I began my PhD trajectory at the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto in September 2007. I expect to start writing my dissertation in the summer of 2009. What follows is my major field proposal as submitted in September 2008.
The annual cycle and its seasons are concepts with which every European culture interacts. Their precise modes of deployment, however, depend more immediately on specific cultural and environmental concepts. Such factors as temporal taxonomies, local climate, and social reality give shape to the functions fulfilled by literary references to the various times of year. With this in mind, it is my intention to examine the literary uses of the seasons in the culturally-distinctive locale of northwestern Europe in the Middle Ages.
It has been observed that Old English poetry makes frequent reference to winter and its characteristics, but that the warmer seasons are rarely mentioned (e.g. Anderson, “The Seasons of the Year in Old English” 237–8; “The Seasons of the Year” 226; Neville, “The Seasons in Old English Poetry” 37). Such usage departs sharply from the Latin poetic tradition with its trope of the locus amoenus. It also finds few resonances in Celtic and Middle English literature, in which winter descriptions are not unknown but motifs of spring and summer are considerably more numerous (Pearsall and Salter 41–4, 33–6; Alamichel 55–60; Dubois 17–18). The Old Norse corpus is, on the whole, little interested in overt references to the passing of the seasons. On the other hand, it points to ritual and mythological traditions that, like Old English poetry, take a strong interest in winter. In early Scandinavian literature, then, this season is primarily associated with the supernatural. Indeed, a similar connection between winter and ritual may be argued to have had at least a modest presence in the religious culture of Western Christendom as a whole. These observations call for a closer study of seasonal imagery in all these traditions, with attention to differences in usage between genres as well as cultures.
A study of the seasons in the various medieval traditions of northwestern Europe will yield insight into seasonal motifs employed in that region and age. In so doing, it will not only illuminate the literary functions of nature imagery, but also cast light on the authors’ attitudes towards seasonal extremes. These extremes represent the test of a culture’s compatibility with the climate it inhabits, and the literary responses they evoke should be regarded in the light of this function. Differences in seasonal preoccupation between the various traditions may point not only to purely literary fashions but also to climate-related social concerns.
In my dissertation, I intend to study Anglo-Saxon and early Scandinavian literary responses to winter, which in this locality represented the most critical climatic threshold for a culture’s sustainability. The major field is intended as a broader study of seasonal imagery, from which the dissertation will gain the benefit of being informed by the full range of seasonal themes, while retaining focus by excluding non-seasonal nature imagery.
The major field will include a number of related literary traditions, but the primary emphasis will be on the Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian material. While a systematic analysis of winter references in the Old English corpus will be conducted at a later stage, the major field will focus instead on a number of texts and traditions representative of the depiction of season, including the elegies, the calendar poems, The Phoenix, and several computistical treatises. Similar genres in Anglo-Latin literature will likewise be included, as well as a few foreign models, thereby to understand Anglo-Saxon calendar traditions in their wider context.
A number of relevant Old Norse texts will be studied for their representations of the seasons. In view of the apparently genetic relationship between the Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse divisions of the year as observed in pre-Christian times (see Anderson, “The Seasons of the Year in Old English”), the computistic literature of medieval Iceland lends itself particularly well for comparison with the Anglo-Saxon material. In addition, both the Eddas and the legendary sources on the ancestors of the earls of Orkney will be included in view of their implications for seasonal mythology. Season-related ritual and folktale themes may furthermore be found in Eyrbyggja saga, while the sagas on the settlement of Greenland provide a medieval perspective on this most climate-threatened of Scandinavian colonies.
Middle English seasonal traditions will be studied primarily as material for comparison with the Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian literature that has my primary focus. As such, they will be represented in the first place by a selection of secondary rather than primary literature. A collection of lyrics (eds. Luria and Hoffman) will be read for their frequent reference to the seasons, and a longer text, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, will similarly be included for its much-discussed seasonal aspect. This selection reflects not only the works’ participation in seasonal themes but also the emphasis of the available scholarship on season in Middle English literature.
A study of the seasonal imagery of northwestern Europe would not be complete without a discussion of Celtic literature, which provides approaches to season not found elsewhere in the British Isles until the Middle English period (Jackson 150–5). Within this language family, Old Irish and Middle Welsh nature poetry is particularly pertinent to my topic. I will therefore read the seasonal poems in the collections by Jackson, Meyer, and Murphy. Since I will be unable to attain a reading knowledge of the Celtic languages within the intended timeframe, I will rely on the English translations provided in these editions. My primary readings in the various corpora of the major field will be accompanied by a wide selection of secondary literature focussing on seasonal themes.
Although the major field will have a distinct literary focus, it will benefit from the consultation of a select number of studies from other disciplines interested in climate and season. For the purpose of seasonal definition, which varied considerably between cultures, both primary and secondary works on the Latin and vernacular computistical traditions will be included, such as the computi of Isidore of Seville, Bede, and Ælfric, the Icelandic Rím treatises, and scholarly discussions of these traditions. To obtain a more accurate understanding of the medieval experience of the natural cycle, a number of studies from the field of climate history will also be consulted. Finally, folkloristics may provide insight into the ritual dimension of the various calendar traditions.
With the proposed major field and subsequent dissertation, I intend to contribute to the study of medieval literature an improved understanding of nature imagery. By approaching seasonal motifs in a context of climate-related social concerns, I will partake of an interdisciplinary paradigm that understands literature in its social and physical context while stopping short of climate determinism. In addition, I hope to provide evidence regarding medieval attitudes towards climatic extremes, which will help illuminate interactions between medieval societies and their environments.
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