Middle English

3 credits · Graduate credit

We will examine in early Middle English, as well as the better known and more frequently studied major authors - Chaucer, Gower, Piers, and Pearl poet. Readings will include selections from prose and poetic histories, mystical writers, contemporary social and political documents (laws, recipes, medical texts, chronicles, charters). We will examine a wide range of early Middle English texts as we develop an appreciation for the roles written in English played in medieval England and the cultural and political consequences of the ability to read and write.