Conference
Poetry, Knowledge and Community in Late Medieval France
Princeton University 1-4 November 2006
The conference will investigate poetry's role in transmitting and transforming knowledge, and the communities which it thereby assumes or creates, in France (including Occitania) in the period 1270-1530.
Plenary speakers at the conference will be David Hult (Professor of French, Berkeley), Stephen Nichols (Chair and Professor of Medieval French Literature, Johns Hopkins University), Nancy Regalado (Professor of French, NYU) and Michel Zink (Professeur au Collège de France).
Wednesday 1 November
2:00 welcoming, opening
2:15-3:45
Stephen G. Nichols (Johns Hopkins University) 'The Enigma of Wisdom: "Translating" Philosophy in Medieval Poetry'
3:45-4:15 break for tea/coffee
4:15-6:15 Citation and lyric insertion
David Wrisley (American University of Beirut), 'Prosifying Lyrical Insertions in the 15th-century Violette (Gérard de Nevers)'
Julien Abed (Université de Paris-IV), 'Oracular poetry as counterpoint: The inclusion of the Sibyls' knowledge in the French feminist poetry of the 15th century'
Jennifer Saltzstein (University of Pennsylvania), 'Refrains in the Jeu de Robin et Marion: History of a Citation'
6:30 reception hosted by the department of French and Italian
Thursday 2 November
9:00-10:30 Narrative schemata
Amandine Mussou (École normale supérieure, Paris), 'Fonctions poétique et didactique de la partie d'échecs dans Les Eschés amoureux en vers'
Francesca Braida (École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris), 'Le songe: une figure et un genre du roman en vers pour transmettre la connaissance de l'ici-bas et de l'au-delà'
10:30-11:00 break
11:00-12:30 Academic knowledge/poetic forms
Lori J. Walters (Florida State University), '"Tout discrete creature cherche a savoir." Christine de Pizan and Jean Gerson on Poetry, Knowledge, and Wisdom'
Mishtooni Bose (Christ Church, Oxford), 'Jean Gerson, poet'
12:30-2:30 lunch
2:30-4:00 Knowledge and love
Joyce Coleman (University of Oklahoma), 'Doctors of Love: The Medieval French Love-Poet Depicted as Magister'
Deborah McGrady (Tulane University), 'Voicing Difference: Poetic Intrusions and Degrees of Truth in the Art d'amours en prose'
4:00-4:30 break
4:30-6:00
Nancy Freeman Regalado (New York University), 'Love Lyrics, Moral Wisdom, and the Material Book'
Reception hosted by the Program in Medieval Studies
Friday 3 November
9:00-10:30 Poetry and politics
Thelma Fenster (Fordham University), 'Hearing Voices: Knowledge, Opinion, and the Songe véritable'
Denis Huë (Université de Haute-Bretagne, Rennes-II), 'Le prince chez Meschinot, mise en forme d'un objet poétique/politique'
10:30-11:00 break
11:00-12:30
David F. Hult (University of California, Berkeley), 'Poetry and the Translation of Knowledge in Jean de Meun'
lunch/afternoon break
4:00-4:30 tea
4:30-6:30 Christine de Pizan
Suzanne Akbari (University of Toronto), 'The Movement from Verse to Prose in the Allegories of Christine de Pizan'
Julia Simms Holderness (Michigan State University), 'Christine de Pizan on Poetry and Compilation'
Karen Fresco (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign), 'The Place of Lyric Poetry in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Manuscript Anthologies Containing Works by Christine de Pizan'
conference dinner
Saturday 4 November
9:00-10:30 Historical knowledge
Kathy M. Krause (University of Missouri-Kansas City), 'Poetic Manuscripts of Genealogy and Power in Picardy'
Dorothea Kullmann (University of Toronto), 'Epic Songs as History Books? Metaliterary Remarks in 14th-Century French chansons de geste'
10:30-11:00 break
11:00-12:30
Michel Zink (Collège de France), 'Les razos et l'idée de la poésie'
12:30-12:45 closing remarks
This conference forms part of the AHRC-funded project Poetic Knowledge in Late Medieval France based in the Universities of Cambridge and Manchester and is hosted thanks to the generosity of the Department of French and Italian at Princeton University.