Department of Spanish and Portuguese

Paper Sp 14

Spanish Literature, Life and History before 1492

This paper has a Learning Support Web Site at www.mml.cam.ac.uk/spanish/SP14/.

Introduction

The Spanish Middle Ages is a fascinating and rewarding period for study. Historically the peninsula was a site of successive waves of invasion and colonisation so that its cultural substrata encompass pagan, Christian, Judaic, and Islamic influences. Consequently Medieval Hispanic cultural is unique and diverse. During this period Castilian came to dominate, the Spanish state started to take shape, and the themes to form later Spanish literature and thought originated.

This paper has a text-based and topic-based section. The set texts permit you to explore the main literary genres (epic, lyric, narrative verse and prose, theatre) through major texts, known and enjoyed throughout the Hispanic world. These are:

the epic of Spain's national hero, the rebellious Cid (Poema de Mio Cid)
the erotic (pseudo?)-autobiographical adventures of an Archpriest (Juan Ruiz, Libro de Buen Amor), complete with tales and lyrics, both bawdy and didactic
a collection of short stories (Juan Manuel, El Conde Lucanor) couched as everyday advice from a wise advisor to a nobleman, and dealing with governance of the self, family, and retinue, with a strong homosocial slant
selected works by Diego de San Pedro, author of the best-selling tale of frustrated desire, Cárcel de Amor, and its prototype, Arnalte y Lucenda, and a fine body of court poetry; spiritual and amatory, serious and parodic
spectacle and the origins of theatre
court song

All texts are read in the original with the aid of glossaries and notes: Castilian has not altered as greatly over the centuries as many other Europe languages, and so students should not expect to encounter linguistic difficulties; however, there are good English translations of most of the set texts with which the originals can be read in tandem. There will be a short series of reading classes at the start of the lecture course.

The topics have been selected to permit students to consider questions of mentality, ideology, and the otherness of the medieval period, and to choose the extent to which they give consideration to literary, cultural and historical matters. The topics offer students the opportunity to explore:

'Female Voice and the Representation of Women': the earliest European female-voice vernacular lyric, the ventriloquism of the female voice by male court poets, and the first women's writing in Castilian
'Living Well, Dying Well': medieval literary, legal, and religious attitudes to transgression, retribution, and natural and divine justice; and to death, the dead, and the process of dying as expressed in ritual and representation
'Convivencia': an opportunity to explore the interactions of the three faith groups of Medieval Iberia, including: the myth of the traumatic loss of Visigothic Hispania; attitudes to language, translation and cultural prestige in Umayyad Córdoba and the reign of Alfonso X, the Wise (8th-11th and 13th centuries, respectively); and the first European translations of Arabic tale collections (Petrus Alfonsi's Disciplina clericalis, Sendebar, Calila e Dimna)
'Treachery and Taboo in Medieval Epic and Epic Legend': Medieval Castilian epic legend is almost unique in the attention it gives to deception and taboo acts, such as blasphemy, rape, incest, and malevolent (rather than righteous) violence
'Myth, History, and Nation Building': the manufacture by the thirteenth-century literary workshops of an historical and mythic identity for Castile, and the gap between the spin and the achievements of the workshop's patron, Alfonso X el Sabio of Castile
'Crisis and Conflict in the Fifteenth Century', the politically troubled fifteenth century, the establishment of the Inquisition, and the rise of the Catholic Monarchs; the interface of politics, propaganda, and poetics

In the Michaelmas term, we shall focus on the close reading and discussion of a selection of the set texts, and in the Lent and Easter terms we shall move on to an in-depth study of some of the historical and cultural topics. In total lectures will cover two or three texts, and a similar number of topics, chosen in consultation with class members. In the examination candidates are required to answer THREE questions, AT LEAST ONE from each section (Section A: Set texts; Section B: Topics); there is an optional commentary question in section A. Note that the set texts will form the basis for the study of some of the topics: these can be supplemented with additional reading.

Prepare for this paper by doing the 'Introductory Reading', and reading the Set texts; you may also wish to read selectively from the background lists (all below). Further reading lists and learning support materials are available on-line; these pages are still under development, and some topics have changed from previous years. Note that the reading lists cater for a wide range of possible interests. No individual student is expected to read all or even most of the items listed on the webpages: please feel free to follow your interests.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, GUIDANCE, OR A LIST OF CURRENT STUDENTS WITH WHOM CONSULT ABOUT THE CURRENT COURSE CONTACT: DR LOUISE M. HAYWOOD (TRINITY HALL, lmh37@cam.ac.uk)

Introductory reading

Caro Baroja, Julio. 'Honour and Shame: A Historical Account of Several Conflicts', in Honour and Shame: The Values of Mediterranean Society, ed. John Peristiany (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press), pp. 81-137.

Deyermond, Alan, Historia y critica de la literatura española: I, Edad Media; and I/1, Edad Media; primer suplemento (Barcelona: Cr'tica, 1980 & 1991).
MacKay, Angus, Spain in the Middle Ages (London: Macmillan, 1977).
Moffitt, J. F., The Arts in Spain (London, Thames & Hudson, 1999), Chapters 2 and 3.
Louise M. Haywood, 'Medieval Spanish Studies', in The Companion to Hispanic Studies, ed. Catherine Davies (London: Arnold, 2002), pp. 32-49.

Recommended editions of set texts

Cantar de mio Cid, Biblioteca Clásica, 1, ed. Alberto Montaner (Barcelona: Crítica, 1993); other good editons are by Colin Smith for Cátedra and Ian Michael for Castalia.
Juan Ruiz, Libro de buen amor, ed., G. B. Gybbon-Monypenny, Clásicos Castalia, 161 (Madrid: Castalia, 1988).
Don Juan Manuel, El Conde Lucanor ed. Guillermo Serés & intro. Germán Orduña, Biblioteca Clásica (Barcelona: Critica, 1994).
Diego de San Pedro, Cárcel de Amor, ed. Carmen Parrilla, Biblioteca Clásica, 17 (Barcelona: Crítica, 1995).
Miguel Ángel Pérez Priego, ed., Teatro medieval, II: Castilla, Páginas de la Biblioteca Clásica (Barcelona: Crítica, 1997) AND EITHER Ana María Álvarez Pellitero, Teatro medieval, Colección Austral, 157 (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1990) OR Ronald Surtz, Teatro castellano de la Edad Media, Clásicos Taurus, 13 (Madrid: Santillana, 1992).
Poesía de cancionero, ed., Alvaro Alonso, Letras Hispánicas, 247 (Madrid: Cátedra, 1991).

Recommended editions have been chosen for the accuracy and quality of their text, and for the range of their annotations.

History and General Background

Collins, Roger, Early Medieval Spain: Unity in Diversity, 400-1000, 2nd ed. (New York: St Martin's, 1995).
Constable, Olivia Remie, ed., Medieval Iberia: Readings from Christian, Muslim and Jewish sources (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1997).
Dillard, Heath, Daughters of the Reconquest: Women in Castilian Town Society, 1100-1300 (Cambridge: UP, 1984).
Huizinga, J., The Waning of the Middle Ages: A Study in the Forms of Life, Thought, and Art in France and the Netherlands in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1955 & reprs).
Linehan, Peter, The Ladies of Zamora (Manchester: UP, 1997).
Reilly, Bernard F., The Medieval Spains, (Cambridge: UP, 1993).
Southern, R.W., The Making of the Middle Ages (London: Hutchinson, 1953).

Dictionaries

Alonso, Mart'n, Diccionario medieval español desde las glosas Emilianenses y Silenses (s. X) hasta el siglo X, 2 vols (Salamanca: Univ. Pont'fica, 1986).
Covarrubias, Sebastián de, Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, 1610 (Madrid, Turner, 1977).
Corominas, J., Diccionario crítico etimológico de la lengua castellana (Berna: Francke, 1954-57).

Literature

Boase, Roger, The Origin and Meaning of Courtly Love (Manchester: UP, 1977).
Ong, Walter J., Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word, New Accents (London: Routledge, 1982).
Bloch, R. Howard, Medieval Misogyny and the Invention of Western Romantic Love (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991)./li>
Jacquart, Danielle, & Claude Thomasset, Sexuality and Medicine in the Middle Ages (Princeton: UP, 1988).
Lewis, C. S., The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Renaissance and Medieval Literature (Cambridge: UP, 1994).
Nepaulsingh, Colbert I., Towards a History of Literary Composition in Medieval Spain, University of Toronto Romance Series, 54 (Toronto: UP, 1986).
Pelikan, Jaroslav, Mary through the Centuries: Her Place in the History of Culture (New Haven: Yale UP, 1996).
Solomon, Michael, The Literature of Misogyny in Medieval Spain: The 'Arcipreste de Talavera' and the 'Spill', Cambridge Studies in Latin American and Iberian Literature, 10 (Cambridge: UP, 1997) (especially Part 1).
Warner, Marina, Alone of All Her Sex: The Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1976).
Whitman, Jon, Allegory: The Dynamics of an Ancient and Medieval Technique (Oxford: Clarendon, 1987).

Learning resources and a full reading list are available online. See www.mml.cam.ac.uk//spanish/SP14/.

Cambridge bookshops (Heffers and Waterstone's) are aware of our reading lists. You may be able to purchase second-hand copies of some of the books from Heffers (tel. 01223 568568). You might also like to try online book-sellers like Amazon, alibris or abebooks.

All lists are also available online: see the Department's Home Page (spanish), under Reading Lists.