A study of late medieval apocalyptic literature and culture, this project examines the interdependence of economic and religious discourse in the Middle Ages and investigates the shift in social consciousness occasioned by demographic changes and the growth of England's profit economy in the fourteenth century. After exploring the growing dissonance between religious tradition and economic language, the study examines expressions of social dissatisfaction, including the actions and communications of the 1381 rebels, William Langland's moral objections in Piers Plowman, and the complaints central to the other 'plowman poems' of Langland's imitators. Contrasting regenerative agrarian metaphors and apocalyptic visions with eschatological, urban visions of paradise, this study argues that Langland and the 1381 rebels exhibit 'radical nostalgia'--a longing for agrarian Christian roots in the midst of social tension which projects the traditional social structure of the past onto a renewed, if not millennial, society / acase@tulane.edu
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TULANE/oai:http://digitallibrary.tulane.edu/:tulane_27493 |
| Date | January 1997 |
| Contributors | Rydzeski, Justine Marie (Author), Kuczynski, Michael P (Thesis advisor) |
| Publisher | Tulane University |
| Source Sets | Tulane University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | Access requires a license to the Dissertations and Theses (ProQuest) database., Copyright is in accordance with U.S. Copyright law |
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