Eschatological Subjects

"Eschatological Subjects: Divine and Literary Judgment in Fourteenth-Century French Poetry takes an innovative approach to medieval eschatology by examining how poets cast themselves in the scene of judgment as defendants summoned to answer to the Almighty for the sins of their writing. Since medieval Europeans lived in perpetual anxiety of divine judgment, constantly surrounded by reminders in art and literature, author J.M. Moreau shows that this is a natural extension of medieval life. But Eschatological Subjects goes even further to demonstrate the largely unrecognized duality of this judge figure: not just God, the judge is also the imperious and imperfect human reader. The simultaneous divine and human judgments in (and of) French poetry reveal much about the ethical stakes of writing vernacular poetry in the later Middle Ages and, most importantly, about the relationships between authors and audiences. Focusing on Guillaume de Deguileville, Guillaume de Machaut, and Jean Froissart (each of whom composed scenes in which they appear on trial before God), Moreau contributes important new insights on the complex "trial process" of later medieval literature, in which poetic authority and fame depended on the poet's ability to defend himself before a fearful court of reader opinion."-- "John Moreau explores how late medieval French poets used the idea of the last judgment to frame their own literary production and its reception among readers. Focusing on works by Deguileville, Machaut, and Froissart, Moreau argues that their use of the divine judgment theme to discuss authorial concerns betrays their anxiety about both their responsibility for what they write and for how their work will be received and consequently judged. The result of this study is a much more dynamic view of the medieval conception of the author role"--