This book draws on a lengthy experience of teaching graduates how to approach medieval books. It leads the reader through the stages of the editorial process, using part of Richard Rolle's Commentary on the Song of Songs as the working exemplar. In the humane sciences, the need for texts is ubiquitous; they provide the regular objects of study. But far less prevalent than editions is any discussion of the premises underlying these objects, or the mechanisms by which they have been constructed. This volume takes up both challenges. First, in a preliminary chapter, it discusses what is at stake in any edition one might read; the persistent argument is that these represent products of modern scholarly decision-making, the imposition of various kinds of unity on the extremely diverse evidence medieval books offer for any literary work. This chapter also explains broadly various options for the presentation of texts – and the difficulties inherent in them all. The remainder of the volume is given over to a step-by-step guide to the process of editing (and eventually to a finished presentation of) a heretofore unpublished medieval text. The discussion seeks to exemplify the decisions editors routinely face, and to suggest ways of addressing them.
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This book is conceived as a handbook for graduates interested in texts and their manuscript presentation, not solely in editing them. As such, it is potentially of broad interest in all fields from antiquity to early modern studies.
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ForewordPreliminary: On Editions 1 Collecting the Witnesses 2 Finding a Copy-text and Transcribing it 3 Comparing the Witnesses, or Collation 4 The Examination of the Variants 5 AnnotationRichard Rolle, ‘Super Canticum’ 4: Edition, Collation, and TranslationAppendix: Additional Manuscript Descriptions; the Manuscripts and the TextNotesIndex
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Reviews ‘In this smart handbook, Ralph Hanna shares his insights about the process of creating an edition of a medieval Latin text, based on his extensive experience editing English vernacular poetry of the later Middle Ages. This is a book for beginners. It provides a clear and thoughtful introduction to the steps necessary to progress from an unedited text in a premodern manuscript to the formal presentation of a textual edition. One of the virtues of this book is its practical approach; Hanna walks the reader through his preparation of an edition of a small portion of a straightforward Latin prose text: Richard Rolle's commentary on the biblical Song of Songs, composed in the 1330s. Reading over Hanna's shoulder, scholars can follow the reasoning behind his editorial decisions and pick up a great deal of practical knowledge about scribal practice in the process.’ The Medieval Review
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Produktdetaljer

ISBN
9781781382721
Publisert
2015-11-18
Utgiver
Vendor
Liverpool University Press
Høyde
239 mm
Bredde
163 mm
Aldersnivå
P, 06
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Innbundet
Antall sider
187

Forfatter

Biographical note

Ralph Hanna is Professor of Palaeography (Emeritus) and Emeritus Fellow at Keble College, Oxford. He is a former Guggenheim Fellow, former Fellow of the Radcliffe Institute (Harvard University), and winner of the British Academy Sir Israel Gollancz Prize for English Language 2015. His many books with Liverpool University Press include Robert Holcot, exegete (2021), Malachy the Irishman, On Poison (2020), Richard Rolle: Unprinted Latin Writings (2019) and Editing Medieval Texts (2015).