Università Roma Tre

The theme of exile in medieval English and German literary texts.

The aim of the course is to investigate how medieval authors represented and reflected upon the theme of exile. Literary texts belonging to different genres (elegies, heroic poems, hagiographical texts, romances) will be analyzed from a historical, literary and philological perspective. Special attention will be given to the identification of sources and of the recurring motifs in descriptions of seclusion and isolation and to intertextual relations. Students will be given the opportunity to learn the main stages of the development of English and German.

Seminars, with students’ presentations of individual researches, will be held. Visits to historical libraries will be planned.

- C. Barber, The English Language: a Historical Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1993.
- P. von Polenz, Geschichte der deutschen Sprache, Berlin-New York: Walter de Gruyter 1978.
- A. M. Luiselli Fadda, Tradizioni manoscritte e critica del testo nel medioevo germanico, Roma-Bari: Laterza 2004 (Parte II).
A selection of chapters from:
- D. Wallace, The Cambridge History of Medieval English Literature, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press 2002.
- D. Kartschoke, Geschichte der deutschen Literatur im hohen Mittelalter, DTV, München 1990.


Further material will be given at the beginning of the course.

Students are advised to attend classes. Those who cannot attend them are requested to contact the teacher at the beginning of the course.