celebrating poetry for life
My peer-reviewed chapter, “Brother Cadfael, Social Justice, and the Medieval Mystery Fiction of Ellis Peters,” now appears in Certainty and Ambiguity in Global Mystery Fiction, ed. John Han and C. ClarkTriplett and Matthew Bardowell (New York, London, Oxford, New Delhi, and Sydney: Bloomsbury Academic, 2024),195-209.
EXTRACT:
My chapter, “A Medieval Search for the Historical Jesus? The Vita Christi in Ranulf Higden’s Compilation and John Trevisa’s Translation of the Polychronicon,” now appears in The Medieval Chronicle 16 (Brill, 2023, chap. 2, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004686267_003.
ABSTRACT:
The Polychronicon, a fourteenth-century universal history of the world compiled from Latin sources by the Benedictine monk of Chester, Ranulf Higden, and translated into English by an Oxford-educated priest, John Trevisa, contains in its fourth book a vita Christi. The life of Jesus in the Polychronicon is interwoven with the historical narrative of the chronicle but, at the same time, it is not presented solely as a series of literal, historical events. It is also subtly enriched with medieval allegorical interpretations. Indeed, for all that the vita Christi in the Polychronicondiffers from traditional works in the genre, it was carefully, rhetorically constructed by Ranulf and translated by Trevisa to situate the conception and birth of Jesus in time, to represent Christ’s divine power through supernatural miracles and over earthly kings, and to contrast his initially hidden identity in Mary’s womb with a revelation of his later public identity through his ministry and its culmination in his Passion. The approach of the chronicler and his translator proved influential on later writers.
My peer-reviewed, academic journal article, “Sam’s Song in the Tower: The Significance of ‘Merry Finches’ in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings,” now appears in The Journal of Tolkien Research Vol. 17, Iss. 2 “Tolkien’s Animals,” Art. 4(Nov 2023).
Abstract:
In The Lord of the Rings, Samwise Gamgee climbs the Tower of Cirith Ungol to try to rescue his master and friend, Frodo Baggins, who has been taken captive by Orcs. When Sam is near despair because he cannot find Frodo, Sam sings a song that makes reference to “merry finches.” What is the significance of this phrase in his lyrics? To answer this question, my essay first explores J.R.R. Tolkien’s ornithological knowledge, especially of finches in England, which is readily demonstrated from a letter he wrote to his son, Christopher Tolkien (July 7, 1944), about his observations of bullfinches in the family garden at 20 Northmoor Road in Oxford and his comparison of them to goldfinches. Next, this essay explores Tolkien’s tendency to connect his naturalist observations to biblical, classical, and medieval myth, legend, and literature. Attention is paid to the legend that associates the goldfinch with Christ’s Passion and, in the process, a thematic parallel is found between the goldfinch’s attempt to alleviate Christ’s suffering and Sam’s attempt to alleviate Frodo’s suffering in the Tower. This study concludes with reflection on Tolkien’s concept of “eucatastrophe,” from his essay “On Fairy-stories,” and the manner in which Tolkien uses the reference to “merry finches” in Sam’s song to foreshadow a sudden turn toward joy.
My peer-reviewed, academic article, ” ‘A Mythology for England’: Teaching Tolkien’s Arthurian Inspirations” now appears in Arthuriana 32:4 (Winter 2022): 10-29.
Abstract:
Excerpt:
Each year, over the past twenty-five years, I’ve been delighted to attend the International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS) at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan. This year, I am attending KalamaZOOM virtually! I am delighted to participate in the sessions of the Pearl-Poet Society and the Tolkienists. #ICMS2023
My newest book, Becoming the Pearl-Poet: Perceptions, Connections, Receptions, Studies in Medieval Literature (New York and London: Rowman & Littlefield / Lexington Books, 2022), is now available for pre-order and will be in print in November!
Abstract:
Who is the Pearl-poet? How do ideas about his life and interpretations of his poems shape our understanding of his work in late-medieval England—and beyond? In Becoming the Pearl-Poet: Perceptions, Connections, Receptions, readers can explore the world of this extraordinary, fourteenth-century writer. In Part I, “Perceptions,” five scholars give insightful literary analyses of the narrative poems attributed to the poet: Pearl, Cleanness, Patience, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and St. Erkenwald. In Part II, “Connections,” six scholars examine connections between these diverse poems, focusing on authorship, ecology, material culture, sartorial adornment, shields, and the poet’s pastoral theology. In Part III, “Receptions,” scholars consider the illustrations of the Pearl Manuscript (British Library MS Cotton Nero A.x), the poet’s cultural situatedness in the Northwest Midlands and Ricardian court, his religious contexts, later translations and paraphrases of his work, and his medieval and modern audiences — including J.R.R. Tolkien. Intended for students and scholars alike, this book encourages readers to gain a deeper understanding of the Pearl-poet and his world, learning many new things and enjoying old things in a new way.
EDITED BY JANE BEAL – CONTRIBUTIONS BY KRISTIN ABBO; ELIZABETH ALLEN; JANE BEAL; JOHN M. BOWERS; M. W. BRUMIT; ETHAN CAMPBELL; NANCY CICCONE; DAVID COLEY; MICHAEL DROUT; JOEL FREDELL; JONATHAN GERKIN; GRACE HAMMAN; KIMBERLY JACK; SCOTT KLEINMAN; KENNA OLSEN; COREY OWEN; JONATHAN QUICK AND MICKEY SWEENEY
My essay, “The Chaucerian Translator,” now appears in Communication, Translation, and Community in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period: New Cultural, Historical, and Literary Perspectives, ed. Albrecht Classen, Fundamentals of Medieval and Early Modern Culture Vol. 26 (De Grutyer, 2022), 233-52.
ABSTRACT
The Chaucerian narrator could easily and perhaps more readily be called the Chaucerian translator. He calls the vast majority of his works “translaciouns” in the Prologue to the Legend of Good Women (LGW) and in his Retraction to The Canterbury Tales. This self-conception deserves more critical consideration as does the process of development that the Chaucerian translator undergoes from Chaucer’s early to later works. Indeed, remarks by the Chaucerian translator throughout Chaucer’s corpus give readers some ideas about how Chaucer the author wanted his audience to perceive how he conceived of the work of translation. First, the Chaucerian translator—especially when acting as a compiler—is dependent upon his authors and their authority. Second, the Chaucerian translator may act as a fidus interpres (“a faithful translator”) without translating verbum pro verbo (“word for word”). Third, when Chaucer the author ventriloquizes his pilgrims in The Canterbury Tales, such as the Nun’s Priest and the Parson, deliberate mistranslations may serve the purposes of satire or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, sincerity, for a multilingual audience. Finally, the Chaucerian translator, whatever his rhetoric might otherwise imply, ultimately takes responsibility for his translations, which he believes may have a damning or salvific effect for his soul, if we as the audience take his remarks in the Retraction seriously. This is a significant development in the Chaucerian translator’s persona near the chronological end of Chaucer’s literary career.
On Wednesday, April 13th, I was delighted to be interviewed by Dr. Andy Jones on “Dr. Andy’s Poetry and Technology Hour” (KDVS). I had the opportunity to share a narrative poem, “The Ballad of the Unicorn Bones,” and a lyric poem, “Perspectives,” both from my poetry collection, Made in the Image (Lulu, 2009) as well as a haiku from my haiku micro-chap, Garden (Origami Poems, 2019):
afternoon sunlight
a green leaf in deep water
reaches for the sky
jb
We chatted about remote teaching, my studies in the MFA in Creative Nonfiction and Certificate in Narrative Medicine programs at Bay Path University, my academic books in progress, including Becoming the Pearl-Poet: Perceptions, Connections, Receptions (Rowman and Littlefield, forthcoming 2022) and Truth and Transformation in the Mythology of J.R.R. Tolkien (McFarland, under contract), and a little bit about my inter-continental travel adventures for ministry, midwifery, and medieval conferences. Dr. Andy also shared about UC Davis’ upcoming Picnic Day and Whole Earth Festival, inviting everyone to come to those events and enjoy them. Thank you so much for including me in your radio show, Dr. Andy! 🙂
The interview, beginning about half-way through the hour (at 35:35 min), is now available as a podcast episode on AmazonMusic.
Please enjoy!
Adare Elyse, a fantasy novelist, recently interviewed me about the ways in which the unicorn is a symbol for Christ in the Middle Ages and how that influenced depictions of the unicorn in later fantasy literature. She published the interview in four parts on her blog; I share the links below. Enjoy! ❤
The Wilson Library at the University of La Verne annually sponsors Faculty Book Day. This year, it took place on Zoom — of course! The recording is now available for anyone interested.
For my part of the panel, which starts around 27:50 min of the video (click on the video below), I got to share about my new edition / translation of Pearl and my new collection of poems, Song of the Selkie.
Enjoy!
My poem, “Knight,” appeared in Great Poems of the Western World, Vol. II, ed. John Campbell (World Poetry Press, 1990), 428-29.
Knight
A knight of gleaming polished armor
shining in the wind!
Black sparkles in his burnished hair —
his precise, chiseled face
darkened and flushed,
body trim and worked and fine
eyes the mirrors of his soul
deep and full and rich like
a darkened shade of the earth
movements like the flowing sea,
rage and fury like an eagle’s wings,
a wave crashing
or calm and cool like a placid lake,
a falling leaf.
A little, emerald-green, sparkling dragon
perches like a parrot
on his shoulder —
a jeweled sword hilt,
a swift steel sword,
strong arms that wield it
this knight
of silver gleaming polished armor
shining in the wind.
* Cordially dedicated to José Fierro:
you inspired me.
My peer-reviewed chapter, “The Life of Christ in Medieval Bestiaries: Imagining the Griffin, Lion, Unicorn, Pelican, and Phoenix,” now appears in Imagination and Fantasy in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Time: Projections, Dreams, Monsters, and Illusions, ed. Albrecht Classen, Fundamentals of Medieval and Early Modern Culture, Vol. 24 (Berlin and Boston: Walter de Gruyter, 2020), 607-36.
FROM THE INTRODUCTION
Bestiaries developed the richness of the medieval Christian imagination, the nature of contemplatives’ memory, and their spiritual literacy – that is, their ability to discern the meaning of images of beasts in art, architecture, and other medieval material cultural media based on the beasts’ depiction (esp. their specific iconic markers) and context – as well as in some of the content included in sermons preached in monastic and secular spheres. As repositories for knowledge received about the natural world from Greco-Roman texts and traditions of learning, and Christian allegorical interpretations from the Physiologus, they were enormously influential. To explore how the bestiaries influenced the late-medieval imagination, it is useful to consider what bestiaries are and how they work as contemplative, devotional texts before turning to specific considerations of the Incarnation, Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ represented through two beasts and two birds – the lion, unicorn, pelican, and phoenix – in medieval bestiaries in general and in the twelfth-century, deluxe, Latin manuscript known as the Aberdeen Bestiary in particular.
My peer-reviewed, academic article, “Saint Galadriel? J.R.R. Tolkien as the Hagiographer of Middle-earth,” now appears in the Journal of Tolkien Research 10 (2020): Iss. 2, Art. 2, 1-34.
Abstract
Galadriel is perceived in different, sometimes contradictory ways both within the world of Middle-earth and the world of Tolkien scholarship. In some ways, she is a liminal figure, on the threshold between Middle-earth and Valinor, and between secular and sacred influences from the primary world Tolkien actually lived in. One neglected context that may help readers to understand Tolkien’s characterization of Galadriel is the medieval cult of the saints.
The cult of the saints provides specific practices and beliefs that shaped how Tolkien consciously characterized Galadriel as saint-like, especially in terms of her beauty, holiness, and power. Her saintliness has Marian qualities, in that female saints were expected to be like the Virgin Mary, but Galadriel is distinctly different from the Virgin Mary in key ways. So she may not necessarily be a figure of “our Lady” in Middle-earth – at least, not in terms of Tolkien’s conscious, authorial intention.
However, in his letters, Tolkien acknowledges the possibility of the formation of an unconsciousconnection between Galadriel and Mary. The late shift in Tolkien’s thinking between characterizing Galadriel as a saint, who “fell” at the kinslaying of the Teleri at Alqualondë because of her “pride” but was redeemed through her penitence and resistance to the temptation of the Ring, to one who is “unstained” and “committed no evil deeds” (Letter 353 To Lord Halsbury) may have been motivated by the perceptions of influential readers of The Lord of the Rings,like Tolkien’s proofreader, Father Robert Murray, S.J.. As this study suggests, Tolkien is not only the sub-creator of Middle-earth, but also the hagiographer of Middle-earth: the man who finally idealizes the Marian qualities of Galadriel in order to inspire us all.
My peer-reviewed academic article, “Powerlessness: Redeeming the Memory of Trauma in Patience,” now appears in Integrité 19:1 (Spring 2020), 14-36.
ABSTRACT:
This essay on Patience, a fourteenth-century, Middle English poem, explores the parallel between the sense of powerlessness experienced by the poem’s speaker as a result of poverty and the powerlessness experienced by Jonah as a result of his prophetic calling. The speaker’s redemptive healing can be understood in terms of the narrative identification with Jonah and the progression through the Christian contemplative stages of humility, purgation, illumination, maturation, and unification. As the conclusion to the poem shows, this process strengthens the virtue of long-suffering in the speaker, not in isolation, but in community with the readers of the poem.
I’ve waited for many years to be able to announce my NEW BOOK: Pearl: A Middle English Edition and Modern English Translation, which is now available from Broadview Press! Although the book is printed, it can’t currently be shipped because it is on lockdown in a warehouse due to the world-wide coronavirus pandemic. It can, however, be pre-ordered! 🙂 The e-version, I believe, is available now, too. UPDATE: The printed edition can now be shipped (July 7, 2020).
Abstract:
Pearl is an exquisitely beautiful, fourteenth-century, Middle English dream vision poem. In it, a man falls asleep in a garden mourning the pearl he lost, and when his “spirit springs into space,” he finds himself in a bejeweled landscape, where birdsong begins to comfort his heart, and he comes to a stream, across which stands the young woman he loved: his beloved Pearl-Maiden, dressed in white, crowned with a pearl-crown, and wearing the “perle of prys” on her breast, standing beneath shining cliffs of crystal. They talk at length – of his sorrow on earth, and her bliss in heaven – and he longs to cross the water to be with her, but is forbidden.
The Pearl-Maiden reveals that she has asked for a “sight” to be shown to the Dreamer, a vision of the New Jerusalem, which he beholds in awe. There he sees the Lamb, bleeding from an open wound in his side, but who has a joyful countenance. He sees the Pearl-Maiden herself, his “lyttel quene,” in procession with many others following the Lamb, and he feels like he is going mad with longing to be with her. Against the warning he received, he tries to cross the stream – only to awaken suddenly! As he meditates on the meaning of his dream vision, his anger dissipates, his grief subsides somewhat, and he realizes that God is his Friend. He prays at the end that we would all be “precious pearls” to that Prince.
In my life, I have found this poem to bring great comfort and consolation when I have faced loss, death or sorrow. May it be for a blessing in these times!
My new poetry anthology,
Hail, Radiant Star! Seven Medievalist Poets (2019),
is now available from Finishing Line Press.
There are seven poets who have written poems to light up the little universe of the book: Jane Beal, Gail Berlin, Albrecht Classen, Thom Foy, Katharine Jager, A.J. Odasso, and Katherine Durham Oldmixon (Garza). Each poet has contributed a group of nine poems, and in reading and re-reading these verses, readers may be able to discern themes that unify each group like constellations are connected by stars in the night sky … There are eighty-eight constellations in the night sky. In the microcosmos of Hail, Radiant Star!, there are just seven: the Crown, the Lyre, the Pegasus, the Lion, the Ship’s Keel, the Twins, and the Virgin. Yet hopefully there is enough light from them to brighten a reader’s heart.
–Jane Beal, editor of Hail, Radiant Star!: Seven Medievalist Poets
Unicorn
The tender scene, so beautiful in the forest,
when the maiden sits in the middle of the path that runs
through the trees, and the unicorn lays his head in her lap:
Incarnation of God! What magic is in the world?
The hunters draw closer, but still, you lie at peace
like a newborn baby wrapped in swaddling clothes
and laid in a manger. The woman with you cannot
imagine how the sword will pierce
her own heart, too.
~ Jane Beal
My article, “Zebel and Salome, the Virgin Mary’s Midwives: Doubt, Faith, and the Miraculous in a Medieval Legend,” now appears in Midwifery Today 131 (Autumn 2019), 44-46.
EXCERPT:
“The birth of Jesus is perhaps the most famous birth in the world. It is called the Nativity (meaning “the Birth”) and represented in homes, churches, and communities by iconic Nativity scenes at Christmastime, when it is celebrated by Christians (and many non-Christians) worldwide. Nativity scenes recall figures from the birth and infancy stories of Jesus preserved in the gospels of Matthew and Luke as well as extra-biblical sources, including Christmas carols: a stable with a star shining over it; domesticated animals like the ox, ass, and sheep; angels, shepherds, and Magi (also known as the Wise Men or Three Kings); and Joseph and Mary, come from Galilee to Bethlehem to participate in a Roman census, and of course, the baby Jesus lying in a hay-filled manger.
“Away in a manger, no crib for a bed –
the little Lord Jesus lay down his sweet head;
the stars in the sky look down where he lay –
the little Lord Jesus asleep on the hay.”
“Away in a Manger” (late 19thc.)
Figures that we almost never see depicted in Nativity scenes today are Zebel and Salome, the midwives who were long believed to have attended Mary when she gave birth to Jesus. That’s because no midwives are named, or even mentioned, in the Nativity accounts in the biblical Gospels of Matthew and Luke. But in the late-antique and medieval periods, several well-known written documents and visual sources depict two midwives with Mary when Jesus was born. These midwives, Zebel and Salome, play a vitally important role in such depictions: their doubt and faith, their practical knowledge and spiritual authority, are used to verify the miraculous nature of the virgin birth.”
My new academic book is now available:
Illuminating Jesus in the Middle Ages (Brill, 2019).
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction: Illuminating Jesus in the Middle Ages Jane Beal
1 Jesus and the Psalms: The Witness of the Latin Liturgical Sequence Nancy van Deusen
2 The Miracles of Jesus in the Writings of the Venerable Bede George Hardin Brown
3 The “Hælend” and Other Images of Jesus in Anglo-Saxon England Larry Swain
4 Christ as an Early Irish Hero: The Poems of Blathmac, Son of Cú Brettan Tomás Ó Cathasaigh
5 The Teaching Logos: Christology and Tropology in Theophylact of Ochrid’s Interpretation of New Testament Parables Thomas Cattoi
6 “I Am”: The Glossa Ordinaria on John’s Gospel Linda Stone
7 Devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus in the Medieval West Rob Lutton
8 The Unicorn as a Symbol for Christ in the Middle Ages Jane Beal
9 Godly Bridegroom and Human Bride Andrew Galloway
10 Medieval Affective Piety and Christological Devotion: Juliana of Mont Cornillon and the Feast of Corpus Christi Barbara Zimbalist
11 Imitatio Christi and Authority in the Lives of St. Francis Donna Trembinski
12 Vision and Sacrament: Christ’s Humanity in the Spirituality of Gertrude the Great of HelftaAaron Canty
13 Christ as Turning Point in Dante’s Commedia Victorio Montemaggi and Lesley Sullivan
14 Jesus and the Christ in Two Middle English Psalm Commentaries Michael P. Kuczynski
15 Jesus as ‘Mother’ in Julian of Norwich’s Showing of Love Julia Bolton Holloway
16 Translation Debates and Lay Accessibility in the Meditationes Vitae Christi and Middle English Lives of Christ Paul J. Patterson
Bibliography
Index
My chapter, “The Unicorn as a Symbol for Christ in Medieval Culture,” is now forthcoming in Illuminating Jesus in the Middle Ages, ed. Jane Beal (Leiden: Brill, 2019).
Analysis of “The Lady and the Unicorn” Tapestries
The images in the six tapestries called The Lady and the Unicorn (or La dame et licorne) participate in network of inter-connected meanings or, perhaps, in four levels of meaning. The imagery includes sacred (allegorical) and secular (literal or historical) senses in the service of the artistic representation of late-medieval Catholic virtue among the nobility. This is certainly tied to the patrons of the tapestries, the Le Viste family of Lyon, France.
The Le Viste family arms are represented in each of the tapestries, indicating their patronage of these extraordinary works of art. Scholarly consensus originally held that Jean IV Le Viste commissioned them, which makes sense because he was in possession of at least three sets of large tapestries, apparently including The Lady and the Unicorn, that are mentioned in his will and were given upon his death to the eldest of his three daughters, Claude. However, there is another argument attributing patronage to Antoine Le Viste, cousin germain of Jean IV Le Viste, perhaps in honor of his affianced, Jacquelin Raguier, whom he married in 1515. (1) Scholars have long doubted that these are wedding tapestries, however, because if they were, by tradition, they would represent the coats of arms of the families of both bride and groom: these six tapestries represent only the Le Viste family arms, and so it is unlikely that The Lady and the Unicorn tapestries were made to honor a nuptial celebration.
Since 1921, when A.F. Kendrick identified the tapestries as having been made in the medieval tradition of the “allegory of the senses,” modern viewers have been taught to read five of the tapestries as representative of sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch:
The sixth tapestry, which admittedly does not fit well with this scheme, may represent a sixth idea, such as the will (“a mon seul desir”) (2), or, enigmatically, relinquishment (because the lady is placing her necklace in a casket – unless, of course, she is actually taking the necklace out of the casket).
Source: Wikipedia
Two other different but nevertheless cogent interpretations of the The Lady and the Unicorn have been put forward in recent years.
In 1997, Kristina Gourlay argued the The Lady and the Unicorn tapestry series is not so much an “allegory of the senses” as it is a representation of the “iconography of love.” Looking to Richard de Fournival’s thirteenth-century Bestiare d’Amour, which contains a chivalric version of the mystical hunt of the unicorn story, she focuses on the tapestry that depicts the lady with the unicorn in her lap and develops an argument re-interpreting The Lady and the Unicorn as a story about the progress of a romance. In her scheme:
In 2000, Marie-Elisabeth Bruel read the tapestries in terms of noble virtues portrayed as allegorical female figures in the Roman de la Rose, equating “sight” with Oiseuse (idleness), “touch” with Richesse (wealth), “taste” with Franchise (candor or freedom of the spirit), “hearing” with Liesse (joy), “smell” with Beauté (beauty), and “a mon seul desir” with Largesse (generosity). (4) Bruel’s model, reading The Lady and the Unicorn in terms of an influential medieval literary work, has been followed by others who have read the tapestries in light of the works of Jean Gerson and Christine de Pizan. (5)
According to these three major interpretations of the series as whole, as well as related studies, the Lady may represent the soul (anima) and the soul’s responses to the senses. She may represent the ideal woman, either in her virtue or her desirability as a lover (or both). She may be inspired, to some degree, by well-known medieval literary works. Furthermore, she may be intended to glorify the nobility of the Le Viste family, woo a spouse into the Le Viste family, educate the daughters of the Le Viste family in the virtues they should possess or advertise the marriageability of the young women in the Le Viste family.
Recently, in her a careful heraldric study of the tapestries, Carmen Decu Teodorescu has suggested that the particular coats of arms represented in the tapestries belonged to Antoine Le Viste, not to Jean IV Le Viste. (6) First noticed by Marice Dayras in 1963, the changes made to the Le Viste family arms in the tapestries were hypothesized by Carmen Decu Teodorescu in 2010 to be a “mark of cadency.” Such a mark is “used in heraldry to indicate by its addition to an armorial the birth order of a male heir. The cadency mark has been traditionally used to differentiate between different branches of a family which bear the same arms.” (7) As has been observed, “Cette hypothèse est renforcée par le fait que son blazon se trouve sur la rose méridionale de l’église Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois de Paris qui a été commandé par Antoine Le Viste par un marché passé en 1532.” (8)
Source: Wikipedia
There are four distinguishing differences in this series of six tapestries: the differences are between banners, the lady’s hair length, the presence or absence of an additional woman, and the wearing of shields (or capes) by the lion and the unicorn.
Based on these major, easily visible distinguishing differences, quite possibly there are at least two different Le Viste tapestry sets here that have been combined, received, and interpreted as a single set. There may have been additional tapestries, now lost, in either set. This idea is not new, but it is significant for interpretation of meaning.
The idea that the central lady in the tapestries represents the Virgin Mary certainly has been considered, but it is not now widely accepted. This is in part because the connection with Mary is not as explicit in The Lady and the Unicorn as in other representations, like the 1480 Swiss tapestry altar frontal (discussed above), though it should be noted that some representations of the Virgin are quite simple, without halo or many identifying symbols around her. By contrast, the prominently displayed Le Viste family arms are quite explicitly and repeatedly displayed, leading art historians to investigate the historical situatedness of the works in terms of their patronage.
Yet culturally literate medieval people were accustomed to understanding the stories, visual art, and architecture around them at multiple levels of meaning: literally and allegorically. It is likely that The Lady and the Unicorn participates in such a network of meaning. Literally and historically, the tapestries may pertain to the women of Le Viste family: their virtue, beauty, and desirability. At the same time, allegorically or spiritually, the tapestries can be characterized as Marian, if not exclusively about Mary, and Christian, if not exclusively about Christ. The Lady is like Mary because the women of the Le Viste family seek to emulate the Virgin. Both the unicorn and the lion are like Jesus because the chivalric male head of their household seeks to emulate Christ. (9) Morally, the tapestries encourage multiple meditative practices, common to late-medieval lay Catholic spirituality, intended to edify the viewers with respect to guarding their senses, and thus, their souls, since the senses are gateways to the soul. Anagogically, they may represent matters unfolding in the future, including the laying aside of wealth in order to receive a heavenly crown.
One image in the series particularly evokes the idea of the virgin capture of the unicorn: the tapestry most commonly called “Sight.”
Source: Wikipedia
Author’s note: For further analysis of the tapestries in the context of Christian unicorn symbolism in the Middle Ages, please see my chapter, “The Unicorn as a Symbol for Christ in Medieval Culture,” in Illuminating Jesus in the Middle Ages, ed. Jane Beal (Leiden: Brill, forthcoming).
Works Cited
1. Sophie Schneelbalg-Perelman, “La Dame à la licorne a été tissée à Bruxelles,” Gazette des Beaux Arts 70 (1967): 253-278. She notes the former existence of an early sixteenth-century, six panel artwork described in a 1548 inventory that once belonged to Prince Erard de la Marck, Prince-Bishop of Liège, and was entitled Los Sentidos: it represented the five senses and included a sixth panel with the inscription liberum arbitrium. She interprets a mon seul desir in light of the Latin in Los Sentidos, suggesting that the Lady may use her senses according to her free will or only desire.
2. Consider, for example, the many legends of Robin Hood and Maid Marian, several contemporary in time with these tapestries, in which the virtues of a counter-cultural Christ (“stealing from the rich to give to the poor”) and an innocent Marian maid are represented in two life-like, noble characters. For discussion, see Stephen Knight, Reading Robin Hood: Content, Form, and Reception in the Outlaw Myth, Manchester Medieval Literature and Culture Series (Manchester University Press, 2015, repr. forthcoming 2017), esp. chap. 7, “The Making and Re-Making of Maid Marian.”
3. Carmen Decu Teodorescu, “La Tenture de la Dame à la Licorne: Nouvelle lecture des armoiries,” Bulletin Monumentalde la Société Française d’ Archéologie 168:4 (2010), 355-67.
4. “Cadency marks,” Heraldric Dictionary, University of Notre Dame. http://www.rarebooks.nd.edu/digital/heraldry/cadency.html. Accessed 28 March 2017.
5. “La Dame à la Licorne,” Wikipédia (française). https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Dame_%C3%A0_la_licorne#Origine. Accessed 28 March 2017.
6. Kristina Gourlay, “La Dame à licorne: A Reinterpretation,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 130 (Sept. 1997): 215-232.
7. Marie-Elisabeth Bruel, “La tapisserie de la Dame à la Licorne, une représentation des vertus allégoriques du Roman de la Rose de Guillaume de Lorris,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts(Dec. 2000): 215-232.
8. See Anne Davenport, “Is there a sixth sense in The Lady and the Unicorn Tapestries?” New Arcadia Review 4 (2010): http://omc.bc.edu/newarcadiacontent/isThereASixthSense_edited.html and Shelley Williams, “Text and Tapestry: The Lady and the Unicorn, Christine de Pizan and the Le Vistes” (Diss., Brigham Young University, 2009).
9. See, for example, Carl Nordenfalk, “The Five Senses in Late Medieval and Renaissance Art,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 48 (1985): 1-22, esp. 7-10.
My academic article, “The Idea of Music in the Latin Polychronicon of Ranulf Hidden and the English Translation of John Trevisa” now appears in The Medieval Chronicle, Vol. 12, edited by Erik Kooper and Sjoerd Levelt, pp. 38-58.
ABSTRACT:
This essay examines the treatment of music as a theme in the fourteenth-century Latin Polychronicon of Ranulf Higden and the English translation of the universal history by John Trevisa. Both compiler and translator were preachers, with special interests in encouraging monastic and priestly preachers, and it appears that they received and transmitted stories concerning music that could serve as moral exempla. This becomes clear through an analysis of stories in five categories: the origins of music, famous musicians as moral exempla, music and sexual morality, music and national identity, and music and wisdom. Key figures examined include Tubalcain and Pythagoras, Socrates, King David, Emperor Nero, Caedmon, Saint Dunstan, Syringa and John, the Cardinal of Rome, while key people groups considered include the Cretans, the Irish, the English, and the Normans. The essay concludes with reflections on the connection between music and wisdom evident in stories retold about Socrates and Pope Sergius I.
My poems ‘Kyrios,’ ‘Light,’ ‘Star,’ ‘Unicorn,’ ‘Pelican,’ ‘Lamb,’ ‘Phoenix,’ ‘Lion,” and ‘Logos,’” now appear in Integrité: A Journal of Faith and Learning 17:2 (Fall 2018), 77-80.
EXCERPT:
A medieval bestiary is a manuscript book that contains “scientific” descriptions of creatures alongside “spiritual” interpretations of those creatures; these derived from an older text called the Philologus. In the Middle Ages, the traits of certain animals were associated with Christ’s life, the Devil’s threat, or the Christian’s spiritual progress. Five entries in medieval bestiaries were particularly associated with different stages of the life of Christ: the unicorn with the Incarnation; the pelican and the lamb with the Crucifixion; and the phoenix and lion with the Resurrection.
The Unicorn was associated with Christ’s Incarnation because of the myth that a unicorn could be calmed and captured by a virgin’s purity. The Pelican, because of belief that this bird pierced its breast to feed its young with its own blood, and the Lamb, because of the descriptions of the atoning sacrifice of the lamb found in Scripture, were associated with the Crucifixion. The Phoenix, because of the myth of how it rises from its own ashes, and the lion, because of the story that it roared its cubs back to life again, were associated with Christ’s Resurrection. In addition to these meaningful connections, many medieval people associated Light (“God is light, and there is no darkness in him”) and the Star (“I am … the bright Morning Star”) with Jesus because these were associated with him in scripture. In medieval bestiaries, the Annunciation to Mary, which presaged the conception and Incarnation of Christ, was associated with the light that shines on an oyster because light and dew were believed to help create the pearl inside the oyster. In general, the star was associated with Christ’s birth because the Magi followed it to find the Savior.
The nine poems below were inspired by these images and ideas in the Christian tradition. In the opening poem, “Kyrios,” the speaker sees a collection of animals at a circus and, inspired by their grandeur, wonders if she is hearing from God and asks God for mercy. In the closing poem, “Logos,” the speaker meditates on the sacred name, Jesus, which in the medieval period (as today) was often abbreviated IHS.
Kyrios
Kyrios, I’m curious –
did I hear you right
in the dark?
Cirque du soleil,
and the cabinet of curiosities,
is still spinning in a lost memory in my mind …
But now, the little boy is dancing
with the little girl, casting light with the lantern
on the wall, dreaming and singing
of a future better than the past:
will you embrace them,
will you embrace us?
Kyrios! Kyrios! I reach out my hand
toward the light from your Star,
as I behold the circus animals in the ring
all of them roaring – lion, lamb, unicorn,
pelican and phoenix, bursting into flames –
as a red cardinal transforms into a parrot
and the valley of peace is pierced
by the beak of my lover’s soul, fearful
and yearning for our embrace, our
embrace, dear Lord! Have mercy,
Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison –
his mouth is so sweet against my mouth.
Kyrios, I’m curious –
did I hear you right
in the dark?
jb
My academic essay, “Preaching and History: The Audience of Ranulf Hidgen’s Ars componendi sermones and the Polychronicon,” now appears in Medieval Sermon Studies 62:1 (2018): 17-28.
ABSTRACT:
In his Ars praedicandi sermones, in traditional yet rich metaphoric language, Ranulf Higden compares Christ to a fountain, a shepherd, a rock, a lily, a rose, a violet, an elephant, a unicorn, and a youthful bridegroom wooing his beloved spouse. Ranulf encourages preachers to use such metaphors while using them himself, rendering his text a performed example of what he encourages. This text is clearly linked to two others: Ranulf’s Latin universal history, the Polychronicon, and John Trevisa’s English translation of it. In the Polychronicon, Ranulf relates the life of Christ, utilizing some of his own rhetorical suggestions from his preaching manual. He also depicts a cross-section of good and bad preachers, including Gregory, Wulfstan, Eustas, St Edmund, and one William Long- Beard and his kinsman, who exemplify (in different ways) the wisdom conveyed in Ranulf’s instruction in the Ars praedicandi. This essay suggests that the literary relationship between the preaching manual and the Polychronicon supplies additional support for the idea that the audience of the latter was not noblemen exclusively, but also clergymen who preached and had responsibility for the care of souls (cura animae).
Also available here… & here: 0 BEAL – Preaching and History – The Audience of Ranulf Higden’s _Ars componendi sermones_ and _Polychronicon_ (Published Version).
My academic essay, “Who is Tom Bombadil? Interpreting the Light in Frodo Baggins and Tom Bombadil’s Role in the Healing of Traumatic Memory in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings,” now appears in The Journal of Tolkien Research 6 (2018): Iss. 1, Art. 1, 1-34.
ABSTRACT:
In Rivendell, after Frodo has been attacked by Ringwraiths and is healing from the removal of the splinter from a Morgul-blade that had been making its way toward his heart, Gandalf regards Frodo and contemplates a “clear light” that is visible through Frodo to “eyes to see that can.” Samwise Gamgee later sees this light in Frodo when Frodo is resting in Ithilien. The first half of this essay considers questions about this light: how does Frodo become transparent, and why, and what is the nature of the light that fills him? As recourse to Tolkien’s letters shows, the light is related to the virtues of Frodo’s character: love, self-sacrifice, humility, perseverance. The light in Frodo also is related to the light in the Phial of Galadrial, which comes from the Earendil’s Silmaril set in the heavens above Middle-earth, which is called the Morning Star. Because “Morning Star” is a name for Jesus in the New Testament, the light within Frodo may be interpreted, symbolically, as the Christ-light.
The second half of this essay considers how this light was ignited in Frodo, specifically by asking: who is Tom Bombadil, and what does he have to do with the light inside of Frodo? The essay explores multiple explanations for the long-standing, critically-debated mystery of Tom Bombadil’s identity, ultimately showing that he must be interpreted at multiple levels of meaning simultaneously. Intriguingly, Tom Bombadil has parallels to the first Adam and the second Adam, Jesus, especially in his role as “Eldest” (or ab origine) and in his ability to bring light to Frodo in the grave of the barrow-wight, save him from death by his song, and heal him from spiritual “drowning” – a word that Tom uses to describe Frodo’s terrifying experience in the barrow and which relates to Frodo’s original childhood wound: the primal loss of his parents, who drowned in a tragic accident. When Frodo receives healing from this trauma, he is strengthened to endure what he later experiences on his quest to destroy the Ring.
My essay, “Tolkien, Eucatastrophe, and the Re-writing of Medieval Legend,” appears in Mallorn: The Journal of the Tolkien Society 58 (Winter 2017).
ABSTRACT:
Using comparative literary analysis, this essay examines three case studies from J.R.R. Tolkien’s oeuvre, in which Tolkien practiced eucatastrophic rewriting: his folk-tale, “Sellic Spell,” in which he re-creates the Old English poem Beowulf; his poem, “Princess Mee,” in which he re-envisions aspects of the myth of Narcissus and the Middle English dream vision poem, Pearl; and the character of Éowyn from The Lord of the Rings, in which he re-imagines the fate of Brynhild, a shield-maiden and valkyrie from Norse legend. In each case, Tolkien rewrites the original so that sorrow is transformed into happiness in Tolkien’s new versions. As part of the analysis of these transformations, this essay also considers a possible personal motivation as well as a larger purpose behind Tolkien’s artistic choices: his relationship to his beloved wife, Edith, and a desire to convey to others the hope he found in his own Christian faith.
My academic essay, “Mapping Desire in Chaucer’s ‘To Rosemounde,’ Shakespeare’s ‘Rape of Lucrece,” and Donne’s ‘A Valediction: Of Weeping,'” now appears in Peregrinations: A Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture 6:3 (2018): 105-29.
EXCERPT:
“The poets Geoffrey Chaucer, William Shakespeare, and John Donne were aware of the existence of medieval world maps. Evidence from their writings clearly shows that the poets were familiar with the genre and had seen cartographic examples of it. They may also have read prose descriptions of the whole world that sometimes journeyed with, and sometimes journeyed separately from, cartographic mappaemundi. The poets each used such maps metaphorically in their poems about women, juxtaposing woman- as-map in their reader-viewer’s inner eye in poetic contexts they created to represent male desire. That desire is figured in a would-be lover’s lament that turns to satiric complaint in Chaucer’s “To Rosemounde” and in a conqueror’s lust that turns to violent assault in Shakespeare’s “Rape of Lucrece,” while in Donne’s “A Valediction: Of Weeping,” it is expressed with tender empathy in an increasingly complex, metaphorical meditation on the tears shed by both lover and beloved on an occasion of parting.1 In order to understand this thematic sexualization of the mappaemundi, it is relevant first to consider the contemplative and educational functions of world maps in medieval Christian culture.”
SANCTUARY POET 