| Synopsis: |
Beowulf and Beyond is a collection of papers mainly on Medieval English (i.e. Old and Middle English) language, literature and culture, often using comparative and interdisciplinary approaches. It features major authors and texts such as Beowulf, Chaucer, the Wyclif Bible, Margery Kempe, and Malory, but also the poem Judgement Day II, the Epinal-Erfurt glossary (ca. 680), and the Assize of bread (1256), a legal document. The more linguistically oriented studies deal with the language of Old English and Old Norse runic inscriptions, with OE word-formation (verbs with prefixed adverbs such as oferfaran; words for people), the loss of final plosive consonants in late Middle English rhyme-words, the use of hyphens in ME, and a comparison between Medieval English and German. Some contributions are specifically concerned with teaching Medieval texts to today's students (Beowulf, Malory). The volume is also a document of the activities of IAUPE, the International Association of University Professors of English. It contains a selection of the papers that were originally presented at the IAUPE Medieval Symposia at Munich/Germany and Vancouver/Canada. |