PostScript to the Middle Ages: Teaching Medieval Studies Through the Name of the Rose

By Alison L. Ganze

More than a quarter century after its publication in English, Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose remains a popular novel among medievalists and nonmedievalists alike. Its riveting account of a series of murders at a wealthy Italian abbey during the papacy of John XXII, amidst the tensions of the Franciscan Spiritualist controversy, serves as an excellent point of entry to the cultural, philosophical, and theological milieu of fourteenth-century Europe. This collection of essays approaches the novel as a primary text in medieval studies courses and seeks to provide ways of integrating it into such courses effectively.

Part One of the collection addresses the pedagogi-cal advantages and pitfalls of teaching The Name of the Rose in a variety of medieval courses, including literature, cultural studies, history, religious studies, art history, and manuscript studies. The scholarly essays in Part Two deal with major medieval historical figures, movements, and cultural phenomena as they pertain to the novel, including fourteenth-century apocalyptic traditions, reflections on medieval language and sign theories, and the search for the lost second book of Aristotle's Poetics.

While each essay in the collection stresses its own disciplinary contexts and concerns, together they enrich each other, providing a valuable addition to the relatively small canon of texts on medieval pedagogy.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0815632347
• ISBN13: 9780815632344
• Release Date: December 2009
• Publisher: Syracuse University Press
• Length: 296 Pages
• Weight: 1.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.4" x 9.3"