Reading piers plowman pdf free
An extremely organized and well articulated analysis of Piers Plowman I think Steiner did an immensely wise thing in organizing her book down by chunks of Passus and assigning each chunk an overarching theme that she organized her argument around On a less formal level the quick and subtle insertions of Steiner s humor and personality even in the formal academic text made this a pleasing analysis to read 276 One of the most illuminating and fascinating books available on Piers Plowman an extraordinarily complex work written in the age of Chaucer I particularly admired the thematic organization into a series of broad categories Value Community Learning Practice Belief and Institution that also plot the poem s development and theology I ve already recommended it to a dozen students 276 To call this book informationally dense would be so much of an understatement it would be a disservice Steiner s guide to this complex work is immersed in the context of the 14th century life literature and religion Langland s thinly veiled commentary on his time is line by line dissected and explained both for its literary style and language choice and between middle English middle French and the then contemporary Latin as well as a handful of Greek there s a lot to choose from as well as for its religious and socio political commentary Steiner employs a continuous stream of examples contemporary citations and well reasoned explanations to bring the background to the text alive Even though little may be positively known about William Langland personally Steiner does an excellent job of making Mr Langland s personality and occasionally his thought process come alive inasmuch as they can be teased out the text of the poem and married to the contemporary sources and times Langland the person is revealed almost as much as by the sources and methods he didn t use as those he did which goes a long way toward making him real and human While the chapters are nominally divided on topical themes there is a distinct tone and pace and depth to the first four chapters which noticeably mellows in the last three making them clearly a faster read than their predecessors My only complaint is that when Steiner s commentary and insight arrive at the end of the poem we arrive at the end of her book Some sort of conclusion at the end and I do mean conclusion editorial as well as literary not a summary would have gone a long way of both completing the elucidation as well as putting an exclamation point on the feeling of accomplishment for having completed such an incredibly thought provoking and informative book. Piers plowman electronic archive The closest to a conclusion is at the end of Chapter 6 where Steiner writes Langland s beautiful reasons show how an English poet can perform the work of Latin rhetoric and in the process fashion a truly literary theological vernacular This simple yet powerful observation says so much about the poem and about Steiner s insight and love of the work I have wanted to read Piers Plowman in the original middle English since i learned about it in high school I firmly believe that for the first time I now feel prepared to make the attempt And being prepared is absolutely necessary Even a reading of a modern English version of Piers would benefit from first reading Steiner s Guide I cannot recommend this book enough to anyone who wants to read Piers Plowman in any language 276
Reading Piers Plowman is an indispensable scholarly guide to a magnificent and notoriously difficult medieval poem With Piers Plowman the fourteenth century poet William Langland proved that English verse could be at once spiritually electrifying and intellectually rigorous capable of imagining society in its totality while at the same time exploring heady ideas about language theology and culture In her study of Piers Plowman Emily Steiner explores how Langland s ambitious poetics emerged in dialogue with contemporary ideas for example about political counsel and gender the ethics of poverty secular and pagan learning lordship and servitude and the long history of Christianity Lucid and comprehensive Steiner s study teaches us to stay alert to the poem s stunning effects while still making sense of its literary and historical contexts Reading Piers Plowman.
