations are used for artistic purposes—in Genesis A, to focus on thematic emphasis

no text in AS England integrates OE into Latin works, however the patterns and etymologies in Genesis A, shows conscious and deliberate choices, showing relationship between learned culture and vernacular poetics

Sources of Anglo-Saxon Culture at Kalamazoo 48th Medieval Congress
sponsor: Sources of Anglo-Saxon Culture
organizer: Benjamin Weber, Cornell U
presider: Thomas D. Hill, Cornell U

The session is in Schneider 1130. The coordinators/organizers underestimated how many folks would want to come. There are more than 60 people and the room is completely full. Six folks are sitting on the floor in the aisle.

“Twice Brewed Ale and Other Anglo-Saxon Concoctions” at Kalamazoo 48th Medieval Congress
Stephen C. Law, U of Central Oklahoma

god ealu “good ale” (good yallow)

suran ealu “sour ale” (means it has not turned out as well, cedovactor? destroys ale, sanitation is important, many a homebrew has ended up being sour)
Flanders has sour ale (Flemish browns); puckering…
Medieval sour ale on tap at Bell’s right now.

strangen ealu “strong ale” alcoholic preservation is also important, besides hops
make life in the mead hall more pleasant

strang hluttor ealu “strong clear ale”
Silver Jubilee for Queen Elizabeth was a strong clear ale

ealdus ealu “old ale” and in the Leechbooks, major curative quality
“if beer survived, I can survive too.”

niwe ealu “new ale” with a freshness
ale wives, 3.5 days, interesting, beers can be drunk young… swiftness if done properly leads to a refreshing drink

twybrownum ealu “twice-brewed ale”
Twice Brewed Inn at Hadrian’s Wall… has no twice-brewed ale

All of this came to my attention through Peter Horn’s discussions of Anglo-Saxon ale.
Lecturing on AS brewing in Oslo today.
He thinks it is a curious term.

Ale, Beer, and Brewsters in England Judith Bennett did not cover
Brewing Mead did not cover
A History of Beer and Brewing ($78 for paperback), no mention of twice brewed ale
Max Nelson’s The Barbarian’s Beverage, no mention

Who does talk?
Richard Under Been in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
Ann Hagen A second Handbook of AS Food and Drink

Unger “possible medicinal advantages, presumably made from a second or third mashing” (24)

Hagen “technique of double brewing was evidently known… The wort would be used instead of water in a second mixture with more malt, and this second wort would be left to ferment, making a strong brew” (209)

opposing descriptions

Dr. Law decided Hagen could not possibly be right.

“Ann Hagen (1995) speculates (I think erroneously) that this would have been a mash that used wort instead of water; this makes little sense, scientifically or chemically, as the conversion of startches to sugars would be adversely affected by a wort that had already utilized the available water needed to bring about the required enzymatic reactions.” (Law, footnote 6)

Everyone concurred. (Law is a nationally ranked beer judge.)

So he brewed, in one day, 60 pounds of grain in three different configurations, one as a control.

This is what he ended up with:

Twicebrewed = 163 (dark, very sweet, malt syrup)
once-brewed =129
small-brewed = 1.068

side by side the three ales
22 days later
FG=1.110
6.943% abv (that is bad)

once brewed 1.041

small-brewed= 1.011

Footnote to “footnote 6”
Anne Hagen is partially right, a wort can indeed be used to make another mash.

But Richard Unger is probably right: the term probably means a “small beer.”

FASCINATING. An experiment in medieval brewing.

“Win of Wunderfatum: The Significance of Wine in Beowulf” at Kalamazoo 48th Medieval Congress
Sharon E. Rhodes, U of Rochester

hall as mead hall, a particular sort of hall in time, place
alcoholic beverages mentioned
mead 13x
ale 7x
beor 3x
win 3x, 5x with compounds—always with something wrong or about to go wrong

win of wunderfatum = feast after Grendel’s fight
3rd describing Beowulf before heading into the mere

win compound only when it has failed…

many sources attest to mead and ale in
baptismal beers, wedding beers, funeral beers

evocation of the good life for the Geats = mead, ale
wunderfatum = word with no inherently positive connotations
happens when they celebrate a false victory, false sense of security

in Beowulf mead and ale are joys of hall life, wine represents negative images of hall

illustrate the distinctions between wine and native drinks
There are benches and seats. No wine benches or seats.
25 in all for mead and beer, ordinariness

men drink alcohol every night
foreshadowing of disaster is only related to wine
Grendel’s death does not get rid of the old
Grendel’s mother has a legitimate grievance. both familiar and foreign, like wine

final use of wine, before Beo makes his speech
Unferth did not remember what he said before when he was drunk with wine

unnamed halls fail in society
mutual “great mead building”
Heorot referred to as mead hall
but poet calls it a Wine Hall when Grendel is on his way
also later when celebratory peace is celebrated too soon (before G’s mother attacks)
Wine Hall… part of dragon
deserted wine hall…
wine hall of the lament (failed)
mead hall is successful

part of other nouns and compounds; usual for the society
(in English con pan –with bread- gives us companion)

“Beer and the Body: Alcohol and Embodiment in Anglo-Saxon Culture” at Kalamazoo 48th Medieval Congress
Perry Harrison, Baylor U

mead hall life and associated traditions, early themes
drinking and related traditions helped determine the culture, the body social and physical

Mead Hall and practices related to structure, utilized as emblems of safety and danger of the community

Beowulf, line 5, cultural weight, “overturned the mead benches of his foes”

literal protection in the mead hall
but also a stable foundation for the construction of the culture’s social body

l. 92, 93 The Wanderer “where are the seats of feasts? Where are the revels of the hall?”

hefty fines against bringing trouble to the halls
“if while in a drinking party and they annoy each other, and one puts up with it, that one should be paid thirty shillings”
proof of value of mead hall

Alexander Bruce, 2001 “An Education in the Mead Hall: Beowulf’s Lessons for …”
storytelling found in the dynamic of the mead hall encourages the tribal youth

While mead hall dynamic is important, alcohol also had a more direct influence…
AS England (book) has diseases and treatments and alcohol by Cameron, draws on 9th Century Leech Book.
Beer is only mentioned in the Leechbook twice.
Ball’s text indicates pervasiveness of alcohol in AS England.
alcohol used for antiseptic, cleanser, pain reducer… wine also part of several remedies
not an incidental action, but a prominent component of their medical condition

Perry Harrison did a great paper. In a few years you will be able to read about this in his dissertation.

I am teaching Shakespeare with a graphic novel. I did this last semester and I will do it this semester. I think that when the students are reading something which wasn’t intended to be read, they need visuals. John McDonald’s The Tempest: The Graphic Novel (American English, Original Text) is a great work for this.

I particularly like it because it uses American spelling, but keeps the entirety of the text of the play in the book.

The students in general enjoy the graphic novel.

It also makes the quizzes more fun. I stick a picture of the character up and ask for an identification.

I purchased the teacher’s workbook for the text and have used it in class for exercises and activities. I would recommend it, if you want some ideas for in class work that you don’t have to think about in order to put together.

I chose this graphic novel, as opposed to one of his others, because this is one of Shakespeare’s romances (at least as defined by Chelsea Publishers) and I have written on it. None of the other romances is presently available from McDonald as a graphic novel. There are other graphic novels, but I haven’t seen them. I was at a conference when I saw this one and was immediately intrigued with the idea.

My British literature course used online texts primarily this semester. The students could purchase and use the anthology, but all the readings were online and marked in the calendar. We used the online versions in class and any quotes came from those.

There were also two graphic novels. One in addition to the literary text Gareth Hind’s Beowulf and one that was the literary text The Tempest.

At the end of class (and unfortunately after all the A students were gone), I asked folks to fill out a survey. (I had forgotten I needed to do it! Gotta put that in the calendar for next semester.)

It’s very interesting what people said in response to the survey. I didn’t know so many people bought the anthology and two people never read anything online except when it was up on the projector. Those two people also don’t own any mobile devices (smart phone, iPad, laptop).

Next semester’s class has the textbook only on the iPad. But I can’t list that in the course sign-up page, so that may cause an issue for some people who have signed up for the course. I hope not as I really need the course to make.

Maybe I should send an email out now to those students who have signed up for the course?

For this semester, where they were all web-based texts, there was a definite split in whether or not this should be done again–whether they thought it was a good idea for their class and would be for the next. It will be interesting to see if that split changes next semester.

I’m also going to be comparing the grades of the paper, web-based, and iPad textbook classes. That will also be interesting.