Date/Time
Date(s) - 1 Dec 2014
5:30 PM - 5:30 PM
Location
Columbia University Faculty House
Category(ies) No Categories
The Seminar on Medieval Studies presents:
Jonathan Morton (Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of French and Romance Philology, Columbia)
“False gods, idolatrous desire, and the nature of art in the Roman de la rose”
December 1, 2014, 5:30PM Faculty House
In the thirteenth-century allegorical poem, artifice, misrecognition and, misinterpretation are constant themes, from Narcissus and his fountain to Pygmalion’s desire for his own sculpted creation. In a text that is itself an artificial creation used to think about nature, the importance of idols and idolatry is a key to understanding the Rose’s treatment of love, literature, and ethics. By reading the poem against Scriptural, philosophical, and theological authorities and, most importantly, by reading sections of the poem against each other, this paper will offer an account of the vexed relationship in the Roman de la rose between the artistic and the natural as emblematized by the adored idol.
All the meetings will begin at 5:30 pm in Faculty House, Columbia University. To reserve a place for dinner at 7 pm (also in Faculty House, buffet at a fixed price of $25), write no less than a week in advance to the rapporteur, Jeffrey Wayno, [email protected]
Additionally, please remember that the full schedule for the seminar, complete with occasional updates, can be found online at:
http://universityseminars.columbia.edu/seminars/medieval-studies/