The Dedalus Book of Medieval Literature: The Grin of the Gargoyle

Brian Murdoch provides an alternative view of the Middle Ages, showing the anarchy and decadence which lurked below the surface of a devout and conformist society. The grinning gargoyle, which mocked the solemnity of Gothic cathedrals, symbolises the violence, depravity and irreverence inherent in man which could not be suppressed by the church.¨Texts translated from the prose, chronicles and verse of the period, such as the Trial of Gilles de Rais, Boccaccio's Decameron, I Have a Gentil Cok,A Black Mass and Metrical Verses on the Subject of his Prick, reveal the wilder aspects of medieval man.€¨ Brian Murdoch has assembled and translated texts from Medieval Latin, Old French, Italian, Scots Gaelic, Cornish, Old and Middle English, Old Irish and Welsh which will redefine the Middle Ages for the modern reader. '...excellent and exciting selection of texts dealing with the world, the flesh, and occasionally the Devil. Here is the hideously cautionary tale of Helmbrecht, and scenes of pagan devil-worship from a Cornish miracle play. Human fallibility is celebrated or condemned accurately and with refreshing vigour.' The Good Book Guide Read more Continue reading Read less ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Brian Murdoch is Professor of German at the University of Stirling and a former Visiting Fellow of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and of Magdalen College, Oxford, where he delivered the Waynflete Lecture in 1994. Primarily a specialist in medieval and renaissance literature (German, Latin, Celtic) , he has also written on the literature of the world wars, and has translated classical and medieval Latin as well as medieval and modern German texts. He is the editor of The Dedalus Book of Medieval Literature and has translated for Dedalus, with his son Brian, the texts of The Dedalus Book of Roman Decadence. --This text refers to the paperback edition. Read more Continue reading Read less