Studies in Romance Languages Series

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  Amadis of Gaul, Books III and IV

  In the long history of European prose, few works have been more influential and popular than Amadis of Gaul. It is a landmark work among the knight-errantry tales and probably derives from an oral tradition. Although its original author is unknown, it was likely written during the early fourteenth century, with the first known version of this work, dating from 1508, written in Spanish by Garci Ordóñez (or Rodríguez) de Montalvo. An early bestseller of the age of printing, Amadis of Gaul was translated into dozens of languages and spawned sequels and imitators over the centuries. A handsome, valiant, and ...Read More

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  Stages of Evil: Occultism in Western Theater and Drama

  “The evil that men do” has been chronicled for thousands of years on the European stage, and perhaps nowhere else is human fear of our own evil more detailed than in its personifications in theater. In Stages of Evil, Robert Lima explores the sociohistorical implications of Christian and pagan representations of evil and the theatrical creativity that occultism has engendered. By examining examples of alchemy, astronomy, demonology, exorcism, fairies, vampires, witchcraft, hauntings, and voodoo in prominent plays, Stages of Evil explores American and European perceptions of occultism from medieval times to the modern age.

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  Salvator Rosa in French Literature: From the Bizarre to the Sublime

  "Salvator Rosa (1615–1673) was a colorful and controversial Italian painter, talented musician, a notable comic actor, a prolific correspondent, and a successful satirist and poet. His paintings, especially his rugged landscapes and their evocation of the sublime, appealed to Romantic writers, and his work was highly influential on several generations of European writers. James S. Patty analyzes Rosa’s tremendous influence on French writers, chiefly those of the nineteenth century, such as Stendhal, Honoré de Balzac, Victor Hugo, George Sand, and Théophile Gautier. Arranged in chronological order, with numerous quotations from French fiction, poetry, drama, art criticism, art history, literary history, ...Read More

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  Amadis of Gaul, Books I and II: A Novel of Chivalry of the 14th Century Presumably First Written in Spanish

  Includes a new Introduction by John E. Keller In the long history of European prose fiction, few works have been more influential and more popular than the romance of chivalry Amadis of Gaul . Although its original author is unknown, it was probably written during the early fourteenth century. The first great bestseller of the age of printing, Amadis of Gaul was translated into dozens of languages and spawned sequels and imitators over the centuries. A handsome, valiant, and undefeatable knight, Amadis is perhaps best known today as Don Quixote’s favorite knight-errant and model. This exquisite English translation restores a ...Read More

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  Chronicle of Alfonso X

  Alfonso X (1221–1284) reigned as king of Castile and León from 1252 until his death. Known to history as El Sabio, the Wise, or the Learned, his appreciation for science and the arts led him to sponsor a number of books on the history of Spain since its Roman settlement. Among them were the Cantigas de Santa Maria, a collection of over four hundred poems exalting his favorite patron saint, Mary, and chronicles of all the kings of Castile and León, Navarre, Aragón, and Portugal.

  Alfonso X died before his own life could be written. His was a reign fraught ...Read More

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  The Three Secular Plays of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz: A Critical Study

  Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1648-1695) wrote poetry, prose, and plays and is considered the greatest of Mexican women writers. She was an intellectual prodigy, reportedly mastering Latin in twenty lessons, and at sixteen she entered a convent so that she might continue her learning. One of the most influential early feminists in the New World, she answered a bishop's criticism in a letter that has become a classic defense of the education of women. She collected a private library of 4,000 volumes, but when she was told that her studies were delaying the progress of her spiritual education, ...Read More

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  Daily Life Depicted in the Cantigas de Santa Maria

  The hundreds of illuminated miniatures found in the Cantigas de Santa Maria, sponsored by King Alfonso X (1252–84), reveal many vistas of daily life in thirteenth century Spain.

  No other source provides such an encyclopedic view of all classes of medieval European society, from kings and popes to the lowest peasants. Men and women are seen farming, hunting, on pilgrimage, watching bullfights, in gambling dens, making love, tending silkworms, eating, cooking, and writing poetry, to name only a few of the human activities represented here.

  Combining keen observation of detail with years of experience in the field, John Keller and ...Read More

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  The Presence of Pessoa: English, American, and Southern African Literary Responses

  Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) is perhaps the most engaging of the great Western modernists of this century. Born in Portugal but raised and educated in southern Africa, Pessoa wrote poetry, fiction, and nonfiction.

  George Monteiro provides refreshingly new interpretations of Pessoa's Mensagem (Message) and the modernist novella 0 Banqueiro Anarquista (The Anarchist Banker). But he is primarily interested in tracing Pessoa's influence on a wide range of contemporary writers.

  Among those Monteiro finds putting Pessoa's work to their own surprising—and sometimes comic—uses are Joyce Carol Oates, Allen Ginsberg, John Wain, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and earlier poets including Thomas Merton, Edouard Roditi, and ...Read More

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  Miracles of Our Lady

  Miracle tales, in which people are rewarded for piety or punished for sin through the intervention of the Virgin Mary, were a popular literary form all through the Middle Ages. Milagros de Nuestra Sehora, a collection of such stories by the Spanish secular priest Gonzalo de Berceo, is a premier example of this genre; it is also regarded as one of the four most important texts of medieval Spain. Difficulties in translating this work have made it unavailable in English except in fragments; now Spanish-language scholars Richard Terry Mount and Annette Grant Cash have made the entire work accessible to ...Read More

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  Dramas of Distinction: Plays by Golden Age Women

  Renaissance Europe was the scene of flourishing and innovative dramatic art, and seventeenth-century Spain enjoyed its own Golden Age of the stage. According to traditional studies of this period, however, men seemed to be the only participants. Now in Dramas of Distinction, Teresa Scott Soufas offers the first book-length critical study of five important women playwrights: Angela de Azevedo, Ana Caro Mallen de Soto, Leonor de la Cueva y Silva, Feliciana Enriquez de Guzman, and Marfa de Zayas y Sotomayor.

  By locating the plays within their period, Soufas avoids universalizing women without regard to history. Her approach transcends the simple ...Read More