Food and Feast in Premodern Outlaw Tales

In __Food and Feast in Premodern Outlaw Tales__ editors Melissa Ridley Elmes and Kristin Bovaird-Abbo gather eleven original studies examining scenes of food and feasting in premodern outlaw texts ranging from the tenth through the seventeenth centuries and forward to their cinematic adaptations. Along with fresh insights into the popular Robin Hood legend, these essays investigate the intersections of outlawry, food studies, and feasting in Old English, Middle English, and French outlaw narratives, Anglo-Scottish border ballads, early modern ballads and dramatic works, and cinematic medievalism. The range of critical and disciplinary approaches employed, including history, literary studies, cultural studies, food studies, gender studies, and film studies, highlights the inherently interdisciplinary nature of outlaw narratives. The overall volume offers an example of the ways in which examining a subject through interdisciplinary, cross-geographic and cross-temporal lenses can yield fresh insights; places canonic and well-known works in conversation with lesser-known texts to showcase the dynamic nature and cultural influence and impact of premodern outlaw tales; and presents an introductory foray into the intersection of literary and food studies in premodern contexts which will be of value and interest to specialists and a general audience, alike. This volume collects eleven essays together with a contextualizing introduction examining the relationship between outlaws, food, and feasting in the literature and culture of the premodern British Isles and France, c. 10th-17th centuries. Cover 1 Half Title 2 Series Page 3 Title Page 4 Copyright Page 5 Contents 6 List of Contributors 8 Acknowledgments 12 1. Introduction 14 2. Grendel’s Eucharist: An Outlaw’s Last Supper 26 3. Food, Feasts, and Temperance: The Social Contracts of “Mete and Drink” in The Tale of Gamelyn 43 4. Bread Without Onions: Winning the Crusades through French Cuisine in Honorat Bovet’s 1398 Apparicion Maistre Jehan de Meun [Apparition of Master Jean de Meun] 68 5. Of Courtesy and Community: Food and Feasting in A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode 88 6. The Preparation and Consumption of Food as Signifiers of Class and Gender Identity in Selected Premodern Texts and Examples of the Robin Hood Cinematic Canon 106 7. “So Shall We Take Our Dinner Sweet”: When the Greenwood Consumes the Outlaw 140 8. Robin Hood’s Poached Feasting in Context: Poor Knights, Disguised Kings, and Romance Parody in A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode 159 9. The Poached Feast and the Kingly Blow: The Question of Courtesy in Late Medieval King and Commoner Narratives 182 10. Acting Out(Law): Feasts, Outlawry, and Identity Constructions in Two Shakespearean Comedies 212 11. Early Modern Fishing Practices and Seafood Culture in Robin Hood’s Fishing 235 12. “Bread With Danger Purchased”: Hunger, Plenty, and the Outlaw on the Early Modern Stage 258 Index 276 Mete,and,Drink;,Bread,Without,Onions;,Honorat,Bovet;,Poached,Feast;,Seafood;,Fishing,Practices Mete and Drink,Bread Without Onions,Honorat Bovet,Poached Feast,Seafood,Fishing Practices "In Food and Feast in Premodern Outlaw Tales editors Melissa Ridley Elmes and Kristin Bovaird-Abbo gather eleven original studies examining scenes of food and feasting in premodern outlaw texts ranging from the tenth through the seventeenth centuries and forward to their cinematic adaptations. Along with fresh insights into the popular Robin Hood legend, these essays investigate the intersections of outlawry, food studies, and feasting in Old English, Middle English, and French outlaw narratives, Anglo-Scottish border ballads, early modern ballads and dramatic works, and cinematic medievalism. The range of critical and disciplinary approaches employed, including history, literary studies, cultural studies, food studies, gender studies, and film studies, highlights the inherently interdisciplinary nature of outlaw narratives. The overall volume offers an example of the ways in which examining a subject through interdisciplinary, cross-geographic and cross-temporal lenses can yield fresh insights; places canonic and well-known works in conversation with lesser-known texts to showcase the dynamic nature and cultural influence and impact of premodern outlaw tales; and presents an introductory foray into the intersection of literary and food studies in premodern contexts which will be of value and interest to specialists and a general audience, alike"-- Provided by publisher