Emotional Alterity in the Medieval North Sea World (Palgrave Studies in the History of Emotions)

This book addresses a little-considered aspect of the study of the history of emotions in medieval literature: the depiction of perplexing emotional reactions. Medieval literature often confronts audiences with displays of emotion that are improbable, physiologically impossible, or simply unfathomable in modern social contexts. The intent of such episodes is not always clear; medieval texts rarely explain emotional responses or their motivations. The implication is that the meanings communicated by such emotional display were so obvious to their intended audience that no explanation was required. This raises the question of whether such meanings can be recovered. This is the task to which the contributors to this book have put themselves. In approaching this question, this book does not set out to be a collection of literary studies that treat portrayals of emotion as simple tropes or motifs, isolated within their corpora. Rather, it seeks to uncover how such manifestations of feeling may reflect cultural and social dynamics underlying vernacular literatures from across the medieval North Sea world. Contents 6 Notes on Contributors 8 Chapter 1: Emotional Alterity in the Medieval Northern Sea World 10 What Is Emotion? 15 The Chapters 18 Conclusion 23 Bibliography 24 Primary Sources 24 Secondary Sources 24 Chapter 2: Grotesque Emotions in Old Norse Literature: Swelling Bodies, Spurting Fluids, Tears of Hail 26 The Body as a Container for Emotions 28 A Pectoral Model of the Mind 34 Tears of Hail 40 Un-sealed Emotive Bodies 43 Bibliography 45 Manuscripts 45 Primary Sources 46 Secondary Sources 48 Chapter 3: “Þá fær Þorbirni svá mjǫk at hann grætr”: Emotionality in the Sagas of East Iceland 52 The Austfirðingasögur and Their Textual Relations 55 Psychonarration and Character Comment 58 Emotion and Bodies 61 Women and Emotion 63 Grief 68 Emotion and Empathy in Hrafnkels saga Freysgoða 70 Bibliography 74 Manuscripts 74 Primary Sources 74 Secondary Sources 74 Chapter 4: On the Wild Side: “Impossible” Emotions in Medieval German Literature 77 Thomasin von Zerklaere: Der Welsche Gast 82 Der Bussard 85 Konrad von Würzburg: Engelhard 88 Die Nibelungenklage 93 Conclusion 97 Bibliography 98 Primary Sources 98 Secondary Sources 98 Chapter 5: “In an Overfurious Mood”: Emotion in Medieval Frisian Law and Life 103 Joy 106 Sadness 107 Fear 115 Anger 121 Conclusion 127 Bibliography 127 Primary Sources 127 Secondary Sources 128 Chapter 6: The Vasa Mortis and Misery in Solomon and Saturn II 133 Introducing the Monster 134 Boethian Sorrow 140 Following Nature 142 Fate Versus Choice 146 Habits of Mind 150 Conclusion 154 Bibliography 155 Manuscript 155 Primary Sources 155 Secondary Sources 156 Chapter 7: De Profundis: Sadness and Healing 158 Emotion and Sin 160 The Two Types of Sadness 161 Talking About It 164 Canst Thou Not Minister to a Mind Diseased? 169 Conclusion 174 Bibliography 174 Primary Sources 174 Secondary Sources 175 Chapter 8: The Hagiographers of Early England and the Impossible Humility of the Saints 178 Is Humility an Emotion? 179 Early Hagiography in England: Cuthbert of Lindisfarne and Wilfrid of Ripon 181 Humility in Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum 188 Tenth-Century Humility 193 Humility in the Hagiography of Goscelin of Saint-Bertin 194 “Heading for the Stars in a Four-Horse Chariot”: Humility in Goscelin’s Liber Confortatorius 199 Bibliography 205 Primary Sources 205 Secondary Sources 206 Chapter 9: Rage and Lust in the Afterlives of King Edgar the Peaceful 208 The Historical Edgar 213 King Edgar and William of Malmesbury 215 Anger and Socially Constructed Emotion 220 Lust and the Principal Vices 225 Conclusion 232 Bibliography 233 Primary Sources 233 Secondary Sources 234 Chapter 10: ‘Shrink Not Appalled from My Great Sorrow’: Translating Emotion in the Celtic Revival 238 “So Red And So Pale”: Killing and Grieving Fer Diad 246 “Howl, If You Will”: A New Death Tale for Deirdre 253 “Weary of War and the World’s Tears”: A Pacifist’s Táin 260 “No Place of Rest”: Outlasting Lamentation 266 “A Romantic and Sentimental Ending”: Afterlives of ‘Translated’ Emotion 270 Bibliography 277 Manuscripts 277 Primary Sources 277 Secondary Sources 279 Index 286