BRISTOL, R.I., April 2008 – Following an intensive year-long study of Arthurian literature under the direction of English Literature Professor Deborah A. Robinson, 18 Roger Williams University English literature senior thesis students will present synopses of their theses to the University community on Wednesday, April 23, and Thursday, April 24, from 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. in the main library’s Mary Tefft White Cultural Center.

While no one course could possibly capture the vibrant schizophrenia of the Middle Ages,  the RWU course titled “Sex, Violence, and Pulp Fiction in the Middle Ages,” tried. Students read (in translation) ninth through 15th century Welsh and Irish (Celtic), French, German and English “histories” and romances to explore how medieval popular—or pulp—fiction served as social commentary.

To contextualize the literature, students studied not only the relevant history, but also the dynamic “cross-channel conversation” among French, German and British writers and troubadours—interdisciplinary and intertextual cultural and historical “conversations” that encompass archeology. Students also studied art and architecture, horticulture, codicology (the study of manuscripts), iconography, film, history, music, myth, philosophy and religion.
 
In each of the two colloquia, nine students will present their theses on a broad range of topics, including: 

• The composite heroes of the Middle Ages, including warrior-kings, chivalric knights and the court;
• The medieval roles of women, including King Arthur’s Guinevere, Tristan’s Iseult, Aucassin’s Nicolette and nobody’s the Wife of Bath; 
• The medieval mind and the concept of “The Other,” including the dwarf, the wizard and, yet again, the woman;
• The “marriage” of Paganism (primarily Celtic) and Christianity;
• The intimate relationship between the animistic natural world, including the garden, the wasteland, and the Otherworld, and humankind’s moral essence;
• The “conversation” among the arts, including “The Hunt of the Unicorn” tapestries, the Canterbury Cathedral, and the narrative arts of the romance;  and
• Arthurian literature’s allusive impact on succeeding generations of authors, including Shakespeare, J. R. R. Tolkien, E. B. White, and J. K. Rowling.

The Mary Tefft White Cultural Center is located on the first floor of the main library. The event is free and open to the public.