Spaces for Reading in Later Medieval England

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxiv

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Mary C. Flannery, Carrie Griffin

   Pages 1-11

3. “Thys ys my boke”: Imagining the Owner in the Book

   • Daniel Wakelin

   Pages 13-33

4. Reading John Walton’s Boethius in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries

   • A. S. G. Edwards

   Pages 35-49

5. Reading in London in 1501: A Micro-Study

   • Julia Boffey

   Pages 51-61

6. Not for Profit: “Amateur” Readers of French Poetry in Late Medieval England

   • Stephanie Downes

   Pages 63-78

7. Playing Space: Reading Dramatic Title-Pages in Early Printed Plays

   • Tamara Atkin

   Pages 79-97

8. Navigation by Tab and Thread: Place-Markers and Readers’ Movement in Books

   • Daniel Sawyer

   Pages 99-114

9. Reading without Books

   • Katie L. Walter

   Pages 115-131

10. “[W]heþyr þu redist er herist redyng, I wil be plesyd wyth þe”: Margery Kempe and the Locations for Middle English Devotional Reading and Hearing

    • Ryan Perry, Lawrence Tuck

    Pages 133-148

11. Privy Reading

    • Mary C. Flannery

    Pages 149-164

12. Mapping the Readable Household

    • Heather Blatt

    Pages 165-181

13. Back Matter

    Pages 183-215

    PDF

We are living in an age in which the relationship between reading and space is evolving swiftly. Cutting-edge technologies and developments in the publication and consumption of literature continue to uncover new physical, electronic, and virtual contexts in which reading can take place. In comparison with the accessibility that has accompanied these developments, the medieval reading experience may initially seem limited and restrictive, available only to a literate few or to their listeners; yet attention to the spaces in which medieval reading habits can be traced reveals a far more vibrant picture in which different kinds of spaces provided opportunities for a wide range of interactions with and contributions to the texts being read. Drawing on a rich variety of material, this collection of essays demonstrates that the spaces in which reading took place (or in which reading could take place) in later medieval England directly influenced how and why reading happened.

• antiquity
• cultural theory
• culture
• drama
• England
• film
• history
• history of literature
• literary theory
• literature
• Medieval Literature
• Middle Ages
• poetry
• social science
• space

“Spaces for Reading in Later Medieval England, Mary Flannery and Carrie Griffin set out to contribute to scholarly debates on the history of reading by focusing on the 'relationship between where reading took place and how it took place'. … they aim to shed new light on different reading practices, and on the attitudes and responses people in late medieval England may have had towards reading.” (Patricia Stoop, sehepunkte, Vol. 19 (4), 2019)

“The essays here offer an in-depth, insightful exploration of those complexities. Recommended for research collections, especially those supporting medieval, early modern, and/or textual studies programs. Summing Up: Recommended. Advanced students through researchers/faculty.” (J. Stevens, Choice, Vol. 54 (4), December, 2016)

Mary C. Flannery is a Maître Assistante of English literature at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland. She is the author of John Lydgate and the Poetics of Fame.

Carrie Griffin is a lecturer in early modern English literature in the School of Culture and Communication at the University of Limerick, Ireland and a Research Associate of English at the University of Bristol, UK. She published an edition of The Wise Book of Philosophy and Astronomy with Middle English Texts/Winter in 2013.

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