Fortune's Faces

The Roman de la Rose and the Poetics of Contingency

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, Medieval, Theory, Nonfiction, History
Cover of the book Fortune's Faces by Daniel Heller-Roazen, Johns Hopkins University Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Daniel Heller-Roazen ISBN: 9780801881558
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press Publication: December 15, 2009
Imprint: Language: English
Author: Daniel Heller-Roazen
ISBN: 9780801881558
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication: December 15, 2009
Imprint:
Language: English

Arguably the single most influential literary work of the European Middle Ages, the Roman de la Rose of Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun has traditionally posed a number of difficulties to modern critics, who have viewed its many interruptions and philosophical discussions as signs of a lack of formal organization and a characteristically medieval predilection for encyclopedic summation. In Fortune's Faces, Daniel Heller-Roazen calls into question these assessments, offering a new and compelling interpretation of the romance as a carefully constructed and far-reaching exploration of the place of fortune, chance, and contingency in literary writing.

Situating the Romance of the Rose at the intersection of medieval literature and philosophy, Heller-Roazen shows how the thirteenth-century work invokes and radicalizes two classical and medieval traditions of reflection on language and contingency: that of the Provençal, French, and Italian love poets, who sought to compose their "verses of pure nothing"in a language Dante defined as "without grammar," and that of Aristotle's discussion of "future contingents" as it was received and refined in the logic, physics, theology, and epistemology of Boethius, Abelard, Albert the Great, and Thomas Aquinas.Through a close analysis of the poetic text and a detailed reconstruction of the logical and metaphysical concept of contingency, Fortune's Faces charts the transformations that literary structures (such as subjectivity, autobiography, prosopopoeia, allegory, and self-reference) undergo in a work that defines itself as radically contingent. Considered in its full poetic and philosophical dimensions, the Romance of the Rose thus acquires an altogether new significance in the history of literature: it appears as a work that incessantly explores its own capacity to be other than it is.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Arguably the single most influential literary work of the European Middle Ages, the Roman de la Rose of Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun has traditionally posed a number of difficulties to modern critics, who have viewed its many interruptions and philosophical discussions as signs of a lack of formal organization and a characteristically medieval predilection for encyclopedic summation. In Fortune's Faces, Daniel Heller-Roazen calls into question these assessments, offering a new and compelling interpretation of the romance as a carefully constructed and far-reaching exploration of the place of fortune, chance, and contingency in literary writing.

Situating the Romance of the Rose at the intersection of medieval literature and philosophy, Heller-Roazen shows how the thirteenth-century work invokes and radicalizes two classical and medieval traditions of reflection on language and contingency: that of the Provençal, French, and Italian love poets, who sought to compose their "verses of pure nothing"in a language Dante defined as "without grammar," and that of Aristotle's discussion of "future contingents" as it was received and refined in the logic, physics, theology, and epistemology of Boethius, Abelard, Albert the Great, and Thomas Aquinas.Through a close analysis of the poetic text and a detailed reconstruction of the logical and metaphysical concept of contingency, Fortune's Faces charts the transformations that literary structures (such as subjectivity, autobiography, prosopopoeia, allegory, and self-reference) undergo in a work that defines itself as radically contingent. Considered in its full poetic and philosophical dimensions, the Romance of the Rose thus acquires an altogether new significance in the history of literature: it appears as a work that incessantly explores its own capacity to be other than it is.

More books from Johns Hopkins University Press

Cover of the book Putting Modernism Together by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Energy Humanities by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Pluralism by Default by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Resilience and Aging by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book New Worlds for All by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Writing History, Writing Trauma by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book African American Faces of the Civil War by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Sending Your Millennial to College by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Keeping Your Child Healthy in a Germ-Filled World by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Marine Fishes of Florida by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book A History of Public Health by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Creative Destruction? by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Patently Mathematical by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book The Science of Mom by Daniel Heller-Roazen
Cover of the book Field Guide to the Natural World of New York City by Daniel Heller-Roazen
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy