Readings

Readings are also listed by session.

Required Texts

Please observe the specific editions and translations while buying or borrowing these texts.

Alighieri, Dante. La Vita Nuova. Translated by Mark Musa. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1999. ISBN: 0192839357.

———. Inferno. Translated by Allen Mandlebaum. New York, NY: Bantam Books, 1982. ISBN: 0553213393.

———. Purgatorio. Translated by Allen Mandlebaum. New York, NY: Bantam Books, 1983. ISBN: 055321344X.

———. Paradiso. Translated by Allen Mandlebaum. New York, NY: Bantam Books, 1986. ISBN: 0553212044.

Boccaccio, Giovanni. The Decameron. Translated by G. H. McWilliam. 2nd ed. London, UK and New York, NY: Penguin Books, 1972, 1995, 2003. ISBN: 0140449302.

Chaucer, Geoffrey. Troilus and Criseyde. Edited by Barry Windeatt. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1998. ISBN: 0192832905.

Additionally, the following selection of works are available on the Web:

Selected Troubadour Lyrics

Guido Guinizelli

Guido Cavalcante

Dante, De Vulgari Eloquentia

Petrarch

Readings by Session

SES # topics readings

1

The Courtly Love Tradition

Introduction

 

2

Domination and Desire

Selected authors. Selected Troubadour Lyrics.

3

Dolce Stil Nuovo

Dante. La Vita Nuova. i-xxi.

Guinizelli, Guido. Al cor gentil.

4

Ennobling Love: Sublimation and Subjection

Dante. La Vita Nuova. xxii-xlii.

Cavalcante, Guido. Sonnets. xxii and xxiii.

5

Historical Background: Secular Politics

 

6

Historical Background: Church Politics

 

7

Florentine History and the The Divine Comedy

Dante. Inferno. i-xi.

8

Epic and Romance

Dante. Inferno. xii-xxii.

De Vulgari Eloquentia.

9

Moral Perversion and Linguistic Distortion

Dante. Inferno. xxiii-xxxiv.

10

Confession and the Practice of Penitence

Dante. Purgatorio. i-xi.

11

Nature and the Power of Love

Dante. Purgatorio. xii-xxii.

12

Ecstatic Desire

Dante. Purgatorio. xxiii-xxxiii.

13

Moral Cosmology

Dante. Paradiso. i-xi.

14

Visions of the Ideal Society

Dante. Paradiso. xii-xxii.

15

The Ends of Language

Dante. Paradiso. xxiii-xxxiii.

16

The Plague of Language

Boccaccio. Decameron. Prologue; I. Introduction, i, ii, iii; II. vii, ix; III. i, iii, x.

17

Comedy and Tragedy

Boccaccio. Decameron. IV. i, ii, v; V. iv, x; VI. Introduction, v, vii, x, Conclusion.

18

Rhetoric and Redemption

Boccaccio. Decameron. VII. i, ii, vi, viii, ix; VIII. i, vii; IX. ii, vi, x; X. v, x, Epilogue.

19

Historical Background: The Fourteenth-Century Renaissance in England

 

20

Britain and the Myth of Trojan Origins

Chaucer. Troilus and Criseyde. I. 1-469.

21

Ricardian Politics

Chaucer. Troilus and Criseyde. I. 470-1090.

22

Free Will and Determinism

Chaucer. Troilus and Criseyde. II.

Petrarch, Sonnet cxxxii, "S'amor non è."

23

Mediators and Mediation

Chaucer. Troilus and Criseyde. III.

24

Multiplicity and Indeterminacy

Chaucer. Troilus and Criseyde. IV.

25

Tragedy and Transcendence

Chaucer. Troilus and Criseyde. V.

26

What Is This Thing Called Love?

Conclusion