Poetics of the Incarnation: Middle English Writing and the Leap of Love

324 Pages·2012·3.587 MB·English

by  Cristina Maria Cervone

Poetics of the Incarnation
The Middle Ages series
ruth Mazo Karras, series editor
edward Peters, Founding editor
A complete list of books in the series is available from the publisher.
Poetics of the Incarnation
Middle English Writing and the Leap of Love
Cristina Maria Cervone
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia
Copyright © 2012 University of Pennsylvania Press
All rights reserved. except for brief quotations used for purposes of
review or scholarly citation, none of this book may be reproduced in any
form by any means without written permission from the publisher.
Published by
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104–4112
www.upenn.edu/pennpress
Printed in the United states of America on acid-free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data
isBN 978–0–8122–4451–9
Cervone, Cristina Maria.
Poetics of the incarnation : Middle english writing and the leap of love
/ Cristina Maria Cervone. — 1st ed.
p. cm. — (The Middle Ages series)
isBN 978-0-8122--4451-9 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Christian poetry, english (Middle)—history and criticism.
2. Poetics—history—To 1500. 3. incarnation in literature. i. Title.
ii. series: Middle Ages series.
Pr365.C47 2012
821.1093823—dc23 2012015055
for my parents,
who first taught me what love is, and encouraged me to leap
*
set me as a seal upon your heart
as a seal upon your arm
for love is strong as death
*
ecce in manibus meis descripsi te
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Contents
introduction 1
Chapter 1. The “enigma” of signification in “Figurative” language 19
Chapter 2. elisions of Abstract and Concrete, epitomized
in a “True-love” 56
Chapter 3. Agency: When Christ as “doer” is Also the “love deed” 85
Chapter 4. Time in Narrative: The Teleology of history Meets the
Timelessness of god “in plenitudo temporis” 124
Chapter 5. “he is in the mydde point”: Poetic deep structure and
the Frameworks of incarnational Poetics 159
Conclusion 209
Notes 215
Works Cited 283
index 301
Acknowledgments 311
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