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Visual Translation in Fifteenth-Century English Manuscripts

Richard K. Emmerson

in Medieval Poetics and Social Practice: Responding to the Work of Penn R. Szittya

This essay suggests that a painting or illustration is an appropriate and important place from which to begin speaking about poetics and narrative; that indeed, so many visual or otherwise nonverbal ... More

This essay suggests that a painting or illustration is an appropriate and important place from which to begin speaking about poetics and narrative; that indeed, so many visual or otherwise nonverbal elements of a culture can be the right place from which to start speaking of textuality. As Emmerson puts it, the manuscript image “visually translates” its accompanying text, and this creative and interpretive activity must form part of our understanding of the creation and reception of late-medieval texts. Reading an illustrated fifteenth-century Pilgrimage of the Soul manuscript (an English translation of Guillaume de Deguileville's French original), Emmerson shows how illustration can foreground a text's most important themes by anticipating, delaying, manipulating, and otherwise energetically interacting with the textual narrative.Less

The Matter of Form: Fin-de-Siècle Illustrated Poetry and the Periodical Press

Alison Chapman

in The Edinburgh Companion to Fin de Siècle Literature, Culture and the Arts

This chapter examines the innovative use of print and illustration in the publishing of poetry in late nineteenth-century magazines. It shows how print and illustration were used to build a coherence ... More

This chapter examines the innovative use of print and illustration in the publishing of poetry in late nineteenth-century magazines. It shows how print and illustration were used to build a coherence or unity of the graphic arts, which in turn helped mark out a distinctive audience for such poetry. It explains the ways in which 1890s poetry was contingent on its graphic treatment in its print context, highlighting the richness of the decorative poetics of this period.Less

Photography

David Seed, Stephen C. Kenny, and Chris Williams (eds)

in Life and Limb: Perspectives on the American Civil War

Most of this section consists of ‘Painful Looks: Reading Civil War Photographs’ by Mick Gidley, who examines the rise of photographs as a medical record of the Civil War and one which increasingly ... More

Most of this section consists of ‘Painful Looks: Reading Civil War Photographs’ by Mick Gidley, who examines the rise of photographs as a medical record of the Civil War and one which increasingly confronted the public with its carnage. The essay is supplemented with a contemporary account of Mathew Brady’s photographs which impressed with their ‘terrible distinctness.’ These pieces are juxtaposed to a section of contemporary photographs taken from the National Museum of Health and medicine, the Library of Congress and other sources.Less

“Scarcely a Brick to Be Seen”: Breaking Boundaries in “Kew Gardens” and “The Mark on the Wall”

Karina Jakubowicz

in Virginia Woolf and the World of Books

This chapter focuses on two of Woolf's short stories, how their narrative style is mirrored in their binding and the physical presentation of the text as both stories focus on visual image.

Middle-Class Audiences, Literary Weeklies and the Inaugural Poem: Household Words, All the Year Round and Once a Week

Caley Ehnes

in Victorian Poetry and the Poetics of the Literary Periodical

Focusing on the poetry published in the inaugural issues of Household Words, All the Year Round and Once a Week, this chapter considers how reading poetry across periodical titles raises fruitful ... More

Focusing on the poetry published in the inaugural issues of Household Words, All the Year Round and Once a Week, this chapter considers how reading poetry across periodical titles raises fruitful questions about the nature of periodical poetry and its role in the press, establishing the principles and terminology that will guide the analysis of periodical poetry in the following chapters. The first two sections of the chapter focus on the concept of the inaugural poem, using the poetry of Charles Dickens’s Household Words as a case study. The latter half of the chapter examines the use of inaugural poetry in the periodicals that grew out of and in opposition to Household Words, which ceased publication in 1859 due to Dickens’s feud with his publishers Bradbury and Evans. In particular, the chapter traces how Dickens used poetry to establish continuity between Household Words and All the Year Round while the proprietors of Once a Week (Bradbury and Evans) distinguished their weekly from Dickens’s through illustrated poetry. This close examination of the era’s competing weeklies ultimately demonstrates the importance of poetry to the development of a periodical’s brand identity.Less

Devotional Reading and Popular Poetry in Good Words

Caley Ehnes

in Victorian Poetry and the Poetics of the Literary Periodical

Focusing on Good Words as a representative example of the religious literary periodical, this chapter argues that the debut of Good Words in 1860 marks the rise of a different kind of religious ... More

Focusing on Good Words as a representative example of the religious literary periodical, this chapter argues that the debut of Good Words in 1860 marks the rise of a different kind of religious periodical based on the literary models provided by the weeklies and monthlies discussed in the previous chapters. In particular, it considers how the devotional poetry published in Good Words promoted devotional reading practices, setting the periodical apart from its direct competitors, All the Year Round and the Cornhill. The first half of the chapter focuses on the form of the periodical’s devotional poetry, including a discussion of parables and hymns. The second half discusses how the periodical’s illustrations contribute to the self-reflexive, affective, and often devotional nature of the monthly’s poetry, creating a space for Christian contemplation within the busy pages of the periodical press.Less