Description |
1 online resource |
Contents |
Cover; Imagining The Woman Reader In The Age Of Dante; Copyright; Dedication; Acknowledgements; Table Of Contents; List Of Illustrations; Prologue: On A Portrait Of A Woman Reader; 1: Introduction: The Making Of The Woman Reader In The Italian Trecento; Medieval Female Literacy, And 'The Feminine' In Reading; What Did Women Read? Documents, Modes, And Fictions Of Reading; Characterizing The Woman Reader; Visualizing The Woman Reader; The Making Of The Woman Reader; 2: Addressees And Readers In Lyric Poetry; The Love Triangle: The Lyric Space And Reading |
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From 'Madonna Dir Vo Voglio' To 'Donna Me Prega / Perch'io Voglio Dire'from The 'Donna Villana' To Contessa Bianca Giovanna, And From 'Donna' To 'Donne'; The Making Of The 'Mixed Audience' Of The Vita Nuova; 'Feci Per Lei Certe Cosette Per Rima'. Vita Nuova 1-17; 'Aiutatemi, Donne A Farle Onore'. Vita Nuova 18-23; 'A Me Pregando Che Io Mandasse Loro Di Queste Mie Parole Rimate'. Vita Nuova 24-42; 3: Women As Text, Text As Woman; Nudity, Clothing, Ornament; Gendered Personification; La Donna È Mobile; The Text Made Flesh: The Ballads, The Siren, Matelda; Mother Poet; Mother Tongue, Mother Text |
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4: Bea(Ta Lec{Rpara}Trixmaking The Commedia's Beatrice: The Donna Gentile Morphs Into Lady Philosophy; Four Eyes, And Two Mouths; Giving Beatrice A Voice: Welding Loquacity And Authority; Beatrice In Hell; Skim-Reading The Vita Nuova In Eden; Beatrice Heavenly Lector And Theologus; Reading God Together In The Empyrean; 5: Francesca And The Others; How Does Francesca Read? The Lancelot, Courtly Poetry, Boethius, And The Tristan; Reading Romances Together: Performing The Lover Or Performing The Reader?; Reading Together For Love: Heloise And Alyson; The Book And The Body: Mary And Flamenca |
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6: Epilogue: Boccaccio's Women Readersportraying The Woman Reader With Her Book; Fiammetta The Reader-Author, And The Invention Of Female Readership; Endnotes; Notes To Prologue; Notes To Chapter 1; Notes To Chapter 2; Notes To Chapter 3; Notes To Chapter 4; Notes To Chapter 5; Notes To The Epilogue; Bibliography; Primary Sources; Secondary Sources; Index |
Summary |
"Imagining the Woman Reader in the Age of Dante brings to light a new character in medieval literature: that of the woman reader and interlocutor. It does so by establishing a dialogue between literary studies, gender studies, the history of literacy, and the material culture of the book in medieval times. From Guittone d'Arezzo's piercing critic, the 'villainous woman', to the mysterious Lady who bids Guido Cavalcanti to write his grand philosophical song, to Dante's female co-editors in the Vita Nova and his great characters of female readers, such as Francesca and Beatrice in the Comedy, all the way to Boccaccio's overtly female audience, this particular interlocutor appears to be central to the construct of textuality and the construction of literary authority. This volume explores the figure of the woman reader by contextualizing her within the history of female literacy, the material culture of the book, and the ways in which writers and poets of earlier traditions imagined her. It argues that these figures are not mere veneers between a male author and a 'real' male readership, but that, although fictional, they bring several advantages to their vernacular authors, such as orality, the mother tongue, the recollection of the delights of early education, literality, freedom in interpretation, absence of teleology, the beauties of ornamentation and amplification, a reduced preoccupation with the fixity of the text, the pleasure of making mistakes, dialogue with the other, the extension of desire, original simplicity, and new and more flexible forms of authority."-- Provided by publisher |
Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
Notes |
Online resource; title from PDF title page (EBSCO, viewed May 16, 2018) |
Subject |
Women -- Books and reading -- History -- To 1500
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Italian literature -- To 1400 -- History and criticism
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Women in literature.
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Authors and readers.
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LITERARY CRITICISM -- Medieval.
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Women in literature.
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Italian literature.
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Authors and readers.
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Literature, Medieval.
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Women and literature.
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Women -- Books and reading.
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Genre/Form |
Electronic books
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Criticism, interpretation, etc.
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History.
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Form |
Electronic book
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ISBN |
9780192550934 |
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0192550934 |
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9780191859762 |
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0191859761 |
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